| The Rising Star of Islam The most important prophet before Mohammed to the Muslims was Musa, or Moses, whom the Torah was revealed to. (18) And the story of Jesus in the Koran is the story of Isa, believed to be the al-masih, the Messiah and kalima-t-allah, the Word of God, but not the Son of God. He was capable of miracles, especially curing the sick and ill. In a similar sense he was “resurrected” and expected to return again one day. His birth was said to be a miracle and occurred when an angel Jibril (Gabriel) visited Miriam (Mary), who lifted her dress and blew on her body to make her pregnant with the breath of god’s spirit, or “The Word.” (19) The biography of Mohammed’s life, written by Mohammed ibn ishaq, was written for the Calif Mansur (754-775 AD) more than a century after the man named Mohammed was supposed to have lived, and this work only exists in even later writings, the Compendium of Ibn Hisham (840 AD) and the Chronicle of Tabiri (932 AD). (20) The sect of Islam that followed the life of Mohammed traces its origin to the period of time just after he died, and the leadership was settled by a series of murders. (21) Just like Buddha, and Jesus after him, both of whom are mythological figures, we may now wonder if Mohammed as well was a mythological figure. It appears that the center of every religion is a mythological figure so why should Mohammed be any different? Muslim armies formed under several Caliphates who took over the Muslim Empire, starting with the Umayyad Caliphate overthrown by the Abbasids (750–1258 AD). The Umayyad family established dynastic, hereditary rule after the end of the First Muslim Civil War in 661. After many Muslim conquests an empire of 33 million people, the largest in history, had been built up. (22) After the second Civil War, power fell into the hands of Marwan I, from another branch of the clan and Syria became their power base with Damascus as the capital. Eventually a rebellion by the Abbasids caused survivors of the Umayyad clan to emigrate to Cordoba where they formed an Emirate and a Caliphate which lasted until 1031 AD. Christians made up a large majority of the population and both Jew and Christians could practice their own religion but were forced to pay a head tax from which Muslims were exempt. (23) |
The Abbasid family claimed to have descended from al-Abbas, an uncle of the Prophet. Muslims of non-Arab descent formed the majority of the revolutionaries of the Abbasid revolution. The revolution resulted in a more liberal attitude toward non-Arab Muslims and the general population at large. Both Sunnis and Shias supported efforts to overthrow the Umayyads. (24) Displeasure over the caliph's brutality as well as admiration for Abu Muslim led to rebellions against the Abbasid Dynasty itself throughout Khorasan and Kurdistan. (25) Although Shi'ites were key to the revolution's success, Abbasid attempts to claim orthodoxy in light of Umayyad material excess led to continued persecution of Shi'ites. (26) In 1258 AD, Mongol hordes killed the last Abbasid caliph in Baghdad ending a two-hundred year-long reign for the Caliphate. (27) (18) Jealous Gods, p. 56 (19) ibid, p. 125 (20) Occidental Mythology, p. 432 (21) ibid, p. 442 (22) Blankinship, Khalid Yahya (1994), The End of the Jihad State, the Reign of Hisham Ibn 'Abd-al Malik and the collapse of the Umayyads, State University of New York Press, p. 37 (23) H.U. Rahman, A Chronology of Islamic History 570-1000 CE (1999), p. 128 (24) Donald Lee Berry, Pictures of Islam, p. 80. Macon: Mercer University Press, 2007) (The Oxford History of Islam, p. 25. Ed. John Esposito. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999) (James Wynbrandt, A Brief History of Saudi Arabia, p. 58. New York (25) Arthur Goldschmidt, A Concise History of the Middle East, pp. 76–77. Boulder: Westview Press, 2002 (26) Bryan S. Turner, Weber and Islam, vol. 7, p. 86. London: Routledge, 1998 (27) Jealous Gods, p. 27; Richard Bulliet, Pamela Kyle Crossley, Daniel Headrick, Steven Hirsch and Lyman Johnson, The Earth and Its Peoples: A Global History, vol. A, p. 251. Boston: Cengage Learning, 2014 |