Spread of Islam

IV

The Umayyads

Muawiyah came to the caliphate by force, not election, and maintained his position through his ties with the Arab army in Syria. So close were the ties between the Umayyads and the Arab military class that almost nine decades of Umayyad rule has been called the period of the Arab Kingdom. Arabism came to rival, if not dominate, Islam as the organizing principle of the state. This trend troubled traditional Muslims and the growing population of non-Arab Muslims. Muawiyah organized a new centre of government in the garrison city of Damascus, signalling the emerging dominance of Syria over Medina and Mecca, and sought to unify his realm by placing the might of the Arab warrior class solidly behind the Umayyads.

A

Further Growth

The Umayyads tried to channel the energy of their subjects and of the military into further conquest. North Africa became one of the main new areas of Islamic expansion. With the North African port cities in the hands of the Christian Byzantines, the Arabs first occupied the rural inland. In 670 they built the new garrison town of Al Qayrawān (in present-day Tunisia), and between 697 and 705 they captured Carthage. Nearby Tunis then became the Arabs’ naval base. Islam then spread among the native Berbers, who entered the Arab armies and were given the same share of the plunder as Arabs. One of the Berbers, Tariq ibn-Ziyad, led the Muslim armies across the Mediterranean to Spain in 711 by way of Gibraltar. The combined Arab-Berber armies conquered Spain and had success in western France until they were defeated in 732 in the Battle of Tours by the Frankish king Charles Martel, stopping their advance in Europe.

In addition to their westward expansion, the Umayyads also sought to destroy the Byzantine Empire by the conquest of Constantinople, which they failed to accomplish three times, in 669, 674-680, and 716-717. They also pressed forward on the eastern front, spreading through what is now Iran and Central Asia. The population in this area consisted of Iranian farmers, the Turkish military governing elite, and Chinese silk traders. By 667 the Arabs reached and crossed the River Oxus (now called the Amu Darya), and by 751 they had taken Samarqand and Toshkent (both in present-day Uzbekistan). Other Arab armies had already reached Sindh (in present-day Pakistan) and the Indus delta in 712. The Arabs, content to plunder and tax the wealth of the region, did not settle in these eastern areas, but did spread Islam throughout the area.

B

Social and Political Ills

Although the Umayyads hoped to unify their growing state, they faced opposition on several fronts, mainly from the mawali, or non-Arab Muslims, and the Shiites.

As Islam spread into the Fertile Crescent and beyond, non-Arabs began to convert to Islam. But since Islam was an Arab movement from its beginnings, the mawali constituted a second-class group. They were known as mawali (Arabic for “clients”) because they were forced to attach themselves to, and provide services for, Arab Muslim groups or individuals. The mawali lived in suburbs built around the amsars and worked as farmers, shopkeepers, craftspeople, and unskilled labourers. They served in the Arab infantry and were paid a smaller share of the plunder than Arabs. Their hope for advancement was for the government to place the emphasis on acceptance of Islam over being an Arab. However, the Umayyads could not reward all Muslims equally, or there would not be enough wealth from plunder to go around. Moreover, the local Muslim communities relied on taxes paid by the mawali. This practice troubled the mawali, and bred discontent, disloyalty, and, eventually, rebellion.

Meanwhile, hostilities between the Umayyads and other Muslim factions, notably the Shiites, continued. Before his death in 680, Muawiyah dispensed with the practice of electing a caliph by designating his son Yazid as heir apparent. This move angered groups that objected to the creation of a virtual Umayyad kingship. Each group had a different opinion as to who, of all the relatives of Muhammad and the descendents of people close to Muhammad, was entitled to lead the Islamic community. The Shiites believed that the caliph should be a descendent of Muhammad through Ali. The Helpers felt that their contribution to Islam had been overlooked in the selection of the rightly guided caliphs, and that one of their number should have been selected. Many groups questioned the very faith of the Umayyads. In addition, the non-Arab Muslims felt that with the emphasis being placed more and more on Arabism rather than on Islam, avenues of social mobility were being closed to them.

The climate of discontent after the death of Muawiyah led to six decades of unrest and civil war. Months after Muawiyah died in 680, Shiites rebelled in Al Kūfah, rallying behind Ali’s son Husayn. Ambushed on his way from Mecca to Al Kūfah, Husayn and his party of relatives and supporters were massacred by Umayyad forces. The Al Kūfah Shiite rebellion was put down, but the killing of Husayn, the grandson of Muhammad, shocked the Islamic world, and led to increased sympathy for the Shiites. Soon after, descendents of the Companions and the Helpers revolted in Medina, and Meccans challenging the faith of the Umayyads rose up in Mecca. The Umayyads recaptured Medina, pillaging the city for three days. Syrian armies unsuccessfully besieged Mecca, in the process destroying the Kaaba, the holy shrine of Islam. Arabia soon descended into chaos, as tribal antagonisms that had been dormant since Muhammad’s time erupted into warfare. Frequent mawali rebellions spread unrest beyond Arabia and across Islamic territory.

C

End of the Umayyads

The Umayyads’ territorial expansion intensified their social problems as more garrison cities and more non-Arabs converting to Islam led to more mawali unhappiness. In the 740s, Shiite rebels formed alliances with another Arab clan, the Abbasids, who were descendants of Abbas, an uncle of Muhammad. The Abbasids proclaimed that all Muslims, Arab or non-Arab, should receive equal treatment. After eliciting the support of rebellious Persian mawalis, this confederation won a decisive battle over Umayyad forces in Iraq in 750 and overthrew the Umayyads (except in Spain, which remained under Umayyad control). The Abbasid dynasty moved the capital to Baghdad, restored order, and instituted reforms meant to give justice to all Muslims.

V

Conclusion

Only 120 years after Muhammad captured Mecca, the Abbasids inherited an Islamic empire that extended from North Africa through the Fertile Crescent, onto the Iranian plateau, over the Oxus across Central Asia to the frontiers of China and India. Over the next few centuries, the Abbasids slowly lost territory to rebellious provinces. Finally, all of the territory in Asia was lost to the invading Mongol Empire in the 13th century. Although the Islamic empire collapsed, the religion of Islam persisted throughout the Middle East, Central Asia, and North Africa. Eventually missionaries and traders spread the faith into sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian subcontinent, South East Asia, and Eastern Europe. Today the ummah, or community of Islam, consists of more than 1 billion members worldwide.