Did that happen anywhere OTL though? It seems like most of the christians of Greece stayed in place even though they could have crossed the border to venetian controlled territory like Morea. The middle to upper classes did move though.
Constantinople falls in 675- A mini brainstorming timeline
- Thread starter Basileus Giorgios
- Start date
Did that happen anywhere OTL though? It seems like most of the christians of Greece stayed in place even though they could have crossed the border to venetian controlled territory like Morea. The middle to upper classes did move though.
DusanUros
Banned
I get the idea, although i think Tobit makes a better point. The Balkans wont pay back as an investment really, while controlling the vastness of central Asia, meaning controlling the entire cotton trade, so its more likely to focus on the East, holding Constantinople for religious reasons probably, as a sign to Chrisianity that their pillar has fallen or something. Plus the city of cities, the center of the world etc, is nothing if all that remains is fire and dust, so i guess they might actually let the Bulgars or the Avars or whoever is around to rule the Balkans on their behalf, probably as a protectorate, or something.
Valdemar II
Banned
On the other hand the Romans needs to rebuild their Empire and North Africa and South Italy had been somewhat depopulated by Justinans Plague if I remember correctly, so they could do this to strengthen their recruitment and tax base.
Exactly. It was done by the Romans of Constantinople to repopulate Anatolia, so I can see the Romans of Ravenna doing it to repopulate Sicily (which ITTL will be the major tax base of the Imperial state)
I think you are confusing "all of Byzantine Balkans" with "all of Balkans. Yes but of course that after Constantinople has fallen to the Arabs the surrounding civilized environment around will also next to follow. Perhaps it has merit to think the Arabs won't reach Dalmatia, but Aegean region and Thrace will surely fall eventually, due to their proximity to Anatolia, the nearest civilized region for both regions mentioned. Try to re-read Megas Dux ton Kypraion's last lengthy post.
I thought what you posited earlier was whether the Avars and Bulgar would try to get Constantinople after it fell to the Arabs. If that would the case, you would see the counter-action done by the Arabs to deal with them and make sure that Constantinople will be secure from anything similar. This infact will most likely be a help to ease the consolidation of Thrace by the muslims, for the pagan barbarian menace will drive its populace to cling more towards the current holder of Constantinople. Though if there wouldn't be any band of nomads visiting, this will be less of the case, but remember that political gravity would still keep the Thrace under Constantinople orbit, so once the nomads are knocking in, back to the previous sentence.
I think that the conquest of Constantinople will may effect the expansion process of the Caliphate to the east. It'll may slow down a bit, but it'll be far from an immediate halt.
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Jaded_Railman
Banned
Yes, actually. Alexios I evacuated a large portion of the population of interior Anatolia during the initial retreat following the Sel'juk conquest. He's a major part of the reason Anatolia become Turkified, rather than the Turks eventually assimilating to the existing culture.
Valdemar II
Banned
Map I made. Oh the joys of having nothing to do!.
Nice map through I think the Bulgar Kingdom would follow Tobits map more, plus a Lombard remnant is likely to survive in North Italy.
First thing to say is the title of 'Sultan' is anachronistic. It was first used in OTL in the 10th century, and derived from an Arabic word meaning 'power'. It came to be used when the Caliphs started to lose political power; yet were still thought of, in a vague way, as being the ultimate authority within Islam. I suggest, considering the extensive territories he controls, that Mikhail is a straightforward Caliph ('Successor', i.e. of the Prophet). If you want a less ideologically charged title, have him call himself a 'Malik' (King).
Next, I agree that it is completely reasonable for the Kaaba to be moved out of Mecca to Alexandria or, more precisely, its most sacred feature: the Black Stone, which is apparently a meteorite from its unusual iron content. Mikhail can build a new Kaaba in Alexandria, set up the Black Stone there, and try to divert the Hajj to this place (and, no doubt, enjoy the profits from all those pilgrims...)
Yes, it seems as if the 'death of Greece' is imminent. I think the area should come to be known as the 'Bilad ar-Rum' ('Land of the Romans') or just plain 'Rum'. If that term refers specifically to Anatolia, then perhaps it could be called an Arabic version of 'Sclavinia' - reflecting the most recent wave of settlers there in the 600-700s.
The term Yunanistan could come later, especially if the Perso- or Turco-Muslims come West again in the future (Yuna/Yauna was the Eastern term for 'Ionians', hence Greeks). All the above names could signal that Greece is now something else, something distinctively Islamic.
Somehow this just does not ring true. It would be a profound breach of civilised etiquette to seize a royal daughter, even of an enemy power, and drag her off and forcibly convert her. If she was given in marriage, or concubinage, fine - but not like this. Rafiq would be mocked in all royal courts as the 'Woman-Snatcher', and be reviled for his bad faith and barbaric ways - so the trouble it would cause would not be worth the hassle. Serval's reaction, conversion to Christianity, also seems far-fetched. He would be under pressure to get his daughter back; if he could not, he would be humiliated as a ruler who could not protect his womenfolk, and be swiftly replaced by someone else who claims he could do so.
No it is NOT reasonable ! Hajar Aswad can be taken out from Kaaba yes, but new Kaaba won't be built. It makes more sense for muslims see it destroyed rather than to build a contender to it. When destroyed, we would just rebuild it in the same spot that we consider as the center of the universe. Claiming somewhere else to be the center of universe though.....
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
I don't agree. The Ottomans took Constantinople when it was in a later stage of development with mosaics and figural images everywhere, and this had zero influence on them. It certainly won't to the Caliphate at the height of its energy and "purity". I would agree Constantinople would accelerate bureaucratization, although Syria and Egypt are already there.
Islam did absorb Aristotelian, philosophic, and rational elements. I don't think anyone understands what the Sharia is. It is a rational system for generating legislation. It's identical in function to Common Law.
There was no such thing as "secular" Roman law. It had the same level of sacrality as the Sharia. The separation of secular and divine didn't happen in the West until the Enlightenment.
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
I don't think this is practicable, and will just cause the population to convert to Islam. How will they live in their new homes? Will someone have plowed fields and planted crops a year in advance so they don't starve to death? Would peasants be interested in abandoning their homes and entire way of life for a very hazardous journey to a strange land which few will survive? Will the inhabitants of this new land accept them?
You're saying that the empire would enslave Jews? Wouldn't that just make them turn to the Caliphate?
I think it is reasonable.
The Qarmatians took the Black Stone to Al-Hasa in 930 C.E. and, although they were reviled by most of the Muslim world as revolutionaries and rebels who held the Caliphs to ransom, they did prosper for a while before mainstream Islam mobilised against them and crushed them.
I think in the formative centuries of Islam it's entirely reasonable for a man claiming to be Caliph to remove the Black Stone to a new site and try and create an alternate religious centre. It would outrage most Muslim opinion, but if he could get away with it for a while history would be re-written and future Muslims would be entirely relaxed with the idea of a Holy City of Alexandria/Iskandariyya.
As for Mecca, I thought its principal claim to fame was (a) that it was the birthplace of the Prophet and then (b) in the centuries which followed, with the advent of the regular Hajj, the association of various places with the new Revelation, and the life and times of the Prophet and his Companions, meant that it ipso facto became the Holy City above all. A big change in the 800-900s, as BG suggested, could have changed all that forever.
Is Mecca thought of as the Centre of the World? You tell me if that's in the Quran or not - I don't claim for a second to be a Quranic scholar. I always thought Islam, absorbing the ancient heritage and lore of the other Abrahamic religions, considered Jerusalem the Centre of the World - or maybe that city is 'merely' the place from where Muhammad was shown a vision of Paradise? Again, I'm not sure. You tell me...
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The point is by the 1400s Islam has had 700+ years of being a Faith which represents the divine in decorations on buildings, and in other art-forms, in an austere and non-figural way. Of course the Ottomans are not going to suddenly abandon that heritage, especially when Islam had brought them (in their own way of looking at the world) such success against an impoverished and 'defeated' civilisation such as the Late Byzantine one.
However, in the 700s onwards, if the Byzantines had been conquered, and the Caliphate had been based in Constantinople, I think the Caliphate's "energy and purity" would have been 'diluted' in overwhelming "Romanness". With no surviving (or just a weak 'rump') 'Romanitas' to partially define itself against, the Caliphate, I suggest to you, may well have been relaxed about taking over many aspects of the Roman way of representing the divine in art. With 'austere', city-despising, desert nomads even more thinly spread in a Caliphate now controlling Anatolia, Constantinople and parts of the Balkans, I think it's plausible that local practices would have exerted a powerful influence on the new Muslim elite.
Syria and Egypt had had their "Romanness" disrupted for decades during the lead-up to the Heraclian wars; Syria had been undergoing a slow process of "Arabisation", at the margins, for a very long time; Egypt's vitality had been undermined by centuries of Roman extractions, and in any case 'Romanitas' was a thin veneer over a profoundly un-Roman society; and both provinces were the periphery, and never the centre, of the Empire - Anatolia, Thrace, Greece and Italy were the "real" Roman heartlands. That is why there is a qualitative difference between influences from the 'periphery', however rich, and influences which would come from controlling the 'centre'.
I also agree that Islam absorbed aspects of Aristotelianism and rationality - that is obvious to me. It is the question of the degree to which Islam would have been further exposed to these traditions if the Caliphate controlled Constantinople that intrigues me. I think, by unifying all the lands where ancient Greek works existed (not only in the original but) in Syriac, and other Eastern languages, that philosophy would have exploded in popularity in intellectual circles, and more of this rational/logical approach could have been absorbed by a developing Islam than happened in our timeline. There was an actual movement within early Islam which tried to do this anyway - they were known as the Mutazili - and they tried to emphasise the importance of human reason over the interpretations of tradition and support a less literal reading of the Quran than came, ultimately, to be accepted. But if these Mutazili-equivalents had Roman scholars, thinkers and new converts among their numbers from the heartlands of Rome, I think it is at least possible for Islam to have developed a sort of Thomas Aquinas figure, centuries before he appeared in western Christianity, and as a result be very, very different from the Islam we know today.
As for Roman Law not being secular, I'm sorry but I just simply cannot agree. For me it is self-evident that Roman Law belonged to the realm of the 'profane', and was often in the early centuries, and in latter ones quite distinctly, different to 'sacred' law. We (in countries which owe a debt to Roman jurisprudence to a greater or lesser degree) get our notion of 'civil' law, the business of family law, law to do with private property, law to do with aspects of state administration, citizens' rights/responsibilities etc from the Romans. In Byzantium, and in the West, there developed a very distinct Church or Canon Law, which was wholly separate from civil/'secular' law. Even the Ottomans drew on this heritage, with the concept of 'Kanun', which, as you'll know for sure, referred to Ottoman administrative regulations, and edicts of the Ottoman Sultans, and which sat alongside Sharia Law. Sure, the full divergence of secular/civil law and religious law really got going from the Enlightenment onwards - but the distinction was always there even during Late Antique and medieval times. In contrast, Jewish/Toraic Law and Sharia are much more all-encompassing systems of law - and theoretically every aspect of human life could be covered by them.
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I'm liking this timeline. It's shaking things up interestingly.
Abdul, remember, it was Roman Christianity after it became mandatory that was unbendingly religious, not the law, which long preceded Christianity. Polytheistic-era law did have secular traditions already.
Alas, in fact, there's plenty of precedent for empires to play with moving around their populations by then (see Judeans in Persia). On the ground, it did tend to have the problems Abdul mentioned, except when the ruler was loyal to them and gave inventives; peasants were good at hiding, due to practice with soldiers and tax collectors. It also made people in the target regions sore, like Palestinians in what used to be Palestine, because empires were very rarely so good about dealing with the property rights involved. After all, they were just subjects.
Abdul, remember, it was Roman Christianity after it became mandatory that was unbendingly religious, not the law, which long preceded Christianity. Polytheistic-era law did have secular traditions already.
Alas, in fact, there's plenty of precedent for empires to play with moving around their populations by then (see Judeans in Persia). On the ground, it did tend to have the problems Abdul mentioned, except when the ruler was loyal to them and gave inventives; peasants were good at hiding, due to practice with soldiers and tax collectors. It also made people in the target regions sore, like Palestinians in what used to be Palestine, because empires were very rarely so good about dealing with the property rights involved. After all, they were just subjects.
I thought you already knew that when I say "Hajar Aswad", it means "Black Stone....
Now, the first thing I have to ask you is, reasonable in what sense of 'reasonable' ?
Why did you bring about the Qarmatians who only ever brought the Black Stone, not building a new Kaaba in Bahrain ?
It is UNREASONABLE ! In this early days of Islam, the majority bulk of muslims were still the Arabians of Arabia. Why the hell do you thing it is reasonable ??
Of course most muslims would be outraged by such move. Almost all of them would !! Especially muslims of Arabia !
Also, even if not so outrightly, there is this passage in Qur'an [42:7] (Bismillah.... ^_^) :
وَكَذَلِكَ أَوْحَيْنَا إِلَيْكَ قُرْآناً عَرَبِيّاً لِّتُنذِرَ أُمَّ الْقُرَى وَمَنْ حَوْلَهَا وَتُنذِرَ يَوْمَ الْجَمْعِ لَا رَيْبَ فِيهِ فَرِيقٌ فِي الْجَنَّةِ وَفَرِيقٌ فِي السَّعِيرِ
"Thus have We sent by inspiration to thee an Arabic Qur'an: that thou mayest warn the Mother of Cities and all around her,- and warn (them) of the Day of Assembly, of which there is no doubt: (when) some will be in the Garden, and some in the Blazing Fire."
The bolded word that obviously refers to Mecca, in Arabic would be "Ummu al Quraa". The word "Ummi", mother, in Islamic(and I also suspect in pre-Islamic Arabian) culture means a lot ! Often synonymous with "center".
Since pre-Islamic era, Mecca has been the economic and religious center of Western, if not the whole Arabian Peninsula. It was the concentration dot of trade routes and pilgrimage from other parts of Arabia. So say, that Mecca-centrism of Islam as directed by Qur'an itself, is merely a continuation of that legacy, only now widened in context about a center of what, would that still not be enough to make copy-pasting Kaaba somewhere else a HUAGE sign of apostasy in the eyes of most muslims ?
The only way I can see this happening is by having a person who loves Egypt enough(means madly, or an ultranationalist native) to do that. I said it wasn't reasonable, but didn't say it was impossible, but this is seriously unlikely.
If that happens, I can see Egypt under this kind of (*?)Islamic regime will be isolated from the rest of Islamic realm, and very unlikely if this new Kaaba would last long, unless muslims east of Egypt will be always in at least almost constant turbulency for quite a long time(say, 2 centuries? And I'm being optimistic).
Though say if this does happen, for every Islamo-Christian hybrid religion fan out there, I think we have a bit of good news for them. If this move would be played right(surely also means popular among the native populace, among other things) I think we can at least have an Islamo-Coptic hybrid religion in all but name, maybe also include the name(the Egyptian Sikhs?
)...
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815-820: Dar-al-Islam.
Rafiq, to general scandal, begins to refer to himself as "Allah's Own Caesar", egged on by his close friend, Patriarch Nicholas III of Constantinople. The Peloponnese, which has largely been converted to Islam, revolts, but Rafiq puts this down with relative ease. A century and a half after the fall of Constantinople, his lands remain overwhelmingly Christian, and he is unwilling to antagonise them for fear of opening up internal divisions in his prosperous and wealthy state.
Rafiq's uncle Sulayman dies, leaving the Fertile Crescent to his son and namesake. Sulayman II names himself Caliph, in the absence of any other claimant on the title, and moves his capital from Damascus to Ctesiphon, to better control Mesopotamia. Opportunistically, Sultan Mikhail of Egypt invades Palestine and briefly occupies Jerusalem. The Caliph, in return for guaranteeing Armenian independence and freedom of worship sweeps down at the head of a large army of Armenians, and inflicts a shattering defeat upon the Egyptians. Mikhail is compelled to surrender all of Arabia and Cyprus Sulayman II.
The Alimid Caliphate of Persia comes under heavy and sustained attack from the Tang Chinese over the silk road. At one point, the Chinese even manage to occupy Samarkand, and look as though they could threaten the Persian capital at Herat.
Dar-al-Harb
Constantine V is forced to face down another African pretender, this time a Numidian warrior by the name of Gregory. Gregory is defeated in battle fairly conclusively, but as Constantine congratulates his troops on their victory, his horse trips, and he falls. After making it back to Ravenna, the Emperor dies in agony, and his replacement is chosen by the Patriarch of Rome, becoming Emperor Peter I.
Edward, King of Britain, campaigns beyond the Firth of Forth, and establishes nominal dominance over the Highlands of Scotland. Using the profits from a decade of succesful campaigning, he begins to build a fleet to ward off the Danish menance.
The Danes land in East Anglia, and sack Norwich. The Bishop of Norwich is captured and crucified by the jeering pagans. The following year, they sail down the Rhine, causing misery amongst the Francians.
Spania collapses into a civil war.
820-825: Dar-al-Islam
Caesar Rafiq, in an attempt to prove his Islamic credentials to his increasingly irritated supporters, launches a massive naval attack on Cherson; but suffers a shattering defeat when the Khazars intervene on the side of Grand Duke George of Cherson at the Battle of Trapezous. The Khazars, following the example of the Danes to the west, begin to launch naval raids against the northern frontiers of Asia Minor, and even manage to burn the suburbs of Constantinople.
Mikhail of Egypt is also in desperate trouble following defeat to Caliph Sulayman. He invades Tripolitania, and is succesful in this, managing to sack Tripoli and Cyrene, and extort a massive ransom from Michael, the governor of Carthage. With this, he returns in triumph to Egypt, and puts the proceeds towards a lavish restoration of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and towards building a massive new mosque and university complex within the capital.
Caliph Sulayman campaigns against the ever rebellious Kurds, and attempts to resettle them on the Persian Gulf. This policy meets with little success, and is abruptly abandoned when it becomes apparent that the Kurds are acting as a dangerous fifth column for the Alimids.
The Alimids manage to throw off the Chinese, and consolidate Islamic Persia. A major crackdown upon the largely Zoroastrian population begins, which will end in the virtual extinction of the faith in Persia within a few generations.
Islam begins to spread to India, though in a highly diluted form influenced by Zorastrianism and the teachings of Nestorius.
Dar-al-Harb
The Emperor Peter is overthrown following the scattering of Roman forces in Tripolitania. His successor is a Greek peasant, who takes the throne as Peter II, in respect to his predecessor, who later becomes Bishop of Milan. Peter II is a millitary man, and immediately launches attacks upon Rafiq of Constantinople, aiming to gain Bulgarian support.
Edward, King of Wessex, dies, leaving a powerfully united Kingdom of Britain to his son Alfred. Though the Highlands and Britanny drop out of Alfred's state, otherwise, the new King is relatively succesful in consolidating his father's improbable Empire. Even the Danes are driven back by the new British navy.
The Franks begin to settle small numbers of Danes along the Rhine Delta, in an attempt to slow down the merciless raids.
Rafiq, to general scandal, begins to refer to himself as "Allah's Own Caesar", egged on by his close friend, Patriarch Nicholas III of Constantinople. The Peloponnese, which has largely been converted to Islam, revolts, but Rafiq puts this down with relative ease. A century and a half after the fall of Constantinople, his lands remain overwhelmingly Christian, and he is unwilling to antagonise them for fear of opening up internal divisions in his prosperous and wealthy state.
Rafiq's uncle Sulayman dies, leaving the Fertile Crescent to his son and namesake. Sulayman II names himself Caliph, in the absence of any other claimant on the title, and moves his capital from Damascus to Ctesiphon, to better control Mesopotamia. Opportunistically, Sultan Mikhail of Egypt invades Palestine and briefly occupies Jerusalem. The Caliph, in return for guaranteeing Armenian independence and freedom of worship sweeps down at the head of a large army of Armenians, and inflicts a shattering defeat upon the Egyptians. Mikhail is compelled to surrender all of Arabia and Cyprus Sulayman II.
The Alimid Caliphate of Persia comes under heavy and sustained attack from the Tang Chinese over the silk road. At one point, the Chinese even manage to occupy Samarkand, and look as though they could threaten the Persian capital at Herat.
Dar-al-Harb
Constantine V is forced to face down another African pretender, this time a Numidian warrior by the name of Gregory. Gregory is defeated in battle fairly conclusively, but as Constantine congratulates his troops on their victory, his horse trips, and he falls. After making it back to Ravenna, the Emperor dies in agony, and his replacement is chosen by the Patriarch of Rome, becoming Emperor Peter I.
Edward, King of Britain, campaigns beyond the Firth of Forth, and establishes nominal dominance over the Highlands of Scotland. Using the profits from a decade of succesful campaigning, he begins to build a fleet to ward off the Danish menance.
The Danes land in East Anglia, and sack Norwich. The Bishop of Norwich is captured and crucified by the jeering pagans. The following year, they sail down the Rhine, causing misery amongst the Francians.
Spania collapses into a civil war.
820-825: Dar-al-Islam
Caesar Rafiq, in an attempt to prove his Islamic credentials to his increasingly irritated supporters, launches a massive naval attack on Cherson; but suffers a shattering defeat when the Khazars intervene on the side of Grand Duke George of Cherson at the Battle of Trapezous. The Khazars, following the example of the Danes to the west, begin to launch naval raids against the northern frontiers of Asia Minor, and even manage to burn the suburbs of Constantinople.
Mikhail of Egypt is also in desperate trouble following defeat to Caliph Sulayman. He invades Tripolitania, and is succesful in this, managing to sack Tripoli and Cyrene, and extort a massive ransom from Michael, the governor of Carthage. With this, he returns in triumph to Egypt, and puts the proceeds towards a lavish restoration of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and towards building a massive new mosque and university complex within the capital.
Caliph Sulayman campaigns against the ever rebellious Kurds, and attempts to resettle them on the Persian Gulf. This policy meets with little success, and is abruptly abandoned when it becomes apparent that the Kurds are acting as a dangerous fifth column for the Alimids.
The Alimids manage to throw off the Chinese, and consolidate Islamic Persia. A major crackdown upon the largely Zoroastrian population begins, which will end in the virtual extinction of the faith in Persia within a few generations.
Islam begins to spread to India, though in a highly diluted form influenced by Zorastrianism and the teachings of Nestorius.
Dar-al-Harb
The Emperor Peter is overthrown following the scattering of Roman forces in Tripolitania. His successor is a Greek peasant, who takes the throne as Peter II, in respect to his predecessor, who later becomes Bishop of Milan. Peter II is a millitary man, and immediately launches attacks upon Rafiq of Constantinople, aiming to gain Bulgarian support.
Edward, King of Wessex, dies, leaving a powerfully united Kingdom of Britain to his son Alfred. Though the Highlands and Britanny drop out of Alfred's state, otherwise, the new King is relatively succesful in consolidating his father's improbable Empire. Even the Danes are driven back by the new British navy.
The Franks begin to settle small numbers of Danes along the Rhine Delta, in an attempt to slow down the merciless raids.
I think there is something here that is quite misunderstood.
For me, it is about confusing between "Islam" and "Muslims".
I think that what are you trying to suggest here, Megas, is the possibility of an Enlightenment-kind of secularist movement departing from somewhere of Islamic World, much like it departed from somewhere of the Christian World IOTL, am I correct ?
And I think Pasha perceived it as, you're suggesting that Islam will make secularism an integral part of Islam.
If what you're suggesting is what I'm thinking you are, then yeah I'm agree there's a definite chance for it, certainly for a mighty long term though. No inevitability, but the chance is simply there.
Yes, that in forming laws and whatknots, muslim lawmakers will be more deeply influenced by Roman ways ITTL, no doubt about that. It's not about making a law separate from Sharia, many people seems to treat it as kind of a Ten Commandments or something. No, it is a neat set of rational methods to generate laws, if using Qur'an as the primary reference, which happens to contain hudud, that is the fixed punishments for certain crimes. Cutting off hand for stealing and stoning to death the adulterers are among these, but this is far from all about Islamic Laws. So it is basically a Common Law, like Pasha said, only with a Holy Book as the main guide. It's not like with more Roman influence the muslims will acquire Common Law; it's already there !
If law makings will be done in religious environment, that is in default case, than "secular" laws will still be basically formed in justification that at minimal it contends with the religious source of guidance, that is Qur'an and Hadith. I know next to nothing about Suleyman's Qanun IOTL, but wasn't it consisted also of muslim jurists ? Did they really totally neglected Qur'an and Hadith when forming regulations ? At least it should be certain that they were to operate by not confronting them. It's not even clear whether they were really totally independent from any form of influence from the religious law makers, to me at least....
But if that situation I stated above can be the departure point for a full scale movement to separate Qur'an and Hadith from worldly managements... well I'm not sure, to be frank. Unlike Christianity, even if the mu'alim caste would be more influenced by the way of priestly culture ITTL, it's not like they will become real priests. It'll be mostly about a more organized clergy and especially formalism, but nothing such a supreme, exclusive authority to commence one-sided interpretation of Islamic Literature, at least if they're Sunni. The fundamental concept in Islam about Qur'anic learning is that each individual muslim is to learn and understand Qur'an personally, not by a patronage of a higher authority, and that will make differences.
In Shia, the concept of Imamate, that is basically a half-apostle, having such extravagant trait as infallibility, only without the duty of accepting divine messages, for Qur'an is already completed, that such can be interpreted that whatever the Imam does, is by the will of God. No way an Imam can be wrong, for he is already freed from error and sin, so whatever the Imam does, it is because he is moved by God. Quite close to the concept of Pope, I think, which is basically a representative of God on earth, so whatever acts of him are the acts of God. I think that very concept may has given Shia clerics impetus to interpret Islamic Literature more liberally than the Sunnis, also to have more organized and powerful clergy, because for them there exists an intermediate figure between the faithful and and the divine, gives them an incentive for outright centralization. In Orthodox Sunnism as we know it though, such element wouldn't exist. So at most the organized Roman Sunni(if they are) clergy would most likely be closer to Protestant Priests, or maybe even the Jewish Rabbis..... Also, in the Eastern Roman tradition is that the church is subordinate to the emperor, so......
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Calm down, friend; there's no need for you to get all cross, now. This is a learned debate, not a shouting match.
I think the discussion has been a good one, which will enlighten many people who don't think about this level of detail; perhaps you could agree with that?
Why do I think moving the Stone is reasonable? Because the Caliph-figure Mikhail in Egypt controls the Holy Sanctuaries. If there are rival Caliphs perhaps you'd have different "flavours" of Islam, and radically different Schools of Law developing, in each 'Islamic Jurisdiction'. If that is so, and the army is behind Mikhail, then he could simply exercise his temporal political power to bring the Stone to a new centre. He could prepare the way with lots of propaganda preached from the pulpit of the Al-Azhar-analogue. For example, he may accuse the Guardians of the Holy Sanctuaries of being wicked and corrupt and not fit to protect the Kaaba any longer. Then, if Mikhail were determined, he could have certain rebel tribesmen invade the sanctuaries and desecrate the Holy Sites. In mock anger, Mikhail could then mobilise his forces, crush the rebels and 'liberate' the Stone from the 'clutches' of wicked pagan "jinns and shaytans". You may think this is an unlikely scenario, but consider: Islam by conquering Constantinople will already start to come under new influences, which may make it deviate from the purity of OTL Islam. And just how powerful would a 'factional' Caliph be? I think enormously so; he could make such changes if he really wanted to. Maybe, too, the concept of the Umma would be weakened and diluted if you have a Caliph in Egypt, another in Rum/Anatolia, another in the Persian East, another in Iraq etc. Of course IOTL you had Umayyad Caliphs in Spain, Abbasid ones in Iraq, Fatimid ones in Cairo - but the point is there are numerous ways things could've gone; Caliphs as semi-messianic figures, with military, religious and political support for their actions, could do these sacrilegeous acts. This is alternate history; you can argue that how things turned out IOTL was never inevitable; the possibilities and permutations are endless.
Thank you for this quote. It is very interesting. 'Mother of Cities' is a poetic term and not a clear one like 'Mecca', which would leave absolutely no room for doubt. This may seem like a basic question, and I honestly do not know the answer, but how do Muslims know this is a reference to Mecca? Perhaps there exist traditions of interpretation going back to the very beginning of Quranic exegesis? Probably that is so. I defer to you on this; I would be fascinated to know what sources of authority laid down this interpretation. I ask, not to be mischievous or pedantic, but because I genuinely thought both Christians and Muslims considered Jerusalem the omphalos, or navel, of the earth. One can make the argument, at least, that the 'Mother of Cities' is Jerusalem - and that in the Sura you quote above the Quran could be warning the people of Jerusalem, and surrounding areas of Palestine, who were Christian in the time of the Prophet, of the 'Garden' or the 'Blazing Fire' to come.
As for Mecca being the geographical centre of western, or all, Arabia in the 7th century, I thought it was Yathrib which was the senior of the two cities - and Mecca only gained the ascendancy during the time of the Prophet. I think Mecca was the religious centre - the place with all the idols which the Prophet broke - but Yathrib was the wealthier merchant centre with its powerful Jewish families and allied Arab tribes.
Most Muslims may be upset by the move of the Stone out of Mecca, but I don't think it invalidates the points I made above about a Caliph's ability to 'think the unthinkable', how a slightly different Islam might make these actions 'understandable' to some, while they are 'unreasonable' to others, and how naked political power and greed (for Hajj revenues) may override the protests from outside the Egyptian state.
The thrust of your original post seemed to imply the 'unreasonableness' of moving the Stone out of Mecca was so ASB as to have made it practically impossible to contemplate in almost any alternate history scenario. Now you seem to backtrack from that position. I think we are actually closer to agreement than you make out.
I don't know, really, because the Mutazilite position was so totally defeated IOTL Islam. I think what I'm trying to say is that maybe an Umma steeped in ancient philosophy would have argued that each Muslim could have the freedom to interpret the Quran in a more metaphorical, or allegorical, way for themselves. Instead of the Literal Word of Allah, maybe the philosophers would have advocated that the Quran contained the Mysteries of Allah, requiring great learning, contemplation and advanced religious understanding to be interpreted - i.e. a sort of 'quasi-priesthood'. I'm thinking indeed of the Jewish rabbinical tradition, which, as a poster on another thread pointed out, was shaped in this way by Rome/Christianity.
Or maybe, 'Western Islam', as I've postulated it, would be the Shia analogue - with powerful priest-imams interposing themselves between Quran and Muslims - and an overall "Messiah"/Pope-type leader. Maybe 'Sunni Islam' would have developed elsewhere, differently, or maybe even not at all. Perhaps on top of all this a third variant of Islam would have emerged, featuring 'Sunni' elements, but passionately believing in the bloodline of the Prophet - in other words, maybe mystical-messianic Islam would have come to dominate and classic Sunni Islam be in the minority.
If any of the above happened, then I think Islamic Law could have been radically different from what has come down to us.
Would Roman Law have "forced" Islam to have a 'secular' element to it? Maybe yes, maybe no - it depends what type of Islam emerged in the Roman Lands. I don't think it's likely that "pure Sunni Sharia" would have come into being if it had taken over Constantinople and the Roman Lands - "pure Sunni Sharia" emerged at least partly because its underlying society/culture was not a Roman one - it was a unique blend of Arab, Persian, Jewish and Roman elements (with the Arab element dominant for the crucial formative period of Caliphate history).
I don't comment further on the Suleymanic Kanun, Quranic scholarship in relationship to law, or Hadith IOTL because they are what they are because of history as it actually was. What they can tell us of alternate-history Islamic Law is very uncertain. But this is my basic point: to postulate alternate-history Islamic Law you must deconstruct what is, and imagine unusual departures down unexpected pathways.
Yes, this paragraph demonstrates what I am trying to say: i.e. from the same corpus of Revelation, you get the radically different developments of Shi'ism. I argue: from the same corpus of Revelation you can have many more variants of Islam - some of which, to come back to the original point, could have been led by a Caliph-Imam type strongman, who could conceive of, and actually implement, the moving of the Black Stone out of Mecca.
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