Download THE RISE OF ISLAM

THE RISE OF ISLAM
Warm Up Rome
1. All knowledge about Jesus comes from the
2. people who die for their faith and thus inspire
others to believe
3. Edict of Milan
4. First Christian Emperor:
5. Year of the fall of Rome:
6. Empire that rises out of Eastern half of Rome:
The Arabian People
• Arabs are a nomadic people who live in the Arabian
Peninsula
– The Arabian Peninsula is a harsh land with a vast
desert interior
– Must move constantly to find water
• Farming was limited, but participated heavily in trade
– Trade routes converged at the Arabian Peninsula
– Domesticated camels to expand the caravan trade
• One of the most important trade towns was called
Mecca
– Mecca contained a structure called the Kaaba, an
ancient building that was considered sacred
Muhammad
• While traveling on business, Muhammad met followers
of Judaism and Christianity
– These faiths influenced his thinking
• Muhammad was a religious man who often left his
home to live in a cave for extended periods
– One of the times at the cave, Muhammad awoke to
find himself in the presence of an angel, who
commanded him to speak messages from Allah
– Decides God has chosen him to be a prophet to
spread messages
• Allah was the one and only true God
• Instructions on how to live to please Allah and live
in paradise after death
– Begins to preach in public and gains a number of
followers
• Some Meccans, however, did not accept his
teachings
• Muhammad moves from Mecca to Yathrib, which came
to be called Medina, “the Prophet’s city”
– This journey came to be known as the hegira, or hijra
– The year the hegira took place became year one on
the Islamic calendar (622)
• This new faith was called Islam, meaning
“achieving peace through submission to God”
– Followers were called Muslims, claim ancestry
to Abraham and his son
• Eventually Muhammad defeats the people of
Mecca and his influence becomes great
Basic Religious Teachings
• Monotheistic, the Qur’an is the sacred text of Islam
– Written down by the followers of Muhammad
– Muslims believe that only in its original Arabic
language can one know the full meaning of the
Qur’an
– The Qur’an also lays out five basic acts that are
central to Islam
• The Five Pillars of Islam
– Belief – profession of faith
• “There is no god but God (Allah) and Muhammad
is the messenger of God”
• Also makes clear that Muhammad is a prophet,
not a deity
– Prayer – perform five daily prayers, always facing
Mecca
– Giving of alms or charity
– Fasting = going without food or drink
• Do this from dawn to dusk during the month of
Ramadan, the month when Muhammad began to
report the messages
– Pilgrimage, called the hajj, to Mecca
• Pilgrims gather by the thousands to pray in the
city’s large mosque
• Mosque = building in which Muslims worship
– Obeying Allah’s will means following the Five Pillars
• Guidelines for good behavior outlined in the Qur’an
– Muslims are forbidden to drink alcohol or eat pork
• The Qur’an teaches that Allah is the same God that the
Jews and Christians worship
– Muhammad considered Abraham, Moses, and Jesus
to be messengers of God, but saw himself as the last
prophet
– Muslims are to respect Jews and Christians as
“people of the book”
Spread of Islam
• When Muhammad died, he had not named a successor
– Abu Bakr was chosen – one of Muhammad’s closest
companions and one of the first converts, he gained
the title caliph = successor to Muhammad
• Creation of an Arab Empire
– Warred against neighboring people and expanded
– Conquered most of the Middle East and part of North
Africa and even Spain
– The expansion into Europe was stopped at the Battle
of Tours in 732 by Charles Martel
– Attacked Constantinople, but was defeated
• The attack on Constantinople led to the Crusades
– Crusades = a holy war to regain the holy land
– Many Crusades will be fought against Muslim power
– The Crusades will have little impact on Southwest
Asia except to breed centuries of mistrust between
Christians and Muslims
• Split in Islam
– After the death of Abu Bakr, the title of caliph passed
to the Umayyad dynasty, who made the office of
caliph hereditary
– Some Muslims, however, favored Ali, who was
Muhammad’s son-in-law
– A civil war broke out and Ali was killed
– Leads to a split in Islam into two groups:
• Sunni – “way of the prophet”, say that the
Umayyads are the true caliphs – most Muslims are
this
• Shiite – “party of Ali”, say that the descendants of
Ali are the true caliphs – mostly found in Iran and
a part of Iraq
Muslim Society
• Women
– According to the Qur’an, women are equal to men
before Allah
– Women had to have a male guardian and were
expected to stay at home and out of sight
– Kept from social contact with men outside their
families, had to be covered at all times
• Slavery
– Slavery was common throughout Muslim lands
– The Qur’an required slaves to be treated fairly