Islam

In the religious movement initiated by Mohammed in Arabia in the 7th century A.D., the term "Islam" describes the proper relationship between men and God (Allah).

Mohammed called his fellow Arabs to submit, or surrender, to the will of God, to commit themselves afresh each day and each moment to the service of the Divine intention. Followers of Islam are known as Muslims, that is, "submitters" to God, those who commit themselves to Him.

Modern Muslims commonly object to the use of the terms "Mohammedan" and "Mohammedanism" lest Christians suppose that Muslims worship Mohammed.

Today Islam can no longer be exclusively identified with Arabs. In mid-20th century, from a seventh to a sixth of mankind adheres in some degree to Islam. There are major groups not only in the traditional Arab lands, but in Africa, Turkey and Eastern Europe, in the former Soviet states, in Iran and Afghanistan, in Pakistan and India, in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, and in China. There are smaller groups in the Americas.

The Arabian peninsula, where Islam was born, is one of the most forbidding places on earth for the maintenance of human life. The greater part of its territory is desert, arid steppe, and barren mountains. Only around the edges of the peninsula and at other spots in the interior are agriculture and settled life possible. Highly developed cultures and great cities existed in the extreme north and south in antiquity. But most of the peninsula was inhabited by nomadic tribesmen, whose livelihood depended upon animal husbandry.

They grazed their Hocks in the desert during the short months of spring and returned to the highlands of the central plateau (the Najd) for the remainder of the year.

Prior to the rise of Islam, the nomads of the interior had never known a foreign conqueror, nor had they ever achieved unity among themselves to the extent of acknowledging a single ruler. The formidable deserts and mountains that ring it kept the interior of Arabia and its people isolated from the control, though not altogether from the influence, of the great empires that rose and fell in the Middle East during antiquity.

There was trade between the nomads and the superior cultures of the Middle East, and knowledge from the outside world filtered into the Arabian desert. No outsider, however, was ever able to control the nomad Arabs.

The life of this nomad society was one of the important elements in the background of Mohammed and the rise of Islam as a religion. Although the Prophet was born in a city, Mecca, he was a member of a tribe that only shortly before had been one of desert nomads and that retained much of the nomad outlook.

Quraysh, the Prophet's tribe, like all the others, accepted a code of mutual assistance and protection. Each tribe owned its flocks in common, and every tribesman was expected to fight to protect the tribe's honor and to avenge injury done to any of its members. If a tribesman was killed or hurt, his fellows thought it a binding duty to exact blood revenge from the offending tribe, not just from the individual guilty of the offense. The blood feuds that often resulted lasted through generations and in several instances led to the disappearance of entire tribes.

Since raiding one another's flocks, women, and possessions was a means of gaining prestige for the Arabs, violence was frequent and life uncertain.

All that prevented unrestrained violence among the fiercely proud tribesmen was fear of blood revenge according to the tribal code.

The hazards and brutality of desert life seem also to be responsible for the Arab tendency toward excess in every activity. Famous for their love of wines, the Arabs considered it a mark of honor to drink the wineshop dry. Similarly they enjoyed gambling and were content to lose the work of a lifetime on a single toss. In military matters they paid the greatest tribute to individual heroes, reckless of life, who would make a grand gesture of courage and defiance. All these characteristics exhibit a consuming concern for reputation, for honor, for the image that a man and his tribe project to the world. Other things that the tribesmen valued highly were numerous flocks, many sons, and the ability to claim distinction for their tribe in terms of the number and greatness of its heroes, the beauty and chastity of its women, its superiority over others, and the eloquence of its poets. The latter were especially revered, as the Arabs greatly admired poetry, considering it supernatural in origin.

The pre-Islamic Arabs had no technical philosophy and no intellectual tradition. Their closest approach to a philosophy was the concept of time (dahr), often mentioned in their poetry. Time, which brings all things to men and then sweeps them away into oblivion, was the ultimate force they recognized. In view of this pessimistic outlook, it is not surprising that the Arabs made the best of their difficult and short lives by eating, drinking, and adventuring in the extreme. Mohammed's religious message gave the bedouin assurance of a force beyond time that controls human destiny and of a meaning for life beyond the here and now.

Although the desert Arabs had religious beliefs and practices, they were not notably religious people. They recognized spirits that dwelt in stones, trees, and springs . They also paid occasional worship to certain nature deities, among them goddesses known as al-Lat, al-Uzzah, and al-Manat. It was also their custom to make pilgrimages during certain months of the year to sacred places and shrines. The most important of these shrines was the Kaaba in Mecca. On the eve of Islam a new element in Arabian religion was introduced by a vaguely defined group called the Hanifs, who were dissatisfied with the pagan outlook and beginning to quest toward monotheism.

Mohammed had some association with these men and considered himself one of them.

Another element of a different kind in the background of Mohammed was the city of Mecca and the conditions prevailing there. Several generations before Mohammed, his tribe had come into possession of the valley where Mecca is located and developed it into a thriving commercial city. Mecca is situated on the coastal plain of the Red Sea at the convergence of important trade routes to Yemen in the south (thence to Africa and India), to Palestine, Egypt, and Syria in the north, and to Iraq in the east.

Although the Quraysh in Mecca produced nothing that could be sold or traded, they became wealthy I as middlemen and merchants.

Arrangements for commerce in the city were extensive and sophisticated. There were a system of credit and banking, means of exchange among different currencies, and a developed system of keeping records. In addition to private ventures, the city organized two annual caravans managed as joint-stock companies, each citizen from the poorest to the most wealthy being allowed to invest. These caravans had as many as 2,500 camels loaded with precious goods, and a large accompanying group of drivers, guides, guards, and messengers. Mecca's chief activity was providing capital for these ventures; very high interest rates were realized on the loans.

This commerce led to contact with the outside world, which may account for Mohammed's knowledge of Jewish and Christian Scriptures.

It also resulted in internal changes in the social structure of the city. The egalitarianism of the desert tribes began to disappear as successful merchants amassed large fortunes. As power and prestige passed to the merchants, tribal solidarity was fragmented, and the support formerly enjoyed by such persons as widows and orphans collapsed.

Unscrupulous moneylenders inflicted great hardship on debtors whose commercial ventures had not fared well. The instability and uncertainty of this changing social order provided rich soil for the growth of Mohammed's concept of a new kind of community based upon religion.