Islam Studies Jahiliyyah

Pre-Islamic Arabia was a culture knit together by kinship. In this society there was no emperor or ruling elite. The people of pre-Islamic Arabia were bound together by nomadic tribes who made profit by trading and most importantly “raiding”. These raids were often described as small-scale warfare and were instrumented by tribal leaders in order to increase the wealth and power of the tribe (Gordon 5). This was the society in which Islam came to power. Warfare and raiding were essential in order to be successful in pre-Islamic Arabia. The integration of warfare into the Islamic religion created a similarity among Muslims, those who follow Islam, and non-Islamic Arabian people. This relationship and common interest established by the prophet Muhammad helped in the rise of Islam among non-Islamic

Beginning with Muhammad’s age from the start of 7th century Islam, Islamic culture and politics have gone a great many events and occurrences. Throughout all of its years, it has boasted both a rich culture and technological/intellectual advancements. The preservation of the Quran, developments in mathematics, and the continued emphasis on respect and charitable nature are just some examples of Islamic achievement. However, as with any growing civilization, Islam has evolved beyond what it originated as. The cultural and political life of Islamic civilization beginning in the 7th century to the end of the Abbasids of the 13th century underwent many changes such as the deteriorating view of women in society and the shift from elected caliphates to dynastical caliphate. But, one aspect that persisted were the religious beliefs and traditions followed by the Islamic people.

In post-classical history, Islam was recognized for its loyalty to Allah and its precise rules of religion. Muhammad, founder of Islam, was born from a nomad-merchant class, giving a pulse to the traveling trait of Islam and its literal veins of expansion throughout the Eurasian borders. While keeping the classic code of Muhammad’s original law underway, Islam’s expansion during 600- 1200 C.E. introduced advanced authority and systems of economic control.

Thus it is evident, that Qutb’s teachings in the ideal of jahiliyya were fundamental to the pathway that Islam decided to follow, and did in fact promote the teachings of Islam and sustained growth.

Throughout the entirety of the Islamic faith, Islamic civilizations have contributed ideas and characteristics of their culture that have spread throughout the world. Also, Islamic civilizations have helped to develop a variety of ideas and caused fields of industry and facets of culture to advance. These fields include but are not limited to education, medicine, mathematics, technology, literature, architecture and trade. Although every industry in the Islamic civilization has an important role in society, education, medicine and trade prove to be the three most important aspects of Islamic achievements.

1. Summary of the Islamic worldview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

This chapter begins with the Muhammad and the message he brings. It all began in the Arabian Peninsula, which was mostly desert. The people who lived there were called Nomadic Bedouin, and they are organized in family and clan groups. The importance of long-distance trade networks became important again between China, India, and Persia, Byzantium. The section starts talking about the early life Muhammad ibn Abdullah was born in to a Mecca merchant family in 570 C.E. He had a difficult life growing up, but in 595 C.E, he married a wealthy widow. By the time, he was thirty he became a merchant and exposed too many faiths. He had a spiritual transformation at the age of forty, and declared that there was only one true god, whose name was Allah, “the god.” His believe that Allah would soon bring judgment on the world, and the divine messenger, Gabriel, delivered these revelations to Muhammad. The Quran, also known as the “recitation,” is the holy book of Islam. Muhammad followers complied with his revelations. They had works of poetry and definitive authority on Islam;

As a political tactic, rulers often portray themselves in a certain way in order to stabilize their reign and rule more effectively. Some take the approach of uniqueness by setting themselves apart from their subject population while others take the approach of sameness by emphasizing the similarities in which they share with the people. Not exclusively limited to apartness or sameness, some rulers have shown to employ a mix of both ruling styles. It is these versatile rulers who have experienced more successes in their reign because they are not compelled to only one ruling style, allowing them to better adapt to the needs of their ruling population. The apartness ruling style is best seen in the Safavid Empire under the rule of Shah Ismail. Shah Ismail uses religion as a political tool to control his state and does so by declaring Shi’ism, a smaller branch of Islam, as the state religion (#). After separating himself & his people from those who are not willing to abide to his ideologies, Shah Ismail can now demand the absolute loyalties from his subjects and persecute those who are deviant. This radical act further creates a deep chasm between Shi’ite Muslims and nearby Sunni Muslims neighbors. As a result, cultural flow and the exchange of beliefs between Sunni & Shi’ite states are essentially hindered. Ismail’s apartness ruling approach is taken to the extreme with social, religious, and legal systems being strictly confined to Shi’ite doctrines (@). It is noted that

The book that we have chosen to review is titled “Lost History, the Enduring Legacy of Muslim Scientists, Thinkers and Artists”. The author of the book is Michael Hamilton Morgan. The book was published in the year 2007 and also holds the same copyright date. The book is a non-fiction. The main subject matter of the book is the history of the Islamic civilization from the birth of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)

The region of the Middle East and its inhabitants have always been a wonder to the Europeans, dating back to the years before the advent of Islam and the years following the Arab conquest. Today, the Islamic world spreads from the corners of the Philippines to the far edges of Spain and Central Africa. Various cultures have adopted the Islamic faith, and this blending of many different cultures has strengthened the universal Islamic culture. The religion of Islam has provided a new meaning to the lives of many people around the world. In the Islamic world, the religion defines and enriches culture and as a result the culture gives meaning to the individual. Islam is not only a religion, it is in its own way a culture. It may be this very

The book, Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society, by author and anthropologist, Lila Abu-Lughod, who is best known for her work on women's issues in the middle east, presents two years of fieldwork in Egypt among the Awlad' Ali Bedouin community who have gone from living a nomadic lifestyle , a farming system where animals are transported from one area to another in search for fresh grazing land, to living in villages where smuggling, raising animals, and doing odd jobs are ways of supporting themselves. In the book, Abu-Lughod brings together the concepts of structure, hierarchy, ideology, and discourse to illustrate the Bedouin culture, and how the

replaced by one after another. It started during the period of the prophet Muhammad and the four

"Islam" is derived from the Arabic root salaama meaning peace, purity, submission and obedience. Islam stands for making peace by submitting to the will of God and obeying His law. Jews and Christians view Islam as the latest of the world's great religions. However, worldwide Muslims (sometimes written "Moslems") understand their universal religion as the "final religion" and the "primal religion."

Islam is one of the oldest religions in history dating back to about 600 AD. It began when a man named Muhammad heard a voice from the heavens instructing him to proclaim the word of god. Currently there are over 800 million followers of the Muslim religion. The main text of the religion is the Quran which is said to be the word of God, or Allah as called in Muslim. Within the Quran, The five pillars of Islam are proclaimed along with many other concepts very unique to the Muslim religion. Prayer is a very important aspect of Islam as well. Islam has a long history of invention, heritage, and world imperialism that must be understood to completely identify with the concepts of the religion and culture.

Due to its ability to harbor some notable rhyme, it hardly appears as plain prose. Concurrently, the Quran lacks the appropriate meters to categorize it as a piece of poetry. It firmly appears as an ascertained approach that was popularly referred to as Saj in pre-Islamic Arabia, although it was an epoch of heated discussions among scholars (Mir). Although the contents, language, and method of the Quran, as well as the social and legal implications emanating from the same, have been examined since ancient duration, new advances have typically been proposed to investigate the book in the light of the mentioned approaches.