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I was surprised to find Islam wasn’t that old

LurkinLongtime

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I mean, relatively speaking. It was created in the 7th century, more than half a millennium after the death and resurrection of Christ. However, it became such a definitive part of a large part of the world from that point on, easily displacing Christianity and other religions in the Middle East before rapidly spreading further. I mean, this random 40 year old merchant starts claiming he’s the final prophet of God and by the time of his death 20 years later, he’s amassed an army of followers and converted most of the Arabian Peninsula into his personal empire.

I’m not a Muslim and I alway assumed it was a few hundred years older than that just because of how secure it was in the Middle East by the early Middle Ages. It’s amazing that it spread so far and in such a short period of time.
 
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JamQueen

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Yet they claim that it was not spread by sword and blood. But, by people just wanting to be like others. When I used to listen to Muslim speakers, they’d claim that places like Malaysia became Muslim just through trading goods. It really is not an old religion, but the newest Abrahamic religion. Judaism is far older.
 

LurkinLongtime

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Did you not learn that in primary school where you live?
No???? I’m American. My world history courses did cover various faiths and I’m fairly sure we discussed Muhammad’s origins but I don’t I would have realized how comparatively recent the 7th century is compared to other major religions.
 

Ambi D

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Like most religions, it incorporates much of its mythology from what people previously practiced, making it easily accepted among large groups of people. That goes for Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism.
 

Santanas

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No???? I’m American. My world history courses did cover various faiths and I’m fairly sure we discussed Muhammad’s origins but I don’t I would have realized how comparatively recent the 7th century is compared to other major religions.
Okay. In the UK it is taught in primary school. For as long as I have known what Islam is, I have known that Islam is the youngest of the Abraham religions, and the youngest of the major world religions.
 

Noah

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The fast spread is actually the spread of the Caliphate, and hence is political. It's the expansion of the Islamic state - not the spread of the Islamic faith.

Contrary to false claims that Muslims spread Islam by the sword - the Muslims only subdued the non-Muslim populations.

The conquerors gave the Jewish and Christian subjects ("People of the Book") the option to either convert to Islam - and if not - to recognise the political authority of the state by paying the 'Jizya' tax. This policy was also extended to Zoroastrian Persians, and later Hindus & Buddhists. Islamic law designates them 'Dhimmis' ("protected people"), and as such continued to have basic freedom of religion, and a communal autonomy where they could practise their own laws.

So Islam officially tolerates Judaism and Christianity and force conversion is actually prohibited by Islamic law. The purpose of the conquests was to facilitate - not force spread of and conversion to Islam. This is what happened for the vast majority of Islamic history and can be generally described as Muslim hegemony - and not a total wipe out of non-Muslims.

This is what made Muslim rule more tolerant than Christian Europe at the time; the Caliphate hosted multiple religions as a result, and in fact Christians remained the majority of the populations in certain regions for a time until around 12th century where it shifted.

In other non-conquered regions, Islam arrived through Muslim traders who did missionary activity in Sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia and the Malay archipelago. The result of which today, is Indonesia being the most populous Muslim-majority country.
 
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