For over 1400 years Muslims have played a leading role in the history of the world. From Spain to China, Muslims have left a lasting impact on the development of different regions. This history has been lost, ignored, or just plain rewritten to ignore Muslims. For too long both Muslims and non-Muslims have been ignorant of this illustrious history.
In this thread, we will try to re-post interesting historical facts related to Muslims from https://www.facebook.com/LostIslamicHistory
You are also invited to participate with us. Please keep this thread for posting the facts and updates only. For discussions, please quote a post and create a new thread for it.
In 956, the geographer al-Masudi drew a world map that included a new continent across the ocean from Africa and labelled it the "unknown land". That was 536 years before Columbus.
In the 1700s, European settlers in North America discovered a tombstone for a Native American prince by the name of "Mahomet", a common corruption of (the name) Muhammad. He could have been descended from Muslim settlers who had intermarried with Natives before Europeans arrived, or a African slaves brought over by the Europeans.
I am a Cherokee Blackfoot American Indian who is Muslim. I am known as Eagle Sun Walker. I serve as a Pipe Carrier Warrior for the Northeastern Band of Cherokee Indians in New York City.
There are other Muslims in our group. For the most part, not many people are aware of the Native American contact with Islam that began over one thousand years ago by some of the early Muslim travelers who visited us. Some of these Muslim travelers ended up living among our people.
For most Muslims and non-Muslims of today, this type of information is unknown and has never been mentioned in any of the history books. There are many documents, treaties, legislation and resolutions that were passed between 1600s and 1800s that show that Muslims were in fact here and were very active in the comunities in which they lived. Treaties such as Peace and Friendship that was signed on the Delaware River in the year 1787 bear the signatures of Abdel-Khak and Muhammad Ibn Abdullah. This treaty details our continued right to exist as a community in the areas of commerce, maritime shipping, current form of government at that time which was in accordance with Islam.
Because of three conflicting agreements made during WWI, Britain was forced to divide up the Middle East arbitrarily in a way that did not respect the wishes or needs of the local populations. Learn more: http://lostislamichistory.com/how-th...he-arab-world/
A very interesting article from the New York Tribune on June 17, 1917, announcing the a new nation to be carved out of the Ottoman Empire called #Palestine.
"In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. This is the assurance of safety which the servant of God, Umar, the Commander of the Faithful, has given to the people of Jerusalem. He has given them an assurance of safety for themselves for their property, their churches, their crosses, the sick and healthy of the city and for all the rituals which belong to their religion. Their churches will not be inhabited by Muslims and will not be destroyed. Neither they, nor the land on which they stand, nor their cross, nor their property will be damaged. They will not be forcibly converted."
- Treaty of Umar for the Christians of Jerusalem when the Muslims conquered the holy city in 637
The Pact of Umar in 637 assured the Christians of Jerusalem freedom of religion and protection under the law. This is over 1000 years before America's Constitution assured the same to non-Christians.
1150 years before America's Bill of Rights, the Muslims under Umar ibn al-Khattab promised religious freedom to Christians in Jerusalem.
After the Muslims conquered Jerusalem in 637, Umar ibn al-Khattab personally cleaned the area of the al-Aqsa Mosque which had been used as a garbage dump by the Romans.
On 3rd of June in 1098, the Crusaders were able to conquer the fortress city of Antioch and massacre its population. Antioch was the only major obstacle preventing them from reaching Jerusalem.
When the Crusaders conquered Jerusalem in 1099, they massacred every resident until the "blood was to our ankles". When Salah al-Din liberated the city 88 years later, all residents were allowed to leave safely with their property. THAT is the effect of Islam in the world.
In 1099, after the Crusaders captured Jerusalem and massacred its population, a scholar, Abu Sa'd al-Harawi, traveled to Baghdad, to rally support among Muslims to oppose the invaders. He led a protest where the people and the caliph promised to do all they can to liberate Jerusalem.
In the coming weeks and months, however, nothing came out of all the promises and expressions of support. The people of Iraq, Syria, and Egypt continued to be preoccupied with their own lives and issues. It would be another 88 years before the Muslim world managed to unite enough to liberate Masjid al-Aqsa.
In 1187, the great general Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi finally liberated Jerusalem from the Crusaders and re-established it as a Muslim city. Learn more about Salah al-Din and the liberation in the latest Lost Islamic History podcast! http://youtu.be/-HZ3WQR2hVI
Salah al-Din was a scholar in addition to a general.
He once quoted a Musalsal Hadith around some soldiers. A Musalsal Hadith is a Hadith in which one performs the same action that Prophet Muhammad performed when he originally said it. In the Musalsal Hadith he quoted, the Prophet (S) smiled, but Salah al-Din did not smile when he narrated it. When asked why, he responded, "How can I smile while the Crusaders are in Jerusalem?"
When he liberated Jerusalem in 1187, he went up in a public space in front of the people and smiled for a long while to make up for that musalsal Hadith.
In the 11th and 12th centuries, two great Muslim military leaders emerged to roll back the tide of European conquest of Muslim lands:
In the 1000s Yusuf ibn Tashfin, a Berber, united al-Andalus under the Murabitun movement and held back conquest by Alfonso VI.
In the 1100s Yusuf ibn Ayyub (Salah al-Din), a Kurd, united Egypt and Syria and defeated the Crusaders, liberating Jerusalem.
In both cases, unity was not based on language or culture, but on religious conviction and a desire to contribute to a successful Muslim ummah.
During the European Dark Ages, Arabic culture and writing were seen as high class. Thus, many Christian paintings from that time had fake Arabic calligraphy in them, including paintings of the Virgin Mary!
Unlike popular beliefs in the West, religion and science are not mutually exclusive. Many of the greatest scientific achievements of the Muslim Golden Age were fueled by religious belief.
For example, the field of algebra was developed in the 800s by al-Khawarizmi in order to better calculate Islamic laws of inheritance and charity.
The scientific method in use today was first propagated by Ibn al-Haytham in 11th century Egypt.
Ibn al-Haytham - The First Scientist
Today's textbooks speak of Newton, Galileo, and Einstein, but ignore the man who inspired them. Without Ibn al-Haytham, science as we know it would not exist.
"The people think of wealth and power as the greatest fate,
But in this world a spell of health is the best state.
What men call sovereignty is a worldly strife and constant war;
Worship of God is the highest throne, the happiest of all estates." - Sultan Suleyman Kanuni
Read more: http://lostislamichistory.com/the-re...uleyman-kanun/
On 15 September 786, the caliph al-Ma'mun was born in Baghdad. He founded the House of Wisdom in the early 800s to promote scientific advancement in the Muslim world.
For 70 years in the 1000s, al-Andalus was in a period of political disunity (very similar to today) that led to overall weakness and conquest by outsiders.
Disunity in al-Andalus: The Taifa Period
One of the recurring themes of Islamic history is that disunity in the Muslim world has consistently led to weakness and the decline of one-powerful empires.
"Justice may be known from tyranny by the Shari'ah [Holy Law]; let the religion of God and the law of the Prophet of God be the goal of every departure and the refuge of every return."
Did you know the world's first intercontinental flight occurred in Istanbul in the 1600s, along with the world's first manned rocket flight?
Read more: Pioneers of Aviation: 17th Century Flight in Istanbul
One of the most enduring (and incorrect) accusations made about the Ottoman Empire is that it was intellectually stagnant. Orientalist historians claim that the Ottomans saw science and religion as mutually exclusive and incompatible, unlike earlier Muslim dynasties. While this accusation may be true for some time periods in Ottoman history, there were many examples of Ottoman scientific and intellectual progress. One notable example is the attempts at human flight made by a pair of brothers in the 1600s in Istanbul.
In the early 900s, the astronomer and mathematician al-Battani developed trigonometry to better understand the motion of planets.
Trigonometry today is a major subject taught in most secondary schools and is based on the work of al-Battani and other Muslim mathematicians of the Golden Age. — in Samarra', Salah ad Din, Iraq.
The Çifte Minareli Medrese is an Islamic school built by the Seljuk Dynasty in 1265 in Erzurum. Its name means "Twin Minaret School" — in Erzurum, Turkey.
Despite being over 4,000 kilometers apart, in 1508 the Mamluks of Egypt and the Gujarat Sultanate allied together to defeat an invading Portuguese fleet in the Indian Ocean.
When Muhammad bin Qasim invaded into Northwestern #India in 711, his small army was able to control a vast area because of the religious freedom guaranteed to all non-Muslims, including Buddhists and Hindus. His army was so respected that many cities greeted the Muslim army with music and dancing in honor of the religious freedom granted to them.
Because of the immense effort that Imam al-Bukhari put into verifying each and every hadith in his compilation, Sahih al-Bukhari has been commonly called the "second most authentic book after the Quran".
The decline and fall of the Ottoman Empire is one of the most complex and controversial events in Islamic history. It involves problems in Ottoman government, economics, religion, and nationalism.
During the Crusades, aspects of Islamic law may have been brought back to Europe from the Muslim world. For example, trust law developed in England in the 12th and 13th centuries, and has many similarities to Islamic laws regarding waqfs (endowments).
Other aspects of Islamic law spread into Christian Europe through Muslim Spain and Sicily during the Middle Ages.
On 25 Sept 1396, Ottoman Sultan Bayezid I defeated an allied Crusader army of Hungarian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, French, Burgundian, and German forces at the Battle of Nicopolis in Bulgaria. — in Nikopoli, Pleven, Bulgaria.
The world's oldest university is the University of al-Karaouine in Fes, Morocco. It was established by a Muslim woman in 859 CE. — in Fez, Figuig, Morocco.
Many early Muslim scientific discoveries were fueled by Islam itself. For example, in the 800s al-Khawarizmi developed algebra to more easily calculate things like Zakat (almsgiving) and inheritance according to Islamic law.
Contrary to the problems seen in Medieval Europe, Islam and science never conflicted.
Ibn al-Haytham - The First Scientist
lostislamichistory.com
Today's textbooks speak of Newton, Galileo, and Einstein, but ignore the man who inspired them. Without Ibn al-Haytham, science as we know it would not exist.
On this day in 1923, Britain created the Mandate of Palestine. Its borders were artificially carved out of the Ottoman Empire and define what is now considered "Palestine".
On this day in 1238, Muslim Valencia was lost to Christian Spaniards. — in Valencia, Comunidad Valenciana, Spain.
One of the recurring themes of Islamic history is that disunity in the Muslim world has consistently led to weakness and the decline of one-powerful empires.
Read more: Disunity in al-Andalus: The Taifa Period
Many abolitionists seeking to free American slaves in the 1800s used Islam and Muslim history to promote their cause.
Horace Mann, a Massachusetts politician, argued in 1847 in the House of Representatives that "Mahometanism (Islam) precedes Christianity, and sets it an example of virtue". He also stated that Prophet Muhammad (S) once said "the worst of men is the seller of men" to make his point against slavery.
In the mid-900s, al-Andalus was gifted an Ancient Greek text about pharmacology from the Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII. For a year, a Jewish rabbi, an Orthodox Christian monk, and several Muslims worked on translating it into Arabic in order to advance science and medical therapy.
Such an effort would have been completely inconceivable anywhere else in Europe at the time.
Since April of this year, over 4,500 Iraqis have been killed in sectarian violence. Where did the divisions in Iraqi society come from? Learn more here: The Roots of Iraq's Sectarian Division
The mihrab of the Small Khan Mosque in Bakhchisarai, Ukraine. It was built in the 1500s by the Crimean Tatars. The star at the top was commonly used by Turks throughout the Middle Ages and was known as the "Seal of Sulayman" hundreds of years before its adoption by the Zionist movement. — in Bakhchysaray, Krym, Ukraine.
In 1924, the secular government of Turkey under the leadership of Ataturk instituted a ban on headscarves for women. Today the Turkish government lifted that ban.
“I constantly sought knowledge and truth, and it became my belief that for gaining access to the splendor and closeness to God, there is no better way than that of searching for truth and knowledge.” -Ibn al-Haytham
Read more: Ibn al-Haytham - The First Scientist
Today's textbooks speak of Newton, Galileo, and Einstein, but ignore the man who inspired them. Without Ibn al-Haytham, science as we know it would not exist.
In the 900s, al-Nayrizi found a method for determining one's location on the earth so that they could properly face Makkah for prayer using the stars. The math behind his method is the basis for modern GPS technology.
In 1492, Spain had over 500,000 Muslims. By 1614, every single one was either expelled or killed.
Spain’s Muslims were given 3 days to leave their homes and board ships destined for foreign lands in 1609.
Read more: Spain's Forgotten Muslims - The Expulsion of the Moriscos
In 100 years, over 500,000 of Spain's Muslims were killed, forced to convert, or exiled from their homeland. The tragedy of this genocide of religious intolerance by Spain's Christians must never b...
On this day (7 October 1571) the Ottoman Navy was destroyed by an alliance of Italian states and the Spanish Empire at the Battle of Lepanto. — in Lepanto, Aitolia kai Akarnania, Greece.
The mihrab of the Grand Mosque of Niebla, Spain. Built in the 10th century, it was converted into a church after being conquered by the Kingdom of Leon and Castille in 1262. — in Niebla, Andalucia, Spain.
“[Alcohol causes] general weakness of most of the nerves of the body, difficulties in articulation, weakness of voluntary movements, arthralgias, gout, etc.. disturbances of the liver which causes tumors and obstructions which is a definite cause of ascites and general ill health” - Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi
Muslim physicians were aware of the negative effects of alcohol hundreds of years before modern medicine and prohibition movements.
In September 1567, Ottoman Sultan Selim II issued an imperial order sending an Ottoman admiral with 15 galleys and 2 galleons to the Sultan of Aceh (part of present-day Indonesia) to serve under his command in a war against a neighboring kingdom.
Despite being 8000 kilometers away, relations between the two sultanates were strong throughout the 16th century.
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conquered Damascus from the Byzantines.
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