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Ummayad

Ummayad

The Umayyad Dynasty (Arabic بنو أمية banū umayya / الأمويون al-umawiyyūn); Persian امویان (Omaviyân), Turkish, Emevi, ) was the first dynasty of caliphs of the Prophet Muhammad who were not closely related to Muhammad himself, though they were of the same Meccan tribe, the Quraish. The first dynasty reigned from AD661 to AD750. Ironically, the clan from which the Umayyads originated had originally been bitter enemies.

Umayyad rulers

Muawiyah had been the governor of Syria under the 3rd caliph and his kinsman, Uthman ibn Affan. After the assassination of Uthman, he was replaced by the new caliph, Ali ibn Abi Talib. Since the killers of Uthman had allied themselves with Ali, Muawiyah refused to accept his caliphate, and in 657 led an army against him. The two sides agreed to a conciliation procedure, resulting in an arbitration that many of Ali's partisans saw as unfair. The Muslim empire was partitioned. When Ali was assassinated in 661, his son Hasan pledged allegiance to Muawiyah and Muawiyah was declared caliph of all Muslim lands. This established the Umayyad dynasty, and the capital of the caliphate was moved to Damascus. Great waves of expansion occurred under the reign of the Umayyads. Muslim armies pushed across North Africa and Iran, through the late 600s, expanding the borders of the empire from the Iberian peninsula, in the west, to what is today Pakistan, in the east. Forces led by Tariq ibn-Ziyad crossed Gibraltar and established Muslim power in the Iberian peninsula, while other armies established power far away in Sind, in South Asia. The Muslim empire under the Umayyads was now a vast domain that ruled a diverse array of peoples. The Umayyads were overthrown in the east by the Abbasid dynasty after their defeat in the Battle of the Zab in 750, following which most of the clan was massacred by the Abbasids. An Umayyad prince, Abd-ar-rahman I, took over the Muslim territory in Al-Andalus (Hispania) and founded a new Umayyad dynasty there.

Umayyad Caliphs at Damascus

- Muawiyah I ibn Abi Sufyan, 661-680
- Yazid I ibn Muawiyah, 680-683
- Muawiya II ibn Yazid, 683-684
- Marwan I ibn Hakam, 684-685
- Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, 685-705
- al-Walid I ibn Abd al-Malik, 705-715
- Suleiman ibn Abd al-Malik, 715-717
- Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz, 717-720
- Yazid II ibn Abd al-Malik, 720-724
- Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, 724-743
- al-Walid II ibn Yazid II, 743-744
- Yazid III ibn al-Walid, 744
- Ibrahim ibn al-Walid, 744
- Marwan II ibn Muhammad (ruled from Harran in the Jazira) 744-750

Umayyad Emirs of Cordoba

- Abd ar-Rahman I, 756-788
- Hisham I, 788-796
- al-Hakam I, 796-822
- Abd ar-Rahman II, 822-8
- [[Abdallah ibn Muhammad]], [[888-912
- Abd ar-Rahman III, 912-929

Umayyad Caliphs at Cordoba

- Abd ar-Rahman III, as caliph, 929-961
- Al-Hakam II, 961-976
- Hisham II, 976-1008
- Mohammed II, 1008-1009
- Suleiman, 1009-1010
- Hisham II, restored, 1010-1012
- Suleiman, restored, 1012-1017
- Abd ar-Rahman IV, 1021-1022
- Abd ar-Rahman V, 1022-1023
- Muhammad III, 1023-1024
- Hisham III, 1027-1031

Umayyad sahaba

Here is a partial list of the Companions of Muhammad who were part of the Umayyad clan:
- Marwan ibn Al-Hakam
- Muawiyah ibn Abi Sufyan
- Abu Sufiyan ibn Harb

Umayyad taba'een

Here is a partial list of the Taba'een (the generation that succeeded the Companions) who were part of the Umayyad clan:
- Abdul Rahman ibn Khalid ibn Walid
- Yazid bin Muawiyah
- Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan

External links

Persian language

Persian (فارسی = Fârsi ... پارسی = Pârsi), (local name in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan: ‘Fârsi’), ‘Pârsi’ (older local name, but still used by some speakers), Tajik (a Central Asian dialect) or Dari (another local name in Tajikistan and Afghanistan), is a language spoken in Iran, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Bahrain, and elsewhere. Prior to British colonization, Persian was also widely used as a second language in the Indian subcontinent; it took prominence as the language of culture and education in several Muslim courts in the subcontinent throughout the Middle Ages and became the official court language under the Mughal emperors. Evidence of its former rank in the region can still be seen by the extent of its influence on Hindi or Urdu, as well as the popularity that Persian literature still enjoys in the region. Persian or its dialects have official-language status in the countries of Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan. There are 61-71 million native speakers [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=90035]. It belongs to the Indo-European language family, and is of the Subject Object Verb type.

History

Persian is a member of the Indo-European family of languages, and within that family it belongs to the Indo-Iranian (Aryan) branch. Scholars believe the Iranian sub-branch consists of the following chronological linguistic path: Old Persian (Avestan and Achaemenid Persian) → Middle Persian (Pahlavi, Parthian, and Sassanids Persian) → Modern Persian (Dari, c. 900 to present Persian). Old Persian, the main language of the Achaemenid inscriptions, should not be confused with the non-Indo-European Elamite language (see Behistun inscription). Over this period, the morphology of the language was simplified from the complex conjugation and declension system of Old Persian to the almost completely regularized morphology and rigid syntax of Modern Persian, in a manner often described as paralleling the development of English. Additionally, many words were introduced from neighboring languages, including Aramaic and Greek in earlier times, and later Arabic and to a lesser extent Turkish. In more recent times, some Western European words have entered the language (notably from French and English). The language itself has greatly developed during the centuries. Due to technological developments, new words and idioms are created and enter into Persian like any other language. In Tehran the Academy of Persian Language and Literature is a center that evaluates the new words in order to initiate and advise their Persian equivalents. In Afghanistan, the Academy of Sciences of Afghanistan does the same for Afghan Persian (among other languages).

Nomenclature

Persian, the more widely used name of the language in English, is an Anglicized form derived from Latin
- Persianus, < Latin Persia, < Greek Persis, a hellenized form of Old Persian Parsa. Farsi is the Arabicized form of Parsi, due to a lack of the /p/ phoneme in Standard Arabic. Its use in the English language is very recent (since the 1970s). Native Persian speakers typically call it "Fârsi" in modern usage. ISO, the Academy of Persian Language and Literature, and many other sources call the language Persian. The government of Afghanistan uses both "Dari" and "Persian" in English communications. The Academy of Persian Language and Literature as well as many lexicographers have announced that "Farsi" is not the appropriate term to use for the Persian language in English. In the ISO 639-1, the local names form the basis for the language codes and for this reason "fa" is the designation for the Persian language in that system.

Dialects and close languages

ISO 639-1 Communication is generally mutually intelligible between Iranians, Tajiks, and Persian-speaking Afghans; however, by popular definition:
- Dari is the local name for the eastern dialect of Persian, one of the two official languages of Afghanistan, including Hazaragi — spoken by the Hazara people of central Afghanistan.
- Tajik could also be considered an eastern dialect of Persian, but, contrary to Iranian and Afghan Persian, it is written in the Cyrillic script. The following are some of the closely related languages of various Iranian peoples within modern Iran proper:
- Mazerooni, or Mazandarani, spoken in northern Iran mainly in the province of Mazandaran.
- Guilaki, or Gilaki — spoken in the province of Guilan.
- Talysh, or Talishi — spoken in northern Iran and southern parts of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
- Luri, or Lori — spoken mainly in the southwestern Iranian province of Lorestan.
- (a.k.a. Tati, or Eshtehardi) — spoken in parts of the Iranian provinces of East Azarbaijan, Zanjan and Qazvin.
- Dari or Gabri — spoken originally in Yazd and Kerman by the Zoroastrians of Iran. Also called Yazdi by some.
- Dzhidi or Judæo-Persian — a collection of languages or dialects spoken by the many varied and ancient Jewish communities throughout the former greatest extent of the Persian Empire, one of the many Jewish languages of Persian Jews.

Orthography

The vast majority of modern Persian text is written in a form of the Arabic alphabet. In recent years the Latin alphabet has been used by some for technological or internationalization reasons.

Arabic Alphabet

Modern Persian is normally written using a modified variant of the Arabic alphabet.

The adoption of the Arabic script

After the conversion of Persia to Islam (see Islamic conquest of Iran), it took approximately one hundred and fifty years before Persians adopted the Arabic alphabet as a replacement for the older alphabet. Previously, two different alphabets were used for the Persian language (Middle Persian, or Pahlavi, at that time): one was also called Pahlavi and was a modified version of the Aramaic alphabet, and the other was a native Iranian alphabet called Dîndapirak (literally: religion script).

Note: "independence" of Arabic and Persian languages

One should note that despite their shared standard alphabet, Persian and Arabic are entirely different languages: they are not closely genetically related (they belong to separate genetic language families, namely, Indo-European and Afro-Asiatic) and naturally have different phonology and grammar.

The features of the Persian variant

The Persian variant adds four letters to the Arabic alphabet for its use, due to the fact that four sounds that exist in Persian do not exist in Arabic. Additionally, it changes the shape of another two. Some people call this modified alphabet the Perso-Arabic alphabet. The additional four letters are: The letters different in shape are: The diacritical marks used in the Arabic script, a.k.a. harakat, are also used in Persian, although some of them have different pronunciations. For example, an Arabic Damma is pronounced as /u/, while in Persian it is pronounced as /o/. The Persian variant also adds the notion of a pseudo-space to the Arabic script, called a Zero-width non-joiner (ZWNJ) by the Unicode Standard. It acts like a space in disconnecting two otherwise-joining adjacent letters, but does not have a visual width.

Note: Spelling of Arabic words in Arabic and in Persian

It should also be noted that many Persian words with an Arabic root are spelled differently from the original Arabic word. Alef with hamza below ( إ ) always changes to alef ( ا ); teh marbuta ( ة ) usually, but not always, changes to teh ( ت ) or heh ( ه ); and words using various hamzas get spelled with yet another kind of hamza (so that مسؤول becomes مسئول).

Further expansion of the Persian variant

The features of the Persian variant have been taken for other languages, such as Pashto or Urdu, and have sometimes been further extended with new letters or punctuation.

Latin Alphabet

The Universal Persian (UniPers / Pârsiye Jahâni) Alphabet is a Latin-based alphabet created over 50 years ago in Iran and popularized by Mohamed Keyvan, who had used it in a number of Persian textbooks for foreigners and travellers. It sidesteps the difficulties of the traditional Arabic-based alphabet, with its multiple letter shapes and ambiguous spellings, and fits particularly well in contemporary electronically written media. Fingilish is the name given to texts written in Persian using the Basic Latin alphabet. It is most commonly used in chat, emails and SMS applications.

Phonology

:Main article: Persian phonology The Persian language has six vowels and twenty-three consonants, including two affricates /ʧ/ (ch) and /ʤ/ (j). Historically, Persian distinguished length: the long vowels , , contrasting with the short vowels , , respectively. Modern spoken Persian, however, generally does not make this distinction anymore. Persian phonology

Consonants
	labial	alveolars	post-alveolars	velars	glottals
voiceless stops
voiced stops
voiceless fricatives
voiced fricatives
nasals
liquids		,
glides

Note that and are affricates, not stops.

Grammar

:Main article: Persian grammar Suffixes predominate Persian morphology, though there are a small number of prefixes. Verbs can express tense and aspect, and they agree with the subject in person and number. There is no grammatical gender for nouns, nor are pronouns marked for natural gender. Normal sentences are structured as "(S) (PP) (O) V". If the object is definite, then the order is "(S) (O + "rɑ:") (PP) V".

Vocabulary

There are many loanwords in the Persian language, mostly coming from Arabic, English, French, and the Turkic languages. Persian has likewise influenced the vocabularies of other languages, especially Indo-Iranian languages and Turkic languages. Many Persian words have also found their way into the English language. See List of English words of Persian origin.

References

- Mace, J. (2003). Persian Grammar: For reference and revision. Routledge-Curzon, London.
- Mahootian, S. (1997). Persian. Descriptive Grammars. Routledge, London.
- Windfuhr, G. L. (1987). Persian. In Comrie, B., editor, The World’s Major Languages, pages 523–546. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

External links

- [http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=PRS Ethnologue report for Eastern Persian]
- [http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=PES Ethnologue report for Western Persian]
- [http://www.easypersian.com/ Easypersian.com]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/translation/Farsi/ Dictionary] with Farsi - English Translations from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition
- [http://www.aryanpour.com/ Aryanpour Persian-English English-Persian Dictionary]
- [http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/Profile.aspx?LangID=63 UCLA Language Materials Project: Persian]
- [http://www.unipers.com/ UniPers.com A proposed Latin-based writing system designed specifically for the Persian language.]
- [http://www.persiandirect.com Persian Linguistics Association]
- [http://homepages.nyu.edu/%7Emmk4/AATP.htm American Association of Teachers of Persian (AATP)]
- [http://www.apersian.org The Centre for Promotion of Persian Language and Literature]
- [http://www.voanews.com/persian VOA’s Persian Language Service]
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/persian BBC’s Persian Language Service]
- [http://www.dwelle.de/persian Deutche Welle’s Persian Service]
- [http://iran-heritage.org/interestgroups/language-articles.htm An Online Persian Language Forum] Category:Classical languages Category:Iranian culture Category:Iranian languages Category:Languages of Afghanistan Category:Languages of Iran Category:Languages of Tajikistan Category:Languages of Uzbekistan Category:Languages of Pakistan Category:Languages of Russia ko:페르시아어 ja:ペルシア語 th:ภาษาเปอร์เซีย

Turkish language

Turkish (Türkçe) is a Turkic language spoken natively in Turkey, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Bulgaria, as well as by several million immigrants in the European Union. The number of native speakers is uncertain, primarily due to a lack of minority language data from Turkey. The figure of 60 million used here assumes that Turkish is the mother tongue of 80% of the Turkish population, with making up most of the remainder. (Linguistic minorities in Turkey are, however, bilingual in Turkish.) There is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Turkish and other Oghuz languages such as Azeri, , and . If these are counted together as "Turkish", the number of native speakers is 100 million, and the total number including second-language speakers is around 125 million.

Classification

Turkish is a member of the Turkish family of languages, which includes Balkan Gagauz Turkish, Gagauz, and Khorasani Turkish in addition to Osmanli Turkish. The Turkish family is a subgroup of the Oghuz languages, themselves a subgroup of the Turkic languages, which most linguists believe to be member of an Altaic language family. Like Finnish and Hungarian, Turkish has vowel harmony, is agglutinative and has no grammatical gender. Word order is usually Subject Object Verb. Turkish has a T-V distinction: second-person plural forms can be used for individuals as a sign of respect.

Geographic distribution

Turkish is spoken in Turkey and by minorities in 35 other countries. In particular, Turkish is used in countries that formerly (in whole or part) belonged to the Ottoman Empire, such as Bulgaria, Romania, the former Yugoslavia (specifically in the Serbian province of Kosovo and Metohija on a local level), and the Republic of Macedonia.

Official status

Turkish is the official language of Turkey, and is one-although today it is less spoken- of the official languages of Cyprus. It is also an official or national language in Bulgaria. In Turkey, the Turkish Language Society (Türk Dil Kurumu) was founded by Kemal Atatürk in 1932 as the Türk Dili Tetkik Cemiyeti ("Society for the Investigation of the Turkish Language"), an independent body. In August, 1983, when Turkey was under martial law as a result of the military coup of 1980, the Turkish Language Society was brought under the control of the prime ministry.

Dialects

Dialects of Turkish include Danubian, Eskişehir (spoken in Eskişehir Province), Razgrad, Dinler, Rumelian, Karamanlı (spoken in Karaman Province), Edirne (spoken in Edirne), Gaziantep (spoken in Gaziantep Province), Urfa (spoken in Şanlıurfa Province), and Goynuk (a village in Bolu).

Sounds

One characteristic feature of Turkish is vowel harmony. For example, if the first vowel of a Turkish word is a front vowel, the second and other vowels of the same word are usually the same vowel or another front vowel: vişne "sour cherry": i is close unround front, e is open unround front. Stress is usually on the last syllable, with the exception of some suffix combinations and words like masa ['masa].

Consonants

The phoneme usually refered to as "soft g", "ğ" in Turkish orthography, actually represents a rather weak front-velar or palatal approximant between front vowels. When it is word-final or preceding another consonant it lengthens the preceding vowel. In all other positions, it is not pronounced at all.

Vowels

Grammar

Turkish has an abundance of suffixes, but no prefixes (apart from the reduplicating intensifier prefix as in beyaz="white", bembeyaz="very white", sıcak="hot", sımsıcak="very hot"). (Some Arabic loan words have their own prefixes, but those are the common prefixes of Arabic.) One word can have many suffixes. Suffixes can be used to create new words (see #Vocabulary) or to indicate the grammatical function of a word. Turkish nouns can take endings indicating the person of a possessor. They can take case-endings, as in Latin. (The series of case-endings is the same for every noun, except for spelling changes owing to vowel harmony, and variation between voiced and unvoiced consonants.) Finally, they can take endings that give them a person and make them into sentences: ev "house", eviniz "your house", evinizde "at your house", Evinizdeyiz "We are at your house." Turkish adjectives as such are not declined (though they can generally be used as nouns, in which case they are declined). Used attributively, they precede the nouns they modify. Turkish verbs exhibit person. They can be made negative or impotential; they can also be made potential. Finally, Turkish verbs exhibit various distinctions of tense, mood, and aspect: a verb can be progressive, necessitative, aorist, future, inferential, present, past, conditional, imperative, or optative. gel- "(to) come", gelme- "not (to) come", geleme- "not (to) be able to come", gelebil- "(to) be able to come", Gelememiş "She [or he] was apparently unable to come." Gelememişti "She had not been able to come." Gelememiştiniz "You (pl) had not been able to come." Gelememiş miydiniz? "Was it the case that you (pl) were not able to come?" All Turkish verbs are conjugated the same way, except for the irregular and defective verb i- (see Turkish copula), which can be used in compound forms: Gelememişti = Gelememiş idi = Gelememiş + i- + -di Word order in Turkish is generally Subject Object Verb, as in Japanese and Latin, but not English. This can be seen in the following sentence from a newspaper (Cumhuriyet, 16 August 2005, p. 1). The sentence uses all noun cases except the genitive: Türkiye'de modayı gazete sayfalarına taşıyan, gazetemiz yazarlarından N. S. yaşamını yitirdi: Türkiye'de "in Turkey" (locative) modayı "fashion" (accusative of moda) gazete "newspaper" (nominative) sayfalarına "to its pages" (dative; sayfa "page", sayfalar "pages", sayfaları "its pages") taşıyan, "carrying" (present participle of taşı-) gazetemiz "our newspaper" (nominative) yazarlarından "from its writers" (ablative; yazar "writer") N. S. [person's name] (nominative) yaşamını "her life" (accusative; yaşam "life") yitirdi. "lost" (past tense of yitir- "lose" from yit- "be lost") "One of the writers of our newspaper, N. S., who brought fashion to newspaper pages in Turkey, lost her life."

Vocabulary

Turkish has the resources for building up many new words from old: from nouns: göz "eye", gözlük "eyeglasses" gözlükçü "someone who sells glasses" gözlükçülük "the business of selling glasses" and from verbs: yat- "lie down" yatır- "lay down [that is, cause to lie down]" yatırım "instance of laying down: deposit, investment" yatırımcı "depositor, investor". Turkish vocabulary has gone through drastic changes in the history of the language. In the last sixty years, Turkish vocabulary has gone through changes that might take three centuries in another language.

Replaced old words

When the Turks came from middle Asia to Anatolia about a thousand years ago, they came in contact with Islam and the Arabic societies. Since the Turks accepted Islam, Arabic words (and fewer, Persian words) started infiltrating the language. During the course of over six hundred years of the Ottoman Empire, Turkish kept borrowing loan words from these two languages. Towards the end of the 19th century, this got to a point where the language was rather called the Ottoman language. This is because Turkish had been inundated with so many loan words that the language became a mix of Turkish, Arabic and Persian. In contemporary Turkey, the Ottoman language is almost incomprehensible. After Atatürk founded the Republic of Turkey, he established the "Turkish Language Foundation" (Türk Dil Kurumu, TDK), whose task was to replace Arabic and Persian origin words with their new Turkish counterparts. The foundation succeeded in removing several hundred Arabic words from the language. While most of the words introduced to the language by TDK are new, TDK also suggested using old Turkish words which had not been used in the language for centuries. Older and younger people in Turkey tend to express themselves with different vocabulary. While the generations born up to the 1940s tend to use the old Arabic origin words (even the obsolete ones), the younger generations favor using the new expressions. Some new words are not used as often as their old counterparts or have failed to convey the intrinsic meanings of their old equivalents. Among some of the old words that were replaced are terms in geometry, directions (north, south, east, west), some of the months and many nouns and adjectives. Many new words have also been derived from verbs. Some examples of new and their old counterparts are: Please see List of replaced loan words in Turkish for an extensive list of replaced old words and current loan words

Writing system

Turkish is written using a modified version of the Latin alphabet, which was introduced in 1928 by Kemal Atatürk as part of his efforts to modernize Turkey. Until 1928, Turkish was written using a modified version of the Arabic alphabet (see Ottoman Turkish language), but use of the Arabic alphabet was outlawed after the Latin alphabet was introduced. See Turkish alphabet.

The language in daily life

Turkish has many formulaic expressions for various social situations. Several of them feature Arabic verbal nouns together with the Turkish verb et- ("make, do"). A famous quotation and motto of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk:
- Yurtta sulh, cihanda sulh "Peace at home, peace in the world." In the current language, this is
- Yurtta barış, dünyada barış.

References

- International Phonetic Association (1999) Handbook of the International Phonetic Association ISBN 0-521-63751-1
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External links

- [http://groups.yahoo.com/group/turkishlearner/ A discussion list for the learners of Turkish]
- [http://www.langtolang.com/ Langtolang Turkish, English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Rumanian, Swedish, Danish, Polish, Czech, Hungarian, Finnish, Esperanto, Swahili, Serbo_Croat Multilingual Dictionary]
- [http://www.turkce-ingilizce.com/ Turkish-English and English-Turkish Online Dictionary]
- [http://www.123lasvegas.info Free turkish dictionary.]
- [http://www.tdk.org.tr/TDKSOZLUK/SOZBUL.ASP Turkish to Turkish Dictionary.]
- [http://turkisaretdili.ku.edu.tr Turkish to Turkish Sign Language (TID) Visual Dictionary]
- [http://www.turkishclass.com Learn Turkish language online.]
- [http://www.fdicts.com/dictlist1.php?k1=97 All free Turkish dictionaries]
- [http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=TRK Ethnologue report for Turkish]
- [http://www.onlineturkish.com onlineturkish.com]
- [http://www.weberberg.de/infoport/tuerkisch Free online Turkish course written in German ]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/translation/Turkish/ Dictionary] with Turkish - English Translations from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition
- [http://www.zargan.com.tr/ Online Turkish-English/English-Turkish dictionary]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Turkish-english/ Turkish - English Dictionary]
- [http://www.langtolang.com/ A comprehensive and accurate Turkish-(English/French/Italian/and various other languages) dictionary]
- [http://aton.ttu.edu Texas Tech University, Archive of Turkish Oral Narrative]
- [http://www.turkcebilgi.com/T%FCrk%E7e An Information site in Turkish Language]
- [http://www.ipb.nu/winmekmak/ WinMekMak - Turkish Verb Conjugator]
- [http://www.turkishlanguage.co.uk/pf.htm The best site for learning Turkish with detailed explanations]
- [http://www.turkishdictionary.net/ Turkish dictionary available for use in various forms]
- [http://miejipang.homestead.com/untitled18.html Let's try to learn Hungarian(Magyar) and Turkish!] Category:Languages of Turkey Category:Languages of Cyprus Category:Languages of the Republic of Macedonia Category:Agglutinative languages Category:Vowel harmony languages category:Turkic languages ja:トルコ語 th:ภาษาตุรกี

Caliph

:This article is on the highest religious and/or temporal title, aspiring universal authority, in Islam; :for lower, notably gubernatorial, uses of the Arabic title khalifa, see that article Caliph is the term or title for the Islamic leader of the Ummah, or community of Islam. It is an Anglicized/Latinized version of the Arabic word خليفة or Khalīfah () which means "successor", that is, successor to the prophet Muhammad. Some academics prefer to transliterate the term as Khalîf. The caliph has often been referred to as Ameer al-Mumineen (أمير المؤمنين), or "Prince of the Faithful," where "Prince" is used in the context of "commander." After the first four caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar ibn al-Khattab, Uthman ibn Affan, and Ali ibn Abi Talib) the title was claimed by the Umayyads, the Abbasids, and the Ottomans, as well as by other, competing lineages in Spain, Northern Africa, and Egypt. Most historical Muslim rulers simply titled themselves sultans or emirs, and gave token obedience to a caliph who often had very little real authority. The title has been defunct since the abolition of the Ottoman Sultanate in 1924.

Origins of the caliphate

Most academic scholars do not believe that Muhammad had explicitly established how the Muslim community was to be governed after his death. Two questions faced these early Muslims: who was to succeed Muhammad, and what sort of authority he was to exercise.

Succession to Muhammad

Fred Donner, in his book The Early Islamic Conquests(1981), argues that the standard Arabian practice at the time was for the prominent men of a kinship group, or tribe, to gather after a leader's death and choose a leader from amongst themselves. There was no specified procedure for this shura, or consultation. Candidates were usually from the same lineage as the deceased leader, but they were not necessarily his sons. Capable men who would lead well were preferred over an ineffectual direct heir. Muhammad, if he considered the matter of succession at all, would possibly have thought that the standard procedure would apply. This is also the argument advanced by Sunni Muslims, who believe that Muhammad's lieutenant Abu Bakr was chosen by the community and that this was the proper procedure. They further argue that a caliph is ideally chosen by election or community consensus, even though the caliphate soon became a hereditary office, or the prize of the strongest general. Sunnis accept that the caliph should be chosen from Muhammad's tribe, the Quraysh. Shi'a Muslims disagree. They believe that Muhammad had given many indications that he considered Ali ibn Abi Talib, his cousin and son-in-law, as his chosen successor. They say that Abu Bakr seized power by force and trickery. All caliphs other than Ali were usurpers. Ali and his descendents are believed to have been the only proper Muslim leaders, or imams. This matter is covered in much greater detail in the article Succession to Muhammad, and in the article on Shi'a Islam. A third branch of Islam, the Ibadi, believes that the caliphate rightly belongs to the greatest spiritual leader among Muslims, regardless of his lineage. They are currently an extremely small sect, found mainly in Oman.

The authority of the caliph

Who should succeed Muhammad was not the only issue that faced the early Muslims; they also had to clarify the extent of the leader's powers. Muhammad, during his lifetime, was not only the Muslim leader, but the Muslim prophet and the Muslim judge. All law and spiritual practice proceeded from Muhammad. Was his successor to have the same status? None of the early caliphs claimed to receive divine revelations, as did Muhammad; none of them claimed to be nabi, a prophet. Muhammad's revelations were soon codified and written down as the Qur'an, which was accepted as a supreme authority, limiting what a caliph could legitimately command. However, there is some evidence that the early caliphs did believe that they had authority to rule in matters not specified in the Qur'an. They believed themselves to be the spiritual and temporal leaders of Islam, and insisted that implicit obedience to the caliph in all things was the hallmark of the good Muslim. The modern scholars Patricia Crone and Martin Hinds, in their book God's Caliph, outline the evidence for an early, expansive view of the caliph's importance and authority. They argue that this view of the caliphate was eventually nullified (in Sunni Islam, at least) by the rising power of the ulema, or Islamic scholars, clerics, and religious specialists. The ulema insisted on their right to determine what was legal and orthodox. The proper Muslim leader, in the ulema's opinion, was the leader who enforced the rulings of the ulema, rather than making rulings of his own. Conflict between caliph and ulema was a recurring theme in early Islamic history, and ended in the victory of the ulema. The caliph was henceforth limited to temporal rule. He would be considered a righteous caliph if he were guided by the ulema. Crone and Hinds argue that Shi'a Muslims, with their expansive view of the powers of the imamate, have preserved some of the beliefs of early Islam. Crone and Hinds' thesis is not accepted by all scholars. Most Sunni Muslims now believe that the caliph has always been a merely temporal ruler, and that the ulema has always been responsible for adjudicating orthodoxy and Islamic law (shari'a). The first four caliphs are called the Rashidun, the Rightly Guided Caliphs, because they are believe to have followed the Qur'an and the way or sunnah of Muhammad in all things. This formulation itself presumes the Sunni ulema's view of history.

The history of the caliphate

Abu Bakr nominated Umar as his successor on his deathbed, and the Muslim community submitted to his choice. Uthman was elected by a council of electors, but was soon perceived by many Muslims to be ruling as a "king" rather than an elected leader. Uthman was killed by rebellious soldiers. Ali then took control, but was not universally accepted as caliph. He faced numerous rebellions and was assassinated after a tumultuous rule of only five years. This period is known as the Fitna, or the first Islamic civil war. One of Ali's challengers was Muawiyah, a relative of Uthman. After Ali's death, Muawiyah managed to overcome all other claimants to the caliphate. He is remembered by history as Muawiyah I, the founder of the Umayyad dynasty. Under Muawiyah, the caliphate became a hereditary office. Under the Umayyads, the Muslim empire grew rapidly. To the west, Muslim rule expanded across North Africa and into Spain. To the east, it expanded through Iran and ultimately to India. However, the Umayyad dynasty was not universally supported within Islam itself. Some Muslims supported prominent early Muslims like al-Zubayr; others felt that only members of Muhammad's clan, the Banu Hisham, or his own lineage, the descendants of Ali, should rule. There were numerous rebellions against the Umayyads, as well as splits within the Umayyad ranks (notably, the rivalry between Yaman and Qays). Eventually, supporters of the Banu Hisham and Alid claims united to bring down the Umayyads in 750. However, the Shi'at Ali, the party of Ali, were again disappointed when the Abbasid dynasty took power, as the Abbasids were descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib and not from Ali. Following this disappointment, the Shi'at Ali finally split from the majority Sunni Muslims and formed what are today the several Shi'a denominations. The Abassids would provide an unbroken line of caliphs for over three centuries, consolidating Islamic rule and cultivating great intellectual and cultural developments in the Middle East. But by 940 the power of the caliphate under the Abassids was waning as non-Arabs, particularly the Turkish (and later the Mamluks in Egypt in the latter half of the 13th century), gained influence, and sultans and emirs became increasingly independent. However, the caliphate endured as both a symbolic position and a unifying entity for the Islamic world. During the period of the Abassid dynasty, Abassid claims to the caliphate did not go unchallenged. The Shi'a Said ibn Husayn of the Fatimid dynasty, which claimed descendancy of Muhammad through his daughter, claimed the title of Caliph in 909, creating a separate line of caliphs in North Africa. Initially covering Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya, the Fatimid caliphs extended their rule for the next 150 years, taking Egypt and Palestine, before the Abbassid dynasty was able to turn the tide, limiting the Fatimids to rule to Egypt. The Fatimid dynasty finally ended in 1171. The Ummayad dynasty, which had survived and come to rule over the Muslim provinces of the Spain, reclaimed the title of Caliph in 929, lasting until it was overthrown in 1031. 1258 saw the conquest of Baghdad and the execution of Abassid caliph by Mongol forces under Hulagu Khan. Although members of the Abassid dynasty proclaimed a new Caliphate within three years, based in Cairo, various other Muslim rulers had also begun to claim the title of caliph and the Muslim empire became fractured. Eventually the caliphate of the Ottomans established primacy. Thus, by the eve of the First World War, the Ottoman caliphate represented the largest and most powerful independent Islamic political entity. The rulers of the Ottoman state, however, only rarely used title of khalifa for political purposes. It is known that Mehmed II and his grandson Selim used it to justify their conquest of Islamic countries. At a later date, one of the last Sultans of the Ottoman Empire, Sultan Abdulhamid II, used it as a tool against the European colonisation and occupation of countries with large Muslim populations.

How the Caliphate Came to an End

See the article Demise of the Ottoman Caliphate. On March 3, 1924, the first President of the Turkish Republic, Kemal Atatürk, constitutionally abolished the institution of the Caliphate. Its powers were transfered to the Turkish Grand National Assembly (parliament) of the newly formed Turkish nation-state and the title has since been inactive. Scattered attempts to revive the Caliphate elsewhere in the Muslim World were made in the years immediately following its abandonment by Turkey, but none were successful. Hussein bin Ali, a former Ottoman governor of the Hejaz who had conspired with the British during World War I and revolted against Istanbul, declared himself Caliph at Mecca two days after Turkey relinquished the title. But no one took his claim seriously, and he was soon ousted and driven out of Arabia by the Saudis, a rival clan that had no interest in the Caliphate. The last Ottoman Sultan Mehmed VI made a similar attempt to re-establish himself as Caliph in the Hejaz after leaving Turkey, but he was also unsuccessful. In the 1920s the Khilafat Movement, a movement to restore the Turkish Caliphate, spread throughout the British colonial territories in Asia. It was particularly strong in India, where it was a rallying point for Muslim communities. A summit was convened in Cairo in 1926 to discuss the revival of the Caliphate, but most Muslim countries did not participate and no action was taken to implement the summit’s resolutions. Though the title Ameer al-Mumineen was adopted by the King of Morocco and Mullah Mohammed Omar, former head of the now-defunct Taliban regime of Afghanistan, neither claimed any legal standing or authority over Muslims outside the borders of their respective countries. The closest thing to a Caliphate in existence today is the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), an international organization founded in 1969 consisting of the governments of most Muslim-majority countries. But the OIC has limited influence; many Muslims are not aware that the organization exists, and its resolutions are often ignored even by member nations.

Reasons for the Caliphate's Continuing Dormancy

Once the subject of intense conflict and rivalry amongst Muslim rulers, the caliphate has lain dormant and largely unclaimed for much of the past 81 years. The reasons for this are varied and complex. During the first half of the European Middle Ages, Muslim kingdoms were global superpowers home to some of the world's preeminent centers of culture, trade, and learning. The fall of the Abbasid Empire in 1258 marked the end of this prolific period of the Muslim World's intellectual history, and subsequent centuries failed to produce Muslim scholarly achievement and technological or intellectual progress of the significance that had characterized earlier Muslim civilizations. Though the void in Muslim geopolitical and military strength was briefly filled by the emergence of the Ottoman Empire (the last symbol of Islamic power), the ongoing intellectual stagnation contributed to a steady decline of the Ottoman Empire's strength and influence, and the Muslim World found itself unable to respond to a booming European resurgance fueled by the Rennaisance, the Reformation, and the Industrial Revolution. By the end of World War I, most Muslim lands had fallen under foreign occupation. Under varying degrees of European control and influence, the Muslim World was subsequently reshaped along secular nationalist lines and heavily influenced by Western or socialist political philosophies. The role of mosques and the religious establishment was substantially reduced in most Muslim countries, leading to the emergence of political and military elites that viewed Islam as a personal matter and not a basis for political unity or a viable foundation for a modern state. Furthermore, the division of the Muslim World into distinct nation-states caused cultural differences to become more pronounced. These effects, coupled with prevalence of old grudges and rivalries between Muslim regimes (particularly in the Arab world), have prevented large-scale interstate cooperation amongst Muslim states from taking place. Though Islam is still a dominant influence in most Muslim societies and many Muslims remain in favor of a caliphate, tight restrictions on political activity in many Muslim countries coupled with the tremendous practical obstacles to uniting over fifty disparate nation-states under a single institution have prevented efforts to revive the caliphate from garnering much active support, even amongst devout Muslims. Popular apolitical Islamic movements such as the Tablighi Jamaat identify a lack of spirituality and decline in religious observance as the root cause of the Muslim World's problems, and claim that the caliphate cannot be successfully revived until these deficiencies are addressed. No attempts at rebuilding a power structure based on Islam were successful anywhere in the Muslim World until the Iranian Revolution in 1979, which was based on Shia principles and did not deal with the issue of a global caliphate. Various Sunni Islamist movements have gained momentum in recent years, calling for a restoration of the caliphate. However many such movements have as yet been unable to agree on a roadmap or a coherent model of Islamic governance, and dialog on this issue amongst Muslim intellectuals has been characterized by uncertainty and confusion amidst a broad range of viewpoints on what a modern Islamic state should look like. Mainstream Islamic institutions in Muslim countries today have generally not made the restoration of the caliphate a top priority and have instead focused on other issues. Most regimes have actually been hostile to such a call. One transnational group, the Hizb_ut-Tahrir, has tried to recruit the world's Muslims to a renewed caliphate. They have published a draft constitution at [http://www.hizb-ut-tahrir.org].

Famous caliphs

- Abu Bakr - First rightly guided caliph of the Sunnis. Subdued rebel tribes in the Ridda Wars.
- Umar ibn al-Khattab - Second rightly guided caliph. During his reign, the Islamic empire expanded to include Egypt, Jerusalem, and Persia.
- Uthman ibn Affan - Third rightly guided caliph. The Qur'an was compiled under his direction. Killed by rebels.
- Ali ibn Abi Talib - Fourth and last rightly guided caliph, and considered the first imam by Shi'a Muslims. His reign was fraught with internal conflict.
- Muawiya I - First Umayyad caliph. Muawiya instituted dynastic rule by appointing his son Yazid as his successor, a trend that would continue through all subsequent caliphates.
- Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz - Umayyad caliph considered by some (mainly Sunnis) to be a fifth rightly guided caliph.
- Haroon al-Rasheed - Abbasid caliph during whose reign Baghdad became the world's preeminent center of trade, learning, and culture. Haroon is the subject of many stories in the famous work 1001 Arabian Nights.
- Suleiman the Magnificent - Early Ottoman Sultan during whose reign the Ottoman Empire reached its zenith.

Dynasties

The more important dynasties include:
- The Umayyad dynasty in Damascus (661-750), followed by:
- The Abbasid dynasty in Baghdad (750-1258), and later in Cairo (under Mameluke control) (1260-1517)
- The Shi'ite Fatimid dynasty in North Africa and Egypt (909-1171). Not universally accepted and not currently included in the following list.
- The Rahmanids, a surviving branch of the Damascus Umayyads, established 'in exile' as Emirs of Córdoba, Spain, declared themselves Caliphs (known as the Caliphs of Cordoba; not universally accepted; 929-1031)
- The Almohad dynasty in North Africa and Spain (not universally accepted; 1145-1269). Traced their descent not from Muhammad, but from a puritanic reformer in Morocco who claimed to be the Mahdi (a puritanic reformer in Morocco, bringing down the 'decadent' Almoravid emirate) whose son established a sultanate and claimed to be a caliph.
- The Ottomans (1453-1924; main title Padishah, also known as Great Sultan etc., used the title Caliph only sporadically between the 16th and late 19th century Note on the overlap of Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates: After the massacre of the Umayyad clan by the Abbassids, one lone prince escaped and fled to North Africa, which remained loyal to the Umayyads. This was Abd-ar-rahman I. From there, he proceeded to Spain, where he overthrew and united the provinces conquered by previous Umayyad Caliphs (in 712 and 712). From 756 to 929, this Umayyad domain in Spain was an independent emirate, until Abd-ar-rahman III reclaimed the title of Caliph for his dynasty. The Umayyad Emirs of Spain are not listed in the summary below because they did not claim the caliphate until 929. For a full listing of all the Umayyad rulers in Spain see the Umayyad article.

Claims to the caliphate

Many local rulers throughout Islamic history have claimed to be caliphs. Most claims were ignored outside their limited domains. In many cases, these claims were made by rebels against established authorities and died when the rebellion was crushed. Notable claimants include:
- al-Zubayr -- held the Hijaz against the Ummayads
- Caliph of the Sudan -- a Songhai king of the Sahel

Lists of Caliphal dynasties and seats

Years according to the Christian era (all AD)

The Rashidun ("Righteously Guided") Accepted by Sunni Muslims as the first four rulers; Shi'a Muslims believe that the first three rulers were usurpers. - Abu Bakr - 632 - 634 - Umar ibn al-Khattab - 634 - 644 - Uthman ibn Affan - 644 - 656 - Ali ibn Abi Talib - 656 - 661 The Umayyads of Damascus - Muawiyah I - 661 - 680 - Yazid I - 680 - 683 - Muawiya II - 683 - 684 - Marwan I - 684 - 685 - Abd al-Malik - 685 - 705 - al-Walid I - 705 - 715 - Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik - 715 - 717 - Umar II - 717 - 720 - Yazid II - 720 - 724 - Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik - 724 - 743 - Al-Walid II - 743 - 744 - Yazid III - 744 - Ibrahim ibn al-Walid - 744 - Marwan II - 744 - 750 The Abbasids of Baghdad The main branch, in Baghdad (Not accepted by the Muslim dominions in the Iberian peninsula and parts of North Africa) - Abu'l Abbas As-Saffah - 750 - 754 - Al-Mansur - 754 - 775 - Al-Mahdi - 775 - 785 - Al-Hadi- 785 - 786 - Harun al-Rashid - 786 - 809 - Al-Amin - 809 - 813 - Al-Ma'mun - 813 - 833 - Al-Mu'tasim - 833 - 842 - Al-Wathiq - 842 - 847 - Al-Mutawakkil - 847 - 861 - Al-Muntasir - 861 - 862 - Al-Musta'in - 862 - 866 - Al-Mu'tazz - 866 - 869 - Al-Muhtadi - 869 - 870 - Al-Mu'tamid - 870 - 892 - Al-Mu'tadid - 892 - 902 - Al-Muktafi - 902 - 908
- Al-Muqtadir - 908 - 932 - Al-Qahir - 932 - 934 - Ar-Radi - 934 - 940 - Al-Muttaqi - 940 - 944 - Al-Mustakfi - 944 - 946 - Al-Muti - 946 - 974 - At-Ta'i - 974 - 991 - Al-Qadir - 991 - 1031	The Umayyads (Rahmanid branch) of Cordoba (Not universally accepted) - Abd-ar-rahman III, as caliph, 929-961 - Al-Hakam II, 961-976 - Hisham II, 976-1008 - Mohammed II, 1008-1009 - Suleiman, 1009-1010 - Hisham II, restored, 1010-1012 - Suleiman, restored, 1012-1017 - Abd-ar-Rahman IV, 1021-1022 - Abd-ar-Rahman V, 1022-1023 - Muhammad III, 1023-1024 - Hisham III, 1027-1031
- Al-Qa'im - 1031 - 1075 - Al-Muqtadi - 1075 - 1094 - Al-Mustazhir - 1094 - 1118 - Al-Mustarshid - 1118 - 1135 - Ar-Rashid - 1135 - 1136 - Al-Muqtafi - 1136 - 1160	The Almohads of Spain and Morroco (Not widely accepted) - Abd al-Mu'min 1145-1163 - Abu Ya'qub Yusuf I 1163-1184 - Abu Yusuf Ya'qub al-Mansur 1184-1199 - Muhammad an-Nasir 1199-1213 - Abu Ya'qub Yusuf II 1213-1224 - Abd al-Wahid I 1224 - Abdallah 1224-1227 - Yahya 1227-1235 - Idris I 1227-1232 - Abdul-Wahid II 1232-1242 - Ali 1242-1248 - Umar 1248-1266 - Idris II 1266-1269
- Al-Mustanjid - 1160 - 1170 - Al-Mustadi - 1170 - 1180 - An-Nasir - 1180 - 1225 - Az-Zahir - 1225 - 1226 - Al-Mustansir - 1226 - 1242 - Al-Musta'sim - 1242 - 1258 The Abbasid branch of Cairo - Al-Mustansir - 1259-1261 - Al-Hakim I - 1262 - 1302 - Al-Mustakfi I - 1302 - 1340 - Al-Wathiq I - 1340 - 1341 - Al-Hakim II - 1341 - 1352 - Al-Mu'tadid I - 1352 - 1362 - Al-Mutawakkil I - 1362 - 1383 - Al-Wathiq II - 1383 - 1386 - Al-Mu'tasim - 1386 - 1389 - Al-Mutawakkil I (restored) - 1389 - 1406 - Al-Musta'in - 1406 - 1414 - Al-Mu'tadid II - 1414 - 1441 - Al-Mustakfi II - 1441 - 1451
- Al-Qa'im - 1451 - 1455 - Al-Mustanjid - 1455 - 1479 - Al-Mutawakkil II - 1479 - 1497 - Al-Mustamsik - 1497 - 1508 - Al-Mutawakkil III - 1508 - 1517	The Ottoman Padishahs Originally the secular, conquering dynasty was just entitled Sultan, soon it started accumulating titles assumed from subjected peoples - Mehmed (Muhammed) II (the Conqueror of Constantinopel, afterwards Istanbul) - 1451 - 1481 (actively used numerous titles such as of Caliph and Caesar ) - Beyazid II - 1481 - 1512 - Selim I - 1512 - 1520 (actively used title of Caliph ) - Suleiman the Magnificent - 1520 - 1566 - Selim II - 1566 - 1574 - Murad III - 1574 - 1595 - Mehmed(Muhammed) III - 1595 - 1603 - Ahmed I - 1603 - 1617 - Mustafa I (First Reign) - 1617 - 1618 - Osman II - 1618 - 1622 - Mustafa I (Second Reign) - 1622 - 1623 - Murad IV - 1623 - 1640 - Ibrahim I - 1640 - 1648 - Mehmed (Muhammed) IV - 1648 - 1687 - Suleiman II - 1687 - 1691 - Ahmed II - 1691 - 1695 - Mustafa II - 1695 - 1703 - Ahmed III - 1703 - 1730 - Mahmud I - 1730 - 1754 - Osman III - 1754 - 1757 - Mustafa III - 1757 - 1774 - Abd-ul-Hamid I - 1774 - 1789 - Selim III - 1789 - 1807 - Mustafa IV - 1807 - 1808 - Mahmud II - 1808 - 1839 - Abd-ul-Mejid I - 1839 - 1861 - Abd-ul-Aziz - 1861 - 1876 - Murad V - 1876 - Abd-ul-Hamid II - 1876 - 1909 (actively used title of Caliph) Note: From 1908 onwards constitutional monarch without executive powers, with parliament consisting of chosen representatives. - Mehmed(Muhammed) V - 1909 - 1918 (constitutional monarch/Caliph without executive powers, parliament consisting of chosen representatives) - Mehmed (Muhammed)VI - 1918 - 1922 (constitutional monarch/Caliph without executive powers, parliament consisting of chosen representatives) The secular Republic of Turkey - Abdul Mejid II - 1922 - 1924; only as Caliph (Head of state: Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha) - Grand National Assembly of Turkey (Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi) 1924-1937 Although the title of Caliph is currently unused, it could conceivably be used again if the Turkish parliament were to decide to reactivate it.

The Sharifan house in (now Saudi) Arabia

A last attempt at restoring the caliphal office and style with ecumenical recognition was made by al-Husayn ibn `Ali al-Hashimi, King of al-Hijaz, who assumed both 11 Mar 1924 and held them until his passing the kingship to his son `Ali ibn al-Husayn al-Hashimi, who did not adopt the khalifal office and style.

Sources and References

- Crone, Patricia & Hinds, Martin -- God's Caliph, Cambridge University Press, 1986
- Donner, Fred -- The Early Islamic Conquests, Princeton University Press, 1981
- [http://www.worldstatesmen.org/Religious_Organizations.html#Caliphate WorldStatesmen] here Religious Organisations (click Muslim Caliphate) - see also present countries per caliphal seat
- [http://www.storyofpakistan.com/articletext.asp?artid=A033 History of the Indian Khilafat Movement]
- [http://www.caliphate.co.uk/ A vision of a 21st Century Khilafah]
- [http://www-personal.umich.edu/~luqman/ List of articles on the nature of a new Khilafah]
- [http://www.khilafah.or.id/ Page dedicated to having a Khilafah in Indonesia]
- [http://howcaliphatewillwork.blogspot.com/ Caliphate Blog]
- [http://www.witness-pioneer.org/vil/Articles/politics/political_framework_of_islam.htm The Political Framework of Islam & Khilafah by Prof. Kurshid Ahmad]
- [http://www.witness-pioneer.org/vil/Articles/politics/understanding_politics_in_islam.htm Prof Yusuf al-Qaradawi on The politics of Islam]
- [http://www.witness-pioneer.org/vil/Articles/politics/espo.html Political Islam: Beyond the Green Menace, by John Esposito, Journal of Current History] Category:Caliphate Category:Heads of state Category:Monarchy Category:Noble titles Category:Religious leaders Category:Titles Category:Arabic words ja:カリフ

Muhammad

: "Muhammad" is a common Muslim male name. For other prominent people called Muhammad, see Muhammad (disambiguation) Muhammad (, also transliterated Mohammad, Mohammed, Muhammed, and sometimes Mahomet (Latin Mahometus), following the Latin or Turkish), is believed by Muslims to be God's final prophet sent to guide mankind with the message of Islam. Non-Muslims generally consider him to be the founder of Islam. According to traditional Muslim biographers, he was born ca. 570 in Mecca (Makkah) and died June 8 632 in Medina (Madinah); both Mecca and Medina are cities in the Hejaz region of present day Saudi Arabia. Literally, Muhammad means "highly praised" in Arabic.

Summary

Born Muhammad ibn Abdullah, he is said to have been a merchant who traveled widely. Muslims believe that in 610, at about the age of forty, while praying in a cave called "Hira" near Mecca, he experienced a vision. Later, he described the experience (to those close to him) as a visit from the Angel Gabriel, who commanded him to memorize and recite the verses sent by God which were later collected as the Qur'an. Gabriel told him that God (Allah) had chosen him as the last of the prophets to mankind. He eventually expanded his mission as a prophet, publicly preaching a strict monotheism and predicting a Day of Judgement. He did not completely reject Judaism and Christianity, two other monotheistic faiths known to the Arabs; he said that he had been sent by God in order to complete and perfect their teachings. Many of his neighbors resented his preaching, and persecuted Muhammad and his followers. In 622, he was forced to flee from Mecca and settle in Yathrib (now known as Medina) with his followers, where he was the leader of the first avowedly Muslim community. War between Mecca and Medina followed, in which Muhammad and his followers were eventually victorious. The military organization honed in this struggle was then set to conquering the other tribes of Arabia. By the time of Muhammad's death, he had unified Arabia, spread Islam throughout the Arab Peninsula, and launched expeditions to the north, towards Syria and Palestine. Under prophet Muhammad's immediate successors the Islamic empire expanded into Palestine, Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, North Africa, and Iberia. Later conquests, commercial contact between Muslims and non-Muslims, and missionary activity spread Islam over much of the globe.

Sources about Muhammad's life

The sources available about Muhammad's life are the Qur'an, the sira biographies, and the hadith collections. While the Qur'an is not a biography of Muhammad, it does provide some information about his life. The earliest surviving biographies are the Life of the Apostle of God, by Ibn Ishaq (d. 768), edited by Ibn Hisham (d. 833); and al-Waqidi's (d. 822) biography of Muhammad. Ibn Ishaq wrote his biography some 120 to 130 years after Muhammad's death. The third source, the hadith collections, like the Qur'an, are not a biography per se. In both the Sunni and Shia belief, they are the accounts of the words and actions of Muhammad. Some skeptical scholars (Wansbrough, Cook, Crone, and others) have raised doubts about the reliability of these sources, especially the hadith collections. They argue that by the time the oral traditions were being collected, the Muslim community had fractured into rival sects and schools of thought. Each sect and school had its own sometimes conflicting traditions of what Muhammad and his companions had done and said. Traditions multiplied, and Muslim scholars made a strenuous effort to weed out what they felt were spurious stories. Traditionalists rely on their efforts while the skeptics feel that the question must be revisited. Muslim and non-Muslim scholars alike agree that there are some inauthentic traditions concerning the life of Muhammad in the hadith collections. Most of these traditions are acknowledged by Muslim clerical authorities to be weak; only a few hadith collections are considered reliable. A very small minority called the "Quran Alone Muslims" consider all hadith as unreliable. However, the historicity of the biographical material about Muhammad presented in the summary above is not generally contested. Traditionalists, both Muslim and non-Muslim, paint a much more detailed picture of Muhammad's life.

Muhammad's life according to Sira

Muhammad's genealogy

According to tradition, Muhammad traced his genealogy back as far as Adnan, whom the northern Arabs believed to be their common ancestor. Adnan in turn is said to be a descendant of Ismaeel (Ishmael), son of Ibrahim (Abraham) though the exact genealogy is disputed. Muhammad's genealogy up to Adnan is as follows: Muhammad ibn Abd Allah ibn Abd al-Muttalib (Shaiba) ibn Hashim (Amr) ibn Abd Manaf (al-Mughira) ibn Qusai (Zaid) ibn Kilab ibn Murra ibn Ka`b ibn Lu'ay ibn Ghalib ibn Fahr (Quraish) ibn Malik ibn an-Nadr (Qais) ibn Kinana ibn Khuzaimah ibn Mudrikah (Amir) ibn Ilyas ibn Mudar ibn Nizar ibn Ma`ad ibn Adnan. (ibn = "son of" in Arabic; alternate names of people with two names are given in brackets.) His nickname was Abul-Qaasim, "father of Qaasim", after his short-lived first son.

Childhood

Muhammad was born into a well-to-do family settled in the northern Arabian town of Mecca. Some calculate his birthdate as April 20, 570 (Shia Muslims believe it to be April 26), and some as 571; tradition places it in the Year of the Elephant. Muhammad's father, Abdullah, had died before he was born and the young boy was brought up by his paternal grandfather Abd al-Muttalib, of the tribe of Quraysh. Tradition says that as an infant, he was placed with a Bedouin wetnurse, Halima, as desert life was believed to be safer and healthier for children. At the age of six, Muhammad lost his mother Amina, and at the age of eight his grandfather Abd al-Muttalib. Muhammad now came under care of his uncle Abu Talib, the new leader of the Hashim clan of the Quraysh tribe, the most powerful in Mecca. Mecca was a thriving commercial centre, due in great part to a stone temple (now called the Kaaba) that housed many different idols. Merchants from different tribes would visit Mecca during the pilgrimage season, when all inter-tribal warfare was forbidden and they could trade in safety. While still in his teens, Muhammad began accompanying his uncle on trading journeys to Syria. He thus became well-travelled and knowledgeable as to foreign ways.

Middle years

Muhammad became a merchant and one of his employers was Khadijah, a rich widow then forty years old. The young twenty-five-year old Muhammad has impressed Khadijah and she proposed to him in the year 595. By Arab custom, minors did not inherit, so Muhammad had received no inheritance from either his father or his grandfather. Ibn Ishaq records that Khadijah bore Muhammad five children, one son and four daughters. All of Khadija's children were born before Muhammad received his first revelation. His son Qasim died at the age of two. The four daughters are said to be Zainab, Ruqayyah, Umm Kulthum, and Fatimah. The Shi'a say that Muhammad had only the one daughter, Fatima, and that the other daughters were either children of Khadijah by her previous marriage, or children of her sister.

The first revelations

Muhammad had a reflective turn of mind and routinely spent nights in a cave (Hira) near Mecca in meditation and thought. Muslims believe that around the year 610, while meditating, Muhammad had a vision of the Angel Gabriel and heard a voice saying to him (in rough translation) "Read in the name of your Lord the Creator. He created man from something which clings. Read, and your Lord is the Most Honored. He taught man with the pen; taught him all that he knew not." (See surat Al-Alaq for a fuller account.) The first vision of Gabriel disturbed Muhammad, but his wife Khadijah reassured him that it was a true vision and became his first follower. She was soon followed by his ten-year-old cousin Ali ibn Abi Talib, and Abu Bakr, whom Sunnis assert to have been Muhammad's closest friend. Until his death, Muhammad reportedly received frequent revelations, although there was a relatively long gap after the first revelation. This silence worried him, until he received surat ad-Dhuha, whose words provided comfort and reassurance. Around 613, Muhammad began to spread his message amongst the people. Most of those who heard his message ignored it. A few mocked him. Some, however, believed and joined his small group.

Rejection

As the ranks of Muhammad's followers swelled, he became a threat to the local tribes and the rulers of the city. Their wealth, after all, rested on the Kaaba, a sacred house of idols and the focal point of Meccan religious life. If they threw out their idols, as Muhammad preached, there would be no more pilgrims, no more trade, and no more wealth. Muhammad’s denunciation of polytheism was especially offensive to his own tribe, the Quraysh, as they were the guardians of the Ka'aba. Muhammad and his followers were persecuted. Some of them fled to Abyssinia and founded a small colony there. Several suras and parts of suras are said to date from this time, and reflect its circumstances: see for example al-Masadd, al-Humaza, parts of Maryam and al-Anbiya, al-Kafirun, and Abasa. In 619, both Muhammad's wife Khadijah and his uncle Abu Talib died; it was known as "the year of sorrows." Muhammad's own clan withdrew their protection of him. Muslims patiently endured hunger and persecution.

Isra and Miraj

Some time in 620, the prophet Muhammad told his followers that he had experienced the Isra and Miraj, a miraculous journey said to have been accomplished in one night. In the first part of the journey, the Isra, he is said to have travelled from Mecca to Jerusalem. In the second part, the Miraj, Muhammad is said to have toured Heaven and Hell, and spoken with earlier prophets, such as Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. Muslims believe that the Jerusalem mosque known as the Masjid al-Aqsa is built over the site from which Muhammad ascended to Heaven.

Hijra

By 622, life in the small Muslim community of Mecca was becoming not only difficult, but dangerous. Muslim traditions say that there were several attempts to assassinate Muhammad. Muhammad then resolved to emigrate to Medina, then known as Yathrib, a large agricultural oasis where there were a number of Muslim converts. By breaking the link with his own tribe, Muhammad demonstrated that tribal and family loyalties were insignificant compared to the bonds of Islam, a revolutionary idea in the tribal society of Arabia. This Hijra or emigration (traditionally translated into English as "flight") marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar. The Muslim calendar counts dates from the Hijra, which is why Muslim dates have the suffix AH (After Hijra). Muhammad came to Medina as a mediator, invited to resolve the feud between the Arab factions of Aws and Khazraj. He ultimately did so by absorbing both factions into his Muslim community, and forbidding bloodshed among Muslims. However, Medina was also home to a number of Jewish tribes (whether they were ethnically as well as religiously Jewish is an open question, as is the depth of their "Jewishness"). Muhammad had hoped that they would recognize him as a prophet, but they did not do so. Some academic historians suggest that Muhammad abandoned hope of recruiting Jews as allies or followers at this time, and thus the qibla, the Muslim direction of prayer, was changed from the site of the former Temple in Jerusalem to the Kabaa in Mecca. Non-Muslim settlements within Muslim territories were taxed rather than expelled. Muhammad drafted a document now known as the Constitution of Medina (ca. 622-623), which laid out the terms on which the different factions, specifically the Jews, could exist within the new Islamic State. In this system, the Jews and other "Peoples of the Book" were allowed to keep their religions as long as they paid tribute. This system would come to typify Muslim relations

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