Chapter 11: Islamic Civilization
Section 1: A New Faith

Lives of the Bedouin
• In ancient times many of the Arabs were bedouin.
• The bedouin lived in tribes, each made up of related families.
• Leading each tribe was a sheikh, or chief, appointed by the heads of the families.
• A council of elders advised the sheikh, who ruled as long as he had the tribe’s consent.
• Warfare was part of bedouin life.
• To protect their honor and their possessions, the bedouin believed in retaliation:
“an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.”
Growth of Towns
• A.D. 500s, Arab tribes had settled around oases or in fertile valleys to pursue either farming or trade.
• The most important was Makkah, a crossroads of commerce about 50 miles inland from the Red Sea.
• Arabs also visited Makkah to worship at the peninsula’s holiest shrine, the Kaaba, which contained statues of the many Arab deities.
Signs of Change
• Most Arabs rejected Judaism and Christianity, however, preferring to find a uniquely Arab form of monotheism.
• This led to the emergence of the religion known as Islam, which means “submission to the will of Allah (God).”
Life of Muhammad
• Muhammad worked as a caravan leader on a trade route.
• Muhammad was about 25 years old, he accepted a marriage proposal from his employer, a wealthy widow of 40 named Khadija.
• As he reflected on life, the greed of Makkah’s wealthy citizens, the worship of idols, and the mistreatment of the poor troubled Muhammad.
Revelation
• A.D. 610, Muhammad experienced a revelation, or vision.
• He heard a voice calling him to be the apostle of the one true deity–Allah, the Arabic word for God.
• A second revelation commanded Muhammad to “rise and warn” the people about divine judgment.
• A.D. 613 Muhammad began sharing his revelations
• He preached to the people of Makkah that there was only one God, and that God measured the worth of people by their devotion and good deeds.
• Khadija and members of Muhammad’s family became the first Muslims, or followers of Islam. Many other converts came from Makkah’s poor.
Opposition to Islam
• Merchants feared that monotheistic worship would end the pilgrimages to Makkah and ruin the city’s economy.
• Driven by these fears, the merchants persecuted Muhammad and the Muslims.
• Threats against his life forced Muhammad to go to Yathrib, a small town north of Makkah.
• Muhammad’s departure to Yathrib is known in Muslim history as the Hijrah, or emigration.
• A.D. 622, marks the beginning of the Islamic era and is recognized as the first year of the Muslim calendar.
Origin of the Islamic State
• In the Madinah Compact of A.D. 624, Muhammad laid the foundation of an Islamic state.
• All areas of life were placed under the divine law given to Muhammad and recorded in the Quran, the holy scriptures of Islam.
Acceptance of Islam
• The Makkans invaded Yathrib but were defeated by the Muslims who, as a result, won the support of many Arab groups outside Madinah.
• The Makkans then accepted Islam and acknowledged Muhammad as God’s prophet.
• Makkah became the spiritual capital of Islam, and Madinah remained its political capital.
• By A.D. 631, the Muslim state included the entire Arabian Peninsula
• After a brief illness, Muhammad died at Madinah in A.D. 632.
• He left behind two major achievements:
1. the formation of a religious community based on carefully preserved sacred writings;
2. the example of his life as an interpretive guide for Muslims to follow.
The Quran
• According to Muslim tradition, the angel Gabriel revealed divine messages to Muhammad over a 22-year period. Faithful Muslims wrote down or memorized these messages.
• Muhammad’s successor, Abu Bakr, to compile them into the Quran, whose name means “recital.”
Values
• Muslims are commanded to honor their parents, show kindness to their neighbors, protect orphans and widows, and give generously to the poor.
• The Quran lays down specific rules to guide Muslims in their daily activities with respect to eating, family life, and business practices.
Law
• Law cannot be separated from religion in Islamic society.
• Islam has no ranked order but generations of legal scholars have organized it into a body of law known as the shari’ah.
• Based on the Quran and the Hadith, or sayings of Muhammad, the shari’ah covers all aspects of Muslim private and public life.
Five Pillars of Islam
• The Quran presents the Five Pillars of Islam, or the five essential duties that all Muslims are to fulfill.
• These duties are the confession of faith, prayer, almsgiving, fasting, and the pilgrimage to Makkah.
Faith
• The first pillar is the confession of faith: “There is no god but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God.”
• Devout Muslims see their lives as a preparation for the Day of Judgement, when people will rise from death and be judged according to their actions.
1. Prayer
• The second pillar of Islam is prayer.
• Muslims express their devotion in prayers offered five times each day–sunrise, noon, afternoon, sunset, and evening.
• Worshipers pray while facing Makkah.
• At noon on Fridays, many Muslims pray together in a mosque.
• An imam, or prayer leader, guides in prayer, and a sermon sometimes follows.
2. Alms
• The third pillar of Islam is the giving of alms, or charity, and reflects the Islamic view that the wealthy should assist the poor and weak.
• Almsgiving is practiced privately through contributions to the needy and publicly through a state tax that supports schools and aids the poor.
3. Fasting
• The fourth pillar of Islam, fasting, occurs in the month of Ramadan, the ninth month in the Muslim calendar.
• During Ramadan, Muhammad received the first revelation. From sunrise to sunset Muslims neither eat nor drink, although they work as usual.
4. Pilgrimage
• The fifth pillar of Islam is the annual pilgrimage, or hajj, to Makkah.
• Every able-bodied Muslim who can afford the trip is expected to make the pilgrimage at least once in his or her lifetime.
• The hajj takes place two months and ten days after the Ramadan fast and involves three days of ceremony, prayer, and sacrifice.

Question: In what ways was Islam a unique religion? In what ways was it similar to other religions that were also founded in this region–Judaism and Christianity?
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Section 2: Spread of Islam
“The Rightly Guided Caliphs”
• The first caliph was Muhammad’s father-in-law and close friend, Abu Bakr. The last, his son-in-law Ali, was married to Muhammad’s daughter Fatimah.
• Muslims have called them “the Rightly Guided Caliphs” because the first four caliphs followed Muhammad’s example.
Early Conquests
• The Rightly Guided Caliphs sought to protect and spread Islam.
• Arab armies swept forth against the weakened Byzantine and Persian Empires, and by A.D. 650, the Arabs had acquired Palestine, Syria, Iraq, Persia, and Egypt.
Success came because…

1. they were united in the belief that they had a religious duty to spread Islam.
2. they saw the conquests as a jihad, or holy struggle to bring Islam to other lands.
3. the Byzantines and the Persians were weakened from continual warfare.
4. members of unofficial religions in both empires readily accepted Muslim rule.
Divisions Within Islam
• While Muslim armies were achieving military success, rival groups fought for the caliphate, or the office of caliph.
• When Ali became the fourth caliph in A.D. 656, one of Ali’s powerful rivals, Mu’awiyah, carried out conquests in Egypt and Iraq, steadily weakening Ali’s hold on the caliphate.
• A.D. 661 Ali was murdered, and Mu’awiyah became the first caliph of the powerful Umayyad dynasty.
• In A.D. 680 Ali’s son Husayn and many of his followers, were massacred by Umayyad troops in a battle at Karbala in present-day Iraq.
• The majority of Muslims, known as the Sunni, or “followers of the way,” believed that the caliph was primarily a leader, not a religious authority.
• The Shiite, the smaller group of Muslims who followed Ali and Husayn, believed that only descendants of Muhammad should hold the caliphate.
• Today, about 90 percent of Muslims are Sunnis; Shiites, the minority, live primarily in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon.
• Other Muslims developed a mystical form of Islam known as Sufism, which sought direct contact with God through prayer, meditation, fasting, and spiritual writing.
Umayyad Conquests
• A.D. 716, the Muslims ruled almost all of Spain, and they advanced halfway into France. Charles Martel stopped them at the Battle of Tours in A.D. 732.
• The Umayyad caliphs built a powerful Islamic state that stressed the political, rather than the religious, aspect of their office.
• To help unite the lands the Umayyads made Arabic the official language, minted the first Arabic currency, built roads, and established postal routes.
Opposition to Umayyad Rule
Umayyad rule caused dissatisfaction among non-Arab Muslims who paid higher taxes, received lower wages in the army and government, and were discriminated against socially.
The Abbasids
• In the year A.D. 747, the anti-Umayyad Arabs and the non-Arab Muslims in Iraq and Persia joined forces, built an army, and, in three years of fighting, overwhelmed the Umayyads.
• The new caliph, Abu’l-’Abbas, established the Abbasid dynasty.
• His successor, al-Mansur, had the city of Baghdad built on the banks of the Tigris River. By the A.D. 900s, about 1.5 million people lived in Baghdad.
• The city was shaped like a circle and surrounded by walls. At Baghdad’s heart stood the great mosque and the caliph’s magnificent palace.
Abbasid Diversity
• The Abbasids–seeking equality among all Muslims, Arab and non-Arab–set up a new ruling group that included Muslims of many nationalities.
• Persians became the dominant group in the government, and the Turks became the leading group in the army.
Breakup of the Islamic State
• The Abbasids ruled the Islamic state from A.D. 750 to A.D. 1258.
• In central Asia, during the A.D. 800s, Persian Muslims set up the Samanid dynasty in the city of Bukhara.
• One of the last Umayyad princes fled to Spain and continued Umayyad rule there.
• The Egyptian dynasty, the Fatimids, gained control over areas in North Africa and the Middle East, rivaling Baghdad for power.
• By the A.D. 1000s, the Abbasids ruled little more than the area around Baghdad.
• During the next 200 years, Baghdad and its Abbasid rulers came under the control of the Seljuk Turks and later, the Mongols.

Question: What were the strengths and weaknesses of Umayyad rule?
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Section 3: Daily Life and Culture
Role of Women & Men
• the Quran told Muslims that “men are responsible for women.”
• A woman’s social position defined by her relationship as wife, mother, daughter, or sister to the male members of her family.
• Islam forbade the tribal custom of killing female infants and also limited polygamy, the practice that allowed a man to have more than one wife.
• A woman had complete control over her own property, could inherit property from her father, and could remarry.
• In addition to politics and the army, Muslim men worked at a variety of businesses or farmed.
• When Muslim boys reached age seven, they entered mosque schools, which were inexpensive and were open to all boys.
• Some young men continued their studies at madrasas, or theological schools.
Urban Centers
• City homes were designed to provide maximum privacy and to keep the occupants cool in the blazing heat.
• Graceful mosques and their slender minarets, dominated the skyline.
• Mosques usually included a prayer hall where worshipers gathered on Fridays.
Trade and the Bazaar
• Muslim merchants dominated trade throughout the Middle East and North Africa until the A.D. 1400s.
• Muslim traders crossed the Indian Ocean gathering cargoes of rubies from India, silk from China, and spices from Southeast Asia.
• Gold, ivory, and enslaved people were brought from Africa, Asia, and Europe, and from the Islamic world came spices, textiles, glass, and carpets.
• The destination of most goods was the city bazaar.
Rural Areas
• Because of the dry climate and the scarcity of water, growing food was difficult in many areas of the Islamic state.
• Farmers made efficient use of the few arable areas–producing good yields by irrigating their fields, rotating crops, and fertilizing the land.
• Most productive land was held by large landowners who were subsidized by the government.
Islamic Achievements
• Between the A.D. 800s and A.D. 1300s, Islamic scientists made important contributions in several scientific areas, such as mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, and medicine.
• They based their work on two main intellectual traditions–those of Greece and India.
The House of Wisdom
• During the A.D. 800s, Baghdad became a leading intellectual center.
• According to Muslim tradition, the Abbasid caliph Ma’mun founded the House of Wisdom at Baghdad in A.D. 830.
Mathematics
• Muslim mathematicians adopted Arabic numerals and used them in a place-value system,
• Created algebra, trigonometry.
Astronomy and Geography
• Muslim astronomers improved on a Greek device called the astrolabe, with which they determined the positions of stars, the movements of planets, and the time.
• By the A.D. 1100s, Muslim geographers had determined the basic outlines of Asia, Europe, and North Africa, producing the first accurate maps of the Eastern Hemisphere.
Chemistry and Medicine
• Muslims developed alchemy, chemistry that attempted to change lead into gold.
• al-Razi, who lived from A.D. 865 to A.D. 925, classified chemical substances as animal, mineral, or vegetable.
• A.D. 900s Ibn Sina produced the Canon of Medicine.
• Muslim physicians founded the science of optics, or the study of light and its effect on sight.
• Ibn al-Haytham, the founder of optics
Art and Architecture
• Artists used calligraphy
• Often they used arabesques–calligraphy accompanied by geometric designs entwined with plant stems, leaves, flowers, and stars–to decorate books, carpets, swords, and entire walls.
Literature
• Until the A.D. 600s, Arabic literature mostly consisted of poetry passed orally through generations.
• During the A.D. 700s, famous writings was Kalila and Dimna, a collection of animal fables that presented moral lessons.
• One of the best known works of this period is the Rubaiyat by Omar Khayyám, a Persian mathematician and poet. Another famous work is A Thousand and One Nights, also known as The Arabian Nights.
Philosophy and History
• Muslim philosophers tried to reconcile the Quran with Greek philosophy.
• Ibn Sina, known in Europe as Avicenna, wrote numerous books on logic and theology as well as medicine.
• Ibn-Rushd, a judge in Córdoba, was the most noted Islamic philosopher.

Question: What examples of cultural diffusion in the Islamic state can you find in these areas: (a) art, (b) mathematics, (c) commerce, and (d) literature?
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