The Jews in the Islamic World

From the Rise of Islam to the End of the Middle Ages (632 to 1500)

By the seventh century, the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanid Empire and their subject peoples were exhausted by centuries of warfare- Into the vacuum stepped a new power that had arisen in Arabia.
The inhabitants of the Arabian peninsula included both desert nomads and town dwellers. They were quite familiar with both the Roman and the Persian worlds, having for centuries lived on the margin of the two great empires, trading with them, serving as mercenaries in their armies, raiding their caravans, and sometimes establishing miniature kingdoms under the protection of one or the other. They were mostly pagans, but some of them were Christians and Jews. It seems to have been through conversations with them that Muhammad (c. 570-632), a businessman from Mecca, came to believe in the principles of monotheism: one incorporeal God who reveals himself through sacred scriptures and who will come W judge all humanity in a final day of judgment. He experienced visions in which he was commissioned to disseminate this message among his own people in the Arabic language. Read the rest of this entry »