AHC: Curb Islam Post Golden Age Peak

With no PoDs prior to 841 CE, how much can the further growth of Islam, as a world religion, be prevented (in terms of population of adherents)? If we can agree on changes that would do this, what would be the larger affects of said changes?

To get us started, the latter 9th century was a hard time for the Abbassid Caliphate as is OTL, so it should give is stuff to work with. Alternatively, we might just focus on keeping future large centers of population (India, Indonesia, etc) from seeing Islamic growth in future centuries.
 
I tend to believe that Islam had a continuous Golden Age, as they held a lead in many fields long after the end of the "Golden Age", the last being medicine under the Mughals.

Anyways, there were actually Persian Zoroastrian states that existed after 841, and many Zoroastrians persisted in Persia. The last Zoroastrian state was the Ziyarid Dynasty, under Mardavij, from 930 to 935. So, you could avoid the near-destruction of Zoroastrianism quite easily at this point.

India is quite easy - just avoid the Ghurid Dynasty invading it. In fact, with this POD, you could see Ghor remain largely Buddhist. This butterflies away the Delhi Sultanate, which was the entity that introduced Islam to India on a large scale. Of course, Sindh is still going to have a large Islamic minority, but that's a minor point. Without India having its large Muslim minority, interactions with Indian Muslims and Indonesians will be butterflied away and replaced by interactions with Indian Hindus and Buddhists, which results in Indonesia and Malaysia remaining largely Hindu-Buddhist.
 
When it comes to the Middle East itself, there is of course the big enemy of the Caliphate-the Caesars of Rome. The early 9th century was pretty harsh on them (the POD is post the sack of Amorium etc), but the ability of the Caliphate to successfully invade Anatolia was basically over around this time (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lalakaon in 863 would be the effective end). I am skeptical whether they could mount a successful counteroffensive in the 9th Century itself (with Sicily, Italy and Bulgaria being major distractions), but with PODs at 841-it is entirely possible to have an alt-Macedonian dynasty that goes massively expansionist in the early 10th Century to take over the Levant and maybe parts of Northern Mesopotamia (some earlier version of John Tzimiskes who lived longer). Egypt-will be a very difficult nut to crack, but is not entirely outside the realm of possibility. That may not be needed though, a Byzantine Empire that holds the non-Egypt bits of the Eastern Med alone would restrict growth of Islam quite a bit, assuming it survives nomadic waves long enough to evolve to be a gunpowder Empire. Of course, a Zorastrian recovery in Persia as suggested by @fjihr may very well prevent Turks from going muslim, which would be interesting in itself-but I think any that wind up in Mesopotamia would ultimately convert to Islam, and be a problem for Romania.

Regarding SE Asia, you need to curtail Arab traders in the Indian Ocean as well-and this might be difficult if Egypt remains muslim. Huh, maybe you do need to have that fall under the Roman yoke or become an independent Coptic state. Mesopotamia would be difficult without a figure like Temujin to help things along.
 
but I think any that wind up in Mesopotamia would ultimately convert to Islam

Who says that Turks would end up in Mesopotamia? I think that non-Islamic Turks would simply invade India without any religious link between them and the Middle East, just as Central Asia had done long before Islam existed. India's closer to Central Asia, and thus more accessible to them.

Regarding SE Asia, you need to curtail Arab traders in the Indian Ocean as well-and this might be difficult if Egypt remains muslim.

Keeping India from having a large Muslim minority is likely the key to that - Indian Muslim traders played a major role in converting Indonesia and Malaysia to Islam, and if India is still almost entirely Hindu, that would mean more Hindu traders, resulting in Indonesia remaining largely Hindu-Buddhist.
 
One good way to do this is to get the Druze to become a real issue. IOTL the Druze were basically a shadowy, vaguely Gnostic religious cult that eventually moved to Syria, but originally they were a significant religion throughout Egypt. They could end up in power in Egypt, effectively splitting the Muslim world in half.
 
The last Zoroastrian state was the Ziyarid Dynasty, under Mardavij, from 930 to 935. So, you could avoid the near-destruction of Zoroastrianism quite easily at this point.
And they kept going after that as a Muslim dynasty. They're an interesting bunch.

You could certainly have a more successful Mardavij who avoids the assassin's blade; there was about a five-year period where he went on a tear.

In the west, you could posit a successful Ibn Hafsun in al-Andalus and have him actually convert back to Christianity en route to toppling the Emirs there.

In the east, you could even go so far as to have the Seljuks show up as some religion other than Muslim. Evidently Seljuk was Nestorian or Jewish before he adopted Islam; have Seljuk stay Nestorian and pass it on to his descendants. The turmoil and clan infighting in the Oghuz Yabgu practically guarantees that some gang of angry guys from the steppe will be on its way to wallop the Muslim world.
 
In the east, you could even go so far as to have the Seljuks show up as some religion other than Muslim. Evidently Seljuk was Nestorian or Jewish before he adopted Islam; have Seljuk stay Nestorian and pass it on to his descendants. The turmoil in the Oghuz Yabgu practically guarantees that some gang of Oghuz Turks will be on its way to wallop the Muslim world.

My issue with the "non-Islamic Turks" scenario is that, without a religious connection to the Middle East, why would they take all of the effort to invade Persia to reach a wealthy land far away? It's much easier for them to simply invade India, which is right next door.
 
My issue with the "non-Islamic Turks" scenario is that, without a religious connection to the Middle East, why would they take all of the effort to invade Persia to reach a wealthy land far away? It's much easier for them to simply invade India, which is right next door.
Depends which Turks you're talking about; especially for the Oghuz at the time, going southeast means crossing Afghanistan to get to India proper, and going too east-ish means you're not fighting fellow Oghuz anymore, you're fighting Yaghmas and Karluks. The Seljuks lived on the Syr Darya, pretty close to the Aral. Once you've smacked the Ghaznavids, getting to the rest of their stuff is going to mean going through the mountains; on the other hand, from the Syr Darya, you can head south and hit Urgench and then keep going to wind up in Persia. Sure, Persia's no land of green and rolling fields either, but if you stick close enough to the Caspian coast you'll end up in Hyrcania, which has a huge rainforest, lots of green land and a nice climate.

Christendom's also west-ish. That is to say, if you're Seljuk's grandson and you have thousands of horsemen at your back and you're Nestorian, why not go to Syria? If you're Jewish, why not head for the Levant?
 
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Find some way to stop the Islamization of the Far East of the Abbasid Caliphate. This entails:

1. Ya'qub ibn Layth al-Saffar is killed battling the Zunbils and the Pashtun remain indigenous/Hindu/Buddhist.

2. Ammar ibn Yassr, is then wa led beyond belief to capture the rest of the Sistan in the absence of the Saffarids.

3. This leads to Islam declining rapidly in the Indus Valley and without communication to Baghdad, is in position to be destroyed by the stronger Rajput co federations to its east.

4. Sogdia remains Zoroastrian by removing Saffarids and then having an early collapse of Abbasid power in Samarra, and then have Turkish invaders clear the way of the Samanids, and their allies. Whether these Turks covert to Islam or not, they are met now with Pashtun kingdoms instead of an open shot to India.

You then count for changes in empire in India and so forth, you could stop Islam's conquest of Hindustan. This then keeps Sumatra and Malaysia within the Dharmic sphere for lack of better terms and Java by virtue is not conquered by merchant and refugee states from Demak. This on its own cuts at most 600 million Muslims away and at least 300 million in my opinion.
 
3. This leads to Islam declining rapidly in the Indus Valley and without communication to Baghdad, is in position to be destroyed by the stronger Rajput co federations to its east.

Was there even much Islam in the Indus Valley beyond Sindh? To my knowledge, it was only really Sindh that was Islamicized (and also Arabized, moreso than the rest of the subcontinent), and Islam only really reached the rest of the subcontinent with the Ghaznavids, Ghurids, and the Delhi Sultanate.
 
Find some way to stop the Islamization of the Far East of the Abbasid Caliphate. This entails:

1. Ya'qub ibn Layth al-Saffar is killed battling the Zunbils and the Pashtun remain indigenous/Hindu/Buddhist.

2. Ammar ibn Yassr, is then wa led beyond belief to capture the rest of the Sistan in the absence of the Saffarids.

3. This leads to Islam declining rapidly in the Indus Valley and without communication to Baghdad, is in position to be destroyed by the stronger Rajput co federations to its east.

4. Sogdia remains Zoroastrian by removing Saffarids and then having an early collapse of Abbasid power in Samarra, and then have Turkish invaders clear the way of the Samanids, and their allies. Whether these Turks covert to Islam or not, they are met now with Pashtun kingdoms instead of an open shot to India.

You then count for changes in empire in India and so forth, you could stop Islam's conquest of Hindustan. This then keeps Sumatra and Malaysia within the Dharmic sphere for lack of better terms and Java by virtue is not conquered by merchant and refugee states from Demak. This on its own cuts at most 600 million Muslims away and at least 300 million in my opinion.

If the Abbasid's loses everything east of persia this will help them or hasten the decline?
 
Was there even much Islam in the Indus Valley beyond Sindh? To my knowledge, it was only really Sindh that was Islamicized (and also Arabized, moreso than the rest of the subcontinent), and Islam only really reached the rest of the subcontinent with the Ghaznavids, Ghurids, and the Delhi Sultanate.

They ruled the Indus Valley apart from nearby Afghanistan. This control and the conquest of Zabul was the spring-board for the Ghurids and Ghaznavids.
 
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