Past, Present and Future of the Cradle of Civilizations (6)
Continue Station Fifteen…
Jews specifically, enjoyed more freedom under Muslim rule than anywhere else in the world. They were granted in Palestine considerable autonomy to make and enforce their own religious, judicial and social traditions. Many Christians and Jews held important posts under various Muslim Caliphs.
Muslims rulers in Jerusalem removed all restrictions that Romans and Byzantines had placed on the right of Jews to visit and inhabit Holy City.
Station Sixteen
Muawiya Bin Abu Sufyan started what is called the Omayyad Era. He was proclaimed the 5th Caliph of Islam, and he took Damascus as his Capital city.
Damascus emerged as a significant city, and its new leaders were keen to link it with Jerusalem in an attempt to embrace the three religions.
Muawiya insisted to have excellent relations with the Christian communities of Syria, and actually one of his closest advisers was Sarjun who was the father of Saint John of Damascus. Sarjun also supervised taxes for the Omayyad Caliph for the entire Middle East.
John of Damascus served before being ordained as Chief Administrator to the Muslim Caliph.
However, Muawiya at the same time was tough on the Byzantine Empire. He took Rhodes and Crete and launched from there several attacks against Constantinople.
Muawiya also expanded his military power towards North Africa and founded the city of Kairouan, and Central Asia where he invaded Kabul, Bukhara and Samarkand.
The Byzantine province of Palaestina Prima became a military sub-province named Jund Filastin under the Omayyad rule. It formed a division of Greater Syria or Jund Al Sham. Jund Filastin extended from Sinai to the Plain of Acre or Akko (Akka) which extends from Lebanon borders in the north to the Carmel Promontory in Palestine in the south, including Rafah, Caesarea, Gaza, Jaffa, Nablus and Jericho. Lod or Al Lid was the capital of the province and later Ramla city took the lead. Jund Al Urdunn was the region to the north and east of Filastin that included cities of Acre or Akko, Bisan and Tiberias.
When Abed Al-Malik Bin Marwan became Caliph, he ordered to build the Dome of Rock near Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Later Al Aqsa Mosque was rebuilt by orders of Caliph Walid Bin Abed Al-Malik.
The site where the Dome was built is also known in Judaism as the Foundation Stone, the spot where Jacob saw in his dreams a ladder to the sky that he climbed and God gave him the name Israel.
Muslims believe that this is also the spot from where Muhammad ascended to heaven in the course of a night journey.
By building the Dome of Rock, Muslims actually were expressing their reverence for Jerusalem, as city of the Prophets from Abraham to Muhammad who according to Islam is the "Seal of Prophets".
Christians and Jews under Omayyad rule were given the official title "People of the Book" with reference to the common roots they share with Muslims.
A group of Jewish attendants were reported to be in charge of cleaning the Mosque and Temple Mount, and also responsible for the maintenance of their lighting. They were rewarded by being exempted from poll taxes.
The Omayyad Caliphs employed Jews and Christians and some of them attained high posts in the government hierarchy. More churches were built.
Muawiya established the principle of heredity for caliphate and before his death he appointed his son Yazid as his successor, whose opposition centered mainly in Persia, Iraq and Hejaz.
The end of Omayyad regime was plagued by natural disasters. A number of earthquakes occurred in Palestine and they caused heavy loss of life and the collapse of the Dome of the Rock.
Station Seventeen
Supported by the province of Khorasan Iran, Ibrahim Al Imam a fourth descent of Abbas Bin Abed Al Muttalib, the youngest uncle of Muhammad, rebelled against the Omayyad Caliph Marwan II, but was captured and died in prison. His brother Abdallah known as Abu Al Abbas Al Saffah, carried on the rebellion, defeated the Omayyad and was subsequently proclaimed Caliph.
The first change he made was to move the caliphate’s capital from Damascus to Baghdad. The Persian Mawali(s) in Iran (who were non Arab Muslims supported) the new caliph. Part of the Mawali(s) demanded less Arab dominance in the region.
Baghdad by now is a significant city, which is already equipped to embrace polymath scientists as well as religious scholars.
Abu Abbas Al Saffah sent his forces to Central Asia, Sindh, Arabia, Anatolia, North Africa Egypt and entered Damascus to set up a new dynasty controlled from Baghdad.
He killed the remaining members of the Omayyad family at one dinner party, but one survivor Abed Al Rahman I, escaped to Al Andalus (Spain) where he assumed the title of Caliph and took Cordoba as a rival Caliphate’s Capital to Baghdad. He built up a Kingdom that dominated North Africa and lasted for about three hundred years.
Jews, Nestorian Christians and Persians were well represented in Abu Al Abbas’s government and in succeeding Abbasid administrations.
Before his death, Abu Al Abbas appointed his brother Abu Ja’far Al MansourAbi Taleb, the cousin of Muhammad and the fourth Caliph. Al Mansur also founded the House of Wisdom in Baghdad.
Shia’s believed that after the death of Muhammad, his cousin Ali was the one who should be the first Caliph and not Abu Bakr. They were very annoyed when Omar Bin Al Khattab and Othman Bin Affan became the second and third Caliph respectively.
When Ali Bin Abi Taleb proclaimed the fourth Caliph, Muawiya fought him and managed to be a Caliph instead of Ali after the latter was surprisingly murdered while praying in the mosque.
Later Ali’s son Al Hasan abandoned the Caliphate to Muawiya on the condition that he becomes the Caliph after him, which Muawiya accepted, but then appointed his son instead, and Al Hasan later was mysteriously murdered by his wife who poisoned him for no unknown reasons.
The other son of Ali, Al Husein decided to fight Muawiya claiming the Caliphate for himself after his supporters urged him to do so. But Yazid the son of Muawiya who is by now the new Caliph defeated him, and he was brutally killed and later all his wives and sons were murdered except one.
Shi’as believe that Ali is the first Imam of the line of twelve Imams who are the rightful successors of Prophet Muhammad. Each Imam was the son of the previous Imam with the exception of Husein bin Ali who was the brother of Hasan bin Ali.
The Twelfth and final Imam is Muhammad Al Mahdi who the Shi’as strongly believe that he is still alive and hidden until his return to bring justice to the world.
Same belief that the Christians apply on Jesus Christ that he shall return to save the world.
It is reported that Al Mansur flogged to Muslim scholars, Abu Hanifah and Imam AL Malki who both were founders of two out of four Muslim schools of law (Shari’a).
Under the rule of the second Abbasid Caliph AL Mahdi, the Barmakid family gained greater powers and worked closely with him to ensure stability and prosperity of his kingdom.
Several of the Abbasids’ caliphs were known to spent time in Jerusalem on their way to and from Makah. When Caliph Al Mansour visited Jerusalem, he ordered the destruction of the crosses on the churches and forbade the Christians to hold services at night.
However later Caliph Harun Al Rachid who was known to be a close friend of King Charlemagne of France, allowed the building of many new churches in the city including monasteries, a hostel, a marketplace and a library.
His son Abu Is’haq who was the Governor of Egypt, and later was Caliph Al Mu'tasem, had the inscription of the Dome of the Rock altered by inserting his own name in place of Abed Al Malik the Omayyad Caliph who first built the Dome.
Harun Al Rachid moved his capital city from Baghdad to Al Raqqah, close to the borders of the Byzantine borders.
Al Rachid depended heavily on his mentor and long-time associate Yahya Al Barmaky, and later his son Ja’far. He appointed him his first minister and his vizier and granted him full executive powers. Yahia and his sons served the Caliph faithfully and sincerely.
Yahia Al Barmaki was Persian and a member of the Barmakids family.
He and his sons helped in translating many Persian works. Ja’far convinced Harun to open a paper mill in Baghdad, which they had its paper making secrets from China.
Ja’far was executed for allegedly having a love affair with Harun’s sister. Some say it was a conspiracy that made the Caliph fears a Shi’a movement against him led by the Barmakids.
During the Abbasid period the Muslim world became a challenging intellectual center of science, knowledge and education. Both Arab and non Arab Muslim scholars translated and gathered the entire world’s knowledge into Arabic.
The Muslim scientists without doubt significantly advanced the knowledge of ancient Roman, Greek, Chinese, Indian, Persian and Egyptian civilizations.
Many thinkers and scientists believe that the Abbasid Era played an important role in transmitting Islamic science to the Christian West.
The Abbasids however made a fatal turn against the Shi’as, who most of them fled to the Maghreb to establish the Idrisid and later other Kingdoms. They also executed their Imam Jafar Al Sadiq.
The Byzantine Empire was continuously fighting the Abbasids in Syria and Anatolia.
Former supporters of Abbasids split and formed their own kingdom in Khorasan in northern Persia.
By the 10th century the Abbasids lost most of Iraq.
Outside Iraq all provinces became de facto states.
The Ismaili Fatimids challenged the Abbasids’ authority. They ruled in Tunisia and moved to Egypt, Maghreb, Sudan, Sicily, Malta, Levant and Hejaz. They were Arabo Berber Muslim Shi’a.
The Fatimids, although had a swift successful era, they could not avoid the ethnic conflicts that split their armies mainly between the Berber and the Turks. The Turkish forces managed to seize Cairo.
Eventually the Berber declared their independence from the Fatimids and recognized the Sunni Abbasid Caliph of Baghdad by 1040.
Later the Fatimids were challenged by the Turkish invasion in the Levant coast and parts of Syria. After the first Crusades the Fatimid’s territory shrank to only Egypt. However, by 1160, the Seljuks ended them, and a new Era of the Ayyubids under Saladin began in Egypt and Syria.
The Seljuk Empire, a Sunni Empire was founded in 1037, and controlled a large area stretching from The Hindu Kush to Eastern Anatolia and from Central Asia to the Persian Arabian Gulf.
The Seljuks played a vital role in the first and second crusades.
Station Eighteen
The First Crusade
To be continued .....
Sami Cherkaoui
www.samicherkaouiarabicblog.blogspot.com
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