Caliph

Much of the media coverage we experience today regarding Muslims and Islam circles around the term jihad. Often, the term “jihadist” is tagged to groups of individuals that employee extreme terrorist tactics. As a result, through Western eyes, jihad is violent Islam; Islam as a religion encourages practitioners to engage in jihad via terrorism. While many Muslims do emphasize jihad as an important aspect of their faith, in many cases, it does not imply violence or terrorism. Jihad was not…

Christianity and Judaism, Islam had a figurehead who guiding the thinking of the early Muslim faith. This leader was Muhammad, and he set out to spread Islam across Arabia and to convert the mainly tribal and pagan Bedouin’s, to Islam. He and the Caliphs, Muslim civil leaders, did so through vast military conquests that extended from Africa, to Western Europe. However, it goes without saying that like most of the ancient monotheist religions, Islam experience great turmoil on its path to…

Shortly after Muhammed founded Islam, Muslims began ruling the Arab lands. Jews lived as a minority under a variety of Muslim-ruled governments. Their rights and privileges were significantly less than that of their Muslim counterparts. In fact, Jews were part of the Dhimmi, which was considered to be any non-believer of Islam. A constant in these hierarchical relationships was Muslims in government and Jewish subjugation. Some scholars say that the motivation behind this oppression was…

Over a hundred thousand people died during the time of the First Crusade. The First Crusade was a devastatingly long fight between the Christians and the Seljuk Turks for many reasons, but the main reason being because the Seljuk Turks were residing in Jerusalem. The Christians had many reasons for starting the First Crusade which impacted the Christian and Islamic relationship forever. The capture of Jerusalem by the Muslim forces along with the letter sent to Pope Urban II by Emperor Alexius I…

Judaism vs. Hinduism Judaism and Hinduism are much more similar up close than they appear at a distance. Now after some looking into them both I realize just how alike they really are. After you have read about the comparison between them, you will realize how much these two really have in common. The two religions I chose to compare are Judaism and Hinduism. Judaism is a Middle Eastern religion that originated in Israel. Hinduism is a religion that originated in India. Both of these religions…

seemed to pursue scholarly and religious matters as opposed to military matters. He took part in three campaigns in Egypt before becoming the head of expeditionary military forces later in1169. He was later appointed as a Wazir (advisor) to the Shi'ite caliph in Cairo consolidating his position by removing the Fatimid's sub-Saharan infantry slave forces. Salah al-Din brought the Shi'ite Fatimid caliphate to a halt which led to the recognition of Sunni caliphate in Baghdad (Brill & Houtsma,…

The Byzantine world was forever altered by the rapid conquest of territories which the Arab armies began in the seventh century. These conquests were due in large part to the martial ability of the Arabic army. Later, tying administrative power to Arab culture, religious unity, and even Islam’s similarities to Christianity aided in the retention and Arabization of the captured territory. In all but one of these cases, the Arabic states followed models created by the Roman, and later, the…

Paper1 To be placed in the role of a general over a battlefield and to combat the opposing general; this is the essence of Chess. Chess is a noble two player strategy game with a reasonable skill floor yet an infinitely high skill cap. This depth leads to a highly captivating game, one where ”An outsider looking on casually might find the intensity incomprehensible. But anyone who has played the game a few times understands how it be engrossing in the extreme”(Shenk 6). The goal of Chess is to…

Today, in Egypt, we are left with the ruins of art and architecture. The pyramids, sphinxes, and tombs were torn apart by the later Egyptian Dynasties and destroyed by looters. Some of the loss of artifacts this have to do with time, earthquakes, and past looters, but the biggest culprits, that many do not think of first, are the early Egyptologists. It was all about getting the biggest and most impressive objects and not really about the importance of the object in context to the area. Because…

who were religious fanatics, arrived in Spain in the year 711 and thus began a period of history which would shape Iberia differently than the rest of Europe as the land adapted to a new religion, language and culture. Hispania became a part of the caliph of Damascus which was the capital of the Muslim world. This Moorish land was known as Al-Andalus and included all of the Iberian Peninsula except for the extreme north-west from where the Christian Reconquest would originate…