An Islamic Japan

[Sang]

Let's say that Muslims somehow managed to find a way to Japan...
They could have somehow conquered China and Korea and spread Islam through Korea, or, they could have colonized Taiwan and spread Islam to Japan.

Or, we could have had Mongols converting to Islam earlier, and making Kublai Khan's invasion of Japan successful.
Or making Tamerlane/Timur turn East instead of West, and somehow conquer China, and maybe one of his descendants could send missionaries to Japan.

The Islamic conquest of Japan doesn't have to happen more than 800 years ago. Remember how easily did the Ottomans Turks converted the Bosniaks and Albanians to Islam, despite ruling Bosnia and Albania for only 300 years.

So, is it ASB to make Japan a Muslim country?
And if it's not... how much would it alter Japan's history?
I know, it would alter it an awfully lot, but would it butterfly the Samurais, the Shogunate, etc. away?
Also, if Islam was spread in Japan, would it be the same as the way Arabs and Persians practice it, or would it be heavily mixed with local Japanese folk elements?

We need a lot of fantasy for this

 

[tonsofun]

Not sure about ASB but very hard.
Most muslims in China are descendants of middle eastern traders. Other than that Islam never quite became mainstream due to the prohibition of wine and pork. Something most Chinese were never going to give up soon. Other than that you would one heck of an army to conquer China. Not sure any muslim army could achieve that unless you conver the Mongols earlier like you said.
Other than that, the best way to get Islam into Japan is to have Islamic trders make their way there and set up trade stations and havea those traders marry Japanese.

 

[Sang]

Not sure about ASB but very hard.
Most muslims in China are descendants of middle eastern traders. Other than that Islam never quite became mainstream due to the prohibition of wine and pork. Something most Chinese were never going to give up soon. Other than that you would one heck of an army to conquer China. Not sure any muslim army could achieve that unless you conver the Mongols earlier like you said.
Other than that, the best way to get Islam into Japan is to have Islamic trders make their way there and set up trade stations and havea those traders marry Japanese.

Japanese people however don't eat meat, and don't drink wine.
They eat rice and fish, and drink sake.
Not sure how Islam would react to that.

By the way, what route would the muslim traders take?
A) Would they go through China and Korea to Japan?
B) Or would they go through Indonesia and Taiwan?

In Case A, we would also get a Muslim Korea.
In Case B, we would get a Muslim Taiwan as well.

But then, how would Islam become really widespread in Japan?
And if Japan wouldn't become a Muslim-majority country, would the Tokugawa Shogunate persecute Muslims the same way they persecuted Christians?

 

[tonsofun]

Not sure how Islam would react to Japanese drinking Sake, but I imagine they woudl try and stop it as Islam doesn't look too positively upon alcohol.
It is possible for missionaries to get there and convert some of the lower classes. The Christians managed. Most religious conversion boils down to whether they can adapt that religion to that culture (Jesuits in China were successful due to the similarity between Jesus and Confucius. Many Chinese Christians at the time believed Confucius to be another prophet of god) and not make it look like cultural assimilation.
To get there I think it would be easier to go through Indonesia. There are already Muslim friendly ports there. It is also quicker.
Whether there can be an Islamic Korea depends on the factors above.

 

[CandyDragon]

Not sure how Islam would react to Japanese drinking Sake, but I imagine they woudl try and stop it as Islam doesn't look too positively upon alcohol.

Islam looks down on intoxication by alcohol, but it tends to be overlooked.

 

[Sang]

Not sure how Islam would react to Japanese drinking Sake, but I imagine they woudl try and stop it as Islam doesn't look too positively upon alcohol.
It is possible for missionaries to get there and convert some of the lower classes. The Christians managed. Most religious conversion boils down to whether they can adapt that religion to that culture (Jesuits in China were successful due to the similarity between Jesus and Confucius. Many Chinese Christians at the time believed Confucius to be another prophet of god) and not make it look like cultural assimilation.
To get there I think it would be easier to go through Indonesia. There are already Muslim friendly ports there. It is also quicker.
Whether there can be an Islamic Korea depends on the factors above.

Well, there are several questions there:
- Why would Muslim traders go to Japan? What would make Japan attractive?
- Which sect of Islam could gain foothold in Japan? Shia or Sunni?
- Would Islam introduce the L sound to the Japanese language?
- Would the Japanese Emperor or Shogun, or the Daimyos persecute Muslims the way they persecuted Christians? Or would several Clans convert to Islam? (the Shimazu converted to Christianity, as far as I can remember)

We need to invite Sumeragi in

 

[Æsir]

Southeast Asian Muslims are Sunni as are Central Asians, so unless there is first a POD introducing Shiite Islam to the Eurasian nomads or to the Malays, I don't think there would be any way for a Muslim Japan to go Shiite.

 

[Sang]

Southeast Asian Muslims are Sunni as are Central Asians, so unless there is first a POD introducing Shiite Islam to the Eurasian nomads or to the Malays, I don't think there would be any way for a Muslim Japan to go Shiite.

So, they would be Sunni.
And would they be severily persecuted if they remained a minority only?
After all, both Christianity and Islam are Abrahamic religions.
If the Tokugawa Shogunate persecuted Christians, I bet they would persecute Muslims too.

 

[Æsir]

So, they would be Sunni.
And would they be severily persecuted if they remained a minority only?
After all, both Christianity and Islam are Abrahamic religions.
If the Tokugawa Shogunate persecuted Christians, I bet they would persecute Muslims too.

Persecution of Christianity was less about religion and more about politics; Tokugawa feared European dominance of Japan as had happened in the Philippines and the Americas. I can't find a source for it, but I recall a story that a Daimyo went to the Shogun to ask that Christianity be banned, to which the Shogun asked how many faiths were present in Japan. The Daimyo replied (I want to say the answer was 23 or thereabouts) and the Shogun asked what harm one more would do. So I would expect the answer to the question rests on how powerful the Muslim powers are relative to Japan.

 

[Sang]

Persecution of Christianity was less about religion and more about politics; Tokugawa feared European dominance of Japan as had happened in the Philippines and the Americas. I can't find a source for it, but I recall a story that a Daimyo went to the Shogun to ask that Christianity be banned, to which the Shogun asked how many faiths were present in Japan. The Daimyo replied (I want to say the answer was 23 or thereabouts) and the Shogun asked what harm one more would do. So I would expect the answer to the question rests on how powerful the Muslim powers are relative to Japan.

And what if Muslims become liek 30-40% of the total population?
And let's say that they are heavily concentrated in the Southern part of Japan.

 

[Sumeragi]

Persecution of Christianity was less about religion and more about politics

There was also a religious part to it: Since Christianity (and also Islam) had a being who was above the Tenno (a god on earth), the basic social structure would be shaken to the core if most of Japan accepted either religion, and this was the religious reason for the crackdown.

Now, personally I do seem to find one way for this to work: Have KOREA convert to Islam through the many traders that came in. Let's suppose that some kind of warrior missionary helped Goryeo defeat the Jurchens, basing things on help from Allah. While there is the entrenched Buddhist nobles, we could have some of the generals become Muslim, and have them take over the country in a coup as in OTL. With a Muslim junta, there is the possibility that Islam could be a major religion.

Next step is seeing if whether Goryeo avoids fighting the Mongols (main reason why Korea's population matched Japans for the next half millennium, only to be reduced further in the Japanese invasions), or manages to defeat them substantially enough to avoid all the bloodshed. If Goryeo manages to keep its large population intact, it has a shot at successfully invading all of Japan, as opposed to the potential Kyushu occupation of OTL (first invasion of Japan).

So, basically for me the key is a Muslim Korea, which is far more possible than Japan adopting Islam directly. Once Muslim Korea successfully invades Japan, we would most likely see mass converting.

 

[Sang]

Now, personally I do seem to find one way for this to work: Have KOREA convert to Islam through the many traders that came in. Let's suppose that some kind of warrior missionary helped Goryeo defeat the Jurchens, basing things on help from Allah. While there is the entrenched Buddhist nobles, we could have some of the generals become Muslim, and have them take over the country in a coup as in OTL. With a Muslim junta, there is the possibility that Islam could be a major religion.

Next step is seeing if whether Goryeo avoids fighting the Mongols (main reason why Korea's population matched Japans for the next half millennium, only to be reduced further in the Japanese invasions), or manages to defeat them substantially enough to avoid all the bloodshed. If Goryeo manages to keep its large population intact, it has a shot at successfully invading all of Japan, as opposed to the potential Kyushu occupation of OTL (first invasion of Japan).

So, basically for me the key is a Muslim Korea, which is far more possible than Japan adopting Islam directly. Once Muslim Korea successfully invades Japan, we would most likely see mass converting.

So, a Muslim Korea.
Sounds good to me.

And what about culture? How much culture is change?
Would the Koreans use the Perso-Arabic script instead of Hanja and Hangul?
Would the Japanese use the Perso-Arabic script instead of Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana?

The Hui people (Muslims) of China developed the Xiao'erjing, writing Chinese langauge with the Arabic script. However, since the Chinese language is tonal, and most words are made up of single syllables, I have no idea how they use it.
On the other hand, the Japanese and Koreans would have an easier job. Their languages are not tonal, thus they have words that usually have multiple syllables. Thus, the Perso-Arabic alphabet can write down every sound that Japanese and Korean contain.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_alphabet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perso-Arabic_script

 

[Sumeragi]

I'm not knowledgeable in Arabic to know whether that would be possible. However, if there are the same vowel/consonant differentiation in Arabic, I figure it might work.

 

[eliphas8]

Well, there are several questions there:
- Why would Muslim traders go to Japan? What would make Japan attractive?
- Which sect of Islam could gain foothold in Japan? Shia or Sunni?
- Would Islam introduce the L sound to the Japanese language?
- Would the Japanese Emperor or Shogun, or the Daimyos persecute Muslims the way they persecuted Christians? Or would several Clans convert to Islam? (the Shimazu converted to Christianity, as far as I can remember)

We need to invite Sumeragi in

I would guess Sunni or possibly Sufi would become the major sect, they are the ones most bent on conversion and sending missionaries everywhere. They would probably trade with Japan for the same reason the Portuguese did.

 

[Sang]

I'm not knowledgeable in Arabic to know whether that would be possible. However, if there are the same vowel/consonant differentiation in Arabic, I figure it might work.

Arabic is inpure Abjad.
Pure Abjad = only consonants are recorded, vowels are not.
Inpure Abjad = consonants and long vowels are recorded, short vowels are not (example: Arabic and Hebrew). They use Mater lectionis to record long vowels, meaning that they use certain consonants to indicate a vowel. For example, in Hebrew, "Yehudim" is written as YHDM. "Yehudi" is written as YHDY, in Arabic, "Nubia" is written as "NWBY".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_alphabet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_alphabet

There is a way to get around that though.
They can create new letters to change the Abjad into a full Alphabet, recording both consonants and vowels (both short and long)
Like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%B0ske_iml%C3%A2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ya%C3%B1a_iml%C3%A2

That could work.
OR, they could just continue using traditional Japanese Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana, and simply translate the Quran to Japanese (not sure if it would work)
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Translations_of_the_Quran
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Translations_of_the_Quran#Asian_languages

Another question would be, how would the pronounce Allah?
Would it become Arra, Arrahu, or what? Or would they adopt the L sound from Arabic/Persian/Korean?

 

[Ridwan Asher]

While this idea has been a long time fascination of mine, I'm not sure about the doability. China is one giant obstacle. Unless Islam will go through a major tweaks there, and I mean MAJOR tweaks, it won't ever going to be able to occupy royalty. Buddhism and Taoism appealed to Japan since Chinese Emperors converted to those religions. The kind of Islam that will appeal to Chinese Emperor can only be the one so Sinified that it can co-opt the cores Chinese spiritual perspective and appeal to the Chinese masses the way the typical big 3 we know have done. Exactly how to do it is quite the question. How to merge Shang-Di and Allah will be fascinating to see. But it will take quite a very oriented-oriented Islamic movement in China, since as far as I can see, chinese muslims functioned kind of similarly to Jews in Chinese society, which kind-of looked down to commerce, while Islam has been always trade-venerating religion. Islam needs to stop being so nichetic in Chinese society so it can diffuse to wider society and thus able to provide a tempting power base for the emperor to placate.

Alternatively, make muslim traders dominate easter China trade. But that's just as equally tricky, if not more....

 

[Sang]

While this idea has been a long time fascination of mine, I'm not sure about the doability. China is one giant obstacle. Unless Islam will go through a major tweaks there, and I mean MAJOR tweaks, it won't ever going to be able to occupy royalty. Buddhism and Taoism appealed to Japan since Chinese Emperors converted to those religions. The kind of Islam that will appeal to Chinese Emperor can only be the one so Sinified that it can co-opt the cores Chinese spiritual perspective and appeal to the Chinese masses the way the typical big 3 we know have done. Exactly how to do it is quite the question. How to merge Shang-Di and Allah will be fascinating to see. But it will take quite a very oriented-oriented Islamic movement in China, since as far as I can see, chinese muslims functioned kind of similarly to Jews in Chinese society, which kind-of looked down to commerce, while Islam has been always trade-venerating religion. Islam needs to stop being so nichetic in Chinese society so it can diffuse to wider society and thus able to provide a tempting power base for the emperor to placate.

Alternatively, make muslim traders dominate easter China trade. But that's just as equally tricky, if not more....

Well, there is another way. Make Muslim traders migrate to North-Eastern China.
Then make China persecute Muslims. Then the Muslim Traders could escape to Korea, and then convert Korea to Islam, and make Korea conquer Japan and Islamize Japan.

 

[The Celt]

I'm pretty sure Jakarta in Indonesia was a Muslim trading kingdom for many centuries; is there any possible route through that?

 

[Color-Copycat]

I think the link is too tenuous if you want to go through Indonesia.

 

[Dan1988]

- Would Islam introduce the L sound to the Japanese language?

Well, not so much that, put probably making the trilled R more widespread. That sound exists in Japanese, but only to give a vulgar connotation; Arabic could probably make the trilled R lose its vulgar connotation.