The Birth of Islam and the Sunni-Shia Division Flashcards
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Q
Mecca
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- Economic and spiritual center even in the pre-Islamic era.
- Home to the Ka’ba(the cube) that was a place for idols and images. Every year believers from the region made a pilgrimage to Mecca to worship their idols. (even status of Jesus and the vrign Mary could be found in the Ka’ab)
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Q
The prophet Muhammad
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- Born around the year 570
- Member of the Quraysh tribe of Meca and more specifically of the hashimite clan.
- By the age of six his parents died and his grandfather who took care of him died two years later.
- Muhammad was raised by his uncle, Abu Talib, who was a merchant.
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Q
Muhammad and monotheism
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- Muhammad’s family was a merchants’ family. It used to travel to Syria, which had a large Christian community.
- Muahammad’s cousin, Waraqa, was a member of the Abrahamic cult which rejected paganism. Waraqa later converted to Christianity.
- Muhammad is described as a gentl, kind and sensitive person.
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Q
Muhammad’s Mission
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- Muhammad began preaching and recruiting around 610 CE after the Angel Gabriel appeared before him on Mount Hira in a cave to which Muhammad used to escape from his daily life as a merchant, and in which he contemplated about life.
- Muhammad preached for believing in one God, the equality of all human beings and empathy for the poor.
- In 622 Muhammad was forced to leave Mecca to Yathrib (also knwon as Medina) (Hijra-emigration)
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Q
Muhammad’s mission 2
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- Medinian converts (Ansar) and Meccan immigrants (Muhajirun) followed Muhammad’s preaching.
- 624 and 625 Battles of Badr and Uhud agaisnt Meccan forces.
- Muhammad isolated Mecca by enlisting the support of ribes around the city that had converted to Islam.
- 629 Muhammad defeated the Jews living in Khaybar, 150km north of Medina.
- January 630 The conquest of Mecca-most Meccans converted to Islam.
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Q
The Spread of Islam
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- VIolence and diplomacy
- In many cases pagans were forced to convert or face the sword. Jews and Christians (people of the books) could keep their fatih but were considered second class citizens that had to pay a special tax.
- IN 435 the Christian Emperor Theodosius II of Byzantine ordered the destruction of pagan shrines and the purification of those pagan sites by using a cross. Pagans who resisted were executed.
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Q
The Spread of Islam 2
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- However, some parts of the emerging Muslim empire did not convert immediately. Sometimes, the process took 200 years.
- The Muslim conquerers did not always force conversion, but rather tried to peacefully allure the inhabitants to convert by exempting converters from taxes and giving them access to the governmental mechanism (work).
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Q
The Inheritance of Muhammad
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- The Muslim state under Muhammad controlled most of the Arabian peninsula and made treaties with different tribes, as well as with Yemen, which was under Persian Rule.
- While Ali, the cousin of Muhammad, and his wife Fatima, the daughter of Muhammad, were attending the washing of Muhammad’s body for burial, Abu Bakr, Muhammad’s father in law and member of the Banu tamim clan of the Quraysh tribe, was elected by an ad-hoc council as Muhammad’s successor.
- Shiites claim that before his death Muhammad declared Ali to be his successor.
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Q
The inheritance of Muhammad 2
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- Sunnis claim that Ali was young(30’s) and inexperienced. They further claim that the message is divine, not the family of the prophet.
- The Story of the necklace: Aisha the wife of Muhammad and the daughter of Abu Bakr had wondered away from the camp to find her lost necklace. The prophet’s caravan departed leaving Aisha behind. Safwan, a childhood friend, found her and brought her back to camp on his camel. Rumors blaming Aisha of committing adulatory spread throughout the camp.
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Q
The Inheritance of Muhammad 3
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- Ali suggested the prophet to divorce Aisha.
- In a revelation Muhammad was told that Aisha was without fault.
- In 634 Abu Bakr was succeed by Umar(who was appointed by Abu Bakr and was not a member of the hashemite clan)
- Umar waged wars in Mesopotamia, Iran, Egypt and Syria and reached Jersualem in 647. He was assassinated by an Iranina slave in 644.
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Q
The Inheritance of Muhammad 4
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- Uthman and Ali compete for the Caliphate.
- Uthman was a member of the powerful Umayya family of the Banu Abd al-Shams clan. This clan was a rival of the Hashemites since the pre-islamic period. Abu Sufyan, an Umayyad, led the pagan resistance to Muhammad in Mecca.
- When Muhammad defeated his opposition he did not cast away the Umayyads, who were an elite family with political and economic connections, but used their power to the benefit of the Islamic empire.
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Q
The Inheritance of Muhammad 5
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- In 636 after Syria was conquered from Byzantine Yazid son of Abu-Sufyan was appointed its governor.
- In a consultation Uthman was chosen over Ali as Cliph with the intention of preventing the creation of a dynasty of Banu Hashem (Hashemites)
- Uthman appointed Umayyads to high posts(for example: governors of Egypt, Kufa and Basra)
- Refused Muslim generals’ requests to expand the conquests and to allocate to them land. Focused on better managing the empire.
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Q
The Inheritance of Muhammad 6
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- Rebellion movement agaisnt Uthman’s nepotism and refusal to expend the conquests.
- In 656 Uthman was killed by the rebels.
- Two parties emerged after the murder of Uthman: a) THose who accused Ali and his supporters for being the moving force behind the rebellion and murder. b)Those who supported Ali and saw Uthman’s death as justified because they considered him to be a transgressor of the faith.
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Q
The Great Fitna (time of trial-the Muslim Civil War)
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- Aisha went to Basra to raise an army agaisnt Ali who was elected by the rebls as Cliph.
- Ali left Medina and headed to Kufa to raise his own army
- Ali moved the Caliphate’s political center to Kufa
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Q
The Great Fitna (time of trial-the Muslim Civil War) 2
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-In Dec 656, on the outskirts of Basra, Aisha’s and Ali’s armies met in the Battle of the Camel. Aisha was defeated and retreated to the Hijaz.
