Moonlight in a Jar: An Al-Andalus Timeline

[KidCabralista]

The thing is shia and sunni back then are not the same shia and sunni today. First the shia are completely different Ismaili and Twelvers are different. Iran doesn't go around celebrating the fatimids.

This is an interesting note - there's no real Shi'i state anywhere but I imagine the lingering influence of the Fatimids means that the most prominent Shi'i school is still the Hafizi Isma'ilism that was the state religion of the Fatimid Caliphate. Even if the Fatimid Caliphs were never that interested in converting their own populace to their brand of Shi'ism, they still set up madrassas and served as sponsors of Shi'i scholars. I wonder if TTL will also see the death of the Hafizi Isma'ilis with the fall of the Caliphate or if they'll pop up elsewhere like the Nizaris managed to do IOTL.

Maybe a member of the last caliph-imam's family flees to a state on the periphery of the Muslim world, following the pattern established by Abd al-Rahman in Andalusia? Yemen (or maybe even just South Yemen alone) might be a good place for Isma'ili Shi'i thought to hold out against the setbacks: the OTL Isma'ili Sulayhid dynasty in Yemen was enthusiastic about conversions during the time it ruled the area. There were constant battles between the Zaidis and the Isma'ilis there OTL, but with enough hegemony that could be put to relative rest. An ATL Isma'ili warrior-queen putting her own name in the Khutba like our world's Arwa al-Sulayhi would be cool.

 

[LunazimHawk]

Legend has it, a Bataid's footwear game is strong enough to turn infidels to ash.
View attachment 440727

I had bata sandals, and they can survive anything. If the first Andulusian soldiers don't land on America with batas, I'm going to be severely disappointed.

 

[245]

I wonder how ibadi Islam is doing and how it might change?

 

[snassni2]

I wonder how ibadi Islam is doing and how it might change?

I find it weird how they spread in OTL. It's as if their cheikhs took a direct flight from Oman to Algeria.

 

[haider najib]

What is ibadi islam and what makes it different from sunni islam.

 

[Planet of Hats]

What is ibadi islam and what makes it different from sunni islam.

Ibadis are the majority in Oman, both OTL and ITTL. They can also be found in parts of the Maghreb, including ITTL.

The Ibadi group supports Abu Bakr and Umar as rightly-guided, but they reject Uthman as the third Caliph. While you might think this makes them Kharijites, they'd tell you they aren't, and they also reject Uthman's murder, along with rejecting the Kharijite belief that you're a kafir if you hold differing viewpoints. That is, Kharijites think that sinning is equivalent to unbelief; Ibadis do not. Doctrinally, they have some views that differ from the rest of Islam, namely that they don't think that there can only be one leader of the Muslim world (they believe in self-rule), they don't believe the Quran is co-eternal with God, they don't believe God will show himself on the Day of Judgment and they don't believe the ruler has to be of the Quraysh. Ibadis also tend to reject a lot of hadith that Sunnis accept, and they completely reject analogical reasoning as a source of truth, which puts them more in line with the Almohads than mainline Sunnis.

ITTL, Ibadis rule Oman and have a few enclaves in the more wastelandy parts of Ifriqiya and the central Maghreb, and they tend to mingle a lot with Kharijites around the fringes of the Berber community.

 

[haider najib]

The thing is is still believe this muslim world will be smaller as Indonesia and India are less likely to convert to islam and them alone make a massive majority of Islamic population. Otl may become smaller than Andalusian islam as its expanding to america and Africa.

 

[Nivek]

The thing is is still believe this muslim world will be smaller as Indonesia and India are less likely to convert to islam and them alone make a massive majority of Islamic population

Why?

 

[Planet of Hats]

The thing is is still believe this muslim world will be smaller as Indonesia and India are less likely to convert to islam and them alone make a massive majority of Islamic population. Otl may become smaller than Andalusian islam as its expanding to america and Africa.

I actually think this version of the Muslim world will be larger, but differently configured. Northern India is right now under the rule of a dynasty of Persanized Karluks, who are Muslim. Islam is still likely to reach Indonesia, even if it doesn't become the religion of majority - but it also has a pretty obvious chance at a free and unopposed headstart into sub-Saharan Africa, which OTL became heavily Christian due to the influence of European colonial empires. And there does at least seem to be a Muslim-majority country in North America in the future, in the form of Cawania.

Islam is already more prevalent in East Africa than OTL: The Banu Hilal brought it with them on their way to OTL Sudan, and trade advantages have resulted in rulers in the African Great Lakes region converting to Islam and becoming tied into the trade with Egypt and Somalia. Together with the collapse of Alodia and its reconstitution as a Muslim emirate with Arabized features, Islam is doing much better in Africa than OTL.

 

[I'tikaf]

The so-called Schism Fatwa is usually flagged by historians as the moment in which Maliki split from mainline Sunni Islam, though in fact it was not so momentous as that and the Fatwa was nearly ignored beyond the Abbasids' zone of control in its own time. But it would solidify the doctrine that the distance between the two modes of Islam had grown almost as broad as the divide between Sunni and Shi'a, with Egypt simply the pivot between the two.

The Schism will be interesting, to say the least, though I wonder how it will affect exchange in religious knowledge between Western and Eastern Islam ITTL. Will Scholars within al-Azhar still refer to texts from Al-Andalus regarding Taharah following the schism or would this halt exchange in ideas (at least theologically) between the two centres of Islam? Would this Neo-Maliki Islam be an entirely new sect or would it still be considered a legitimate School of Islam albeit following a false Caliph (Imam??? This is a bit weird IMHO as a Sunni Muslim. I'm so used to Shi'ites having Schisms over religious authority and it's really foreign for me to consider that it might have happened within Sunni Islam) or would they be as reviled as Shi'ites?

 

[haider najib]

Why?

my assumption is Andalusia will have a smaller colonial empire than spain so less america would be owned by them. Also Indonesia are so big in pop that even more of africa and america wont fill in the hole that those two have as both make a clear majority of islam. Africa and americas dont have the pop to challenge islamic pop of otl south asia and indonesia.

 

[Planet of Hats]

The Schism will be interesting, to say the least, though I wonder how it will affect exchange in religious knowledge between Western and Eastern Islam ITTL. Will Scholars within al-Azhar still refer to texts from Al-Andalus regarding Taharah following the schism or would this halt exchange in ideas (at least theologically) between the two centres of Islam? Would this Neo-Maliki Islam be an entirely new sect or would it still be considered a legitimate School of Islam albeit following a false Caliph (Imam??? This is a bit weird IMHO as a Sunni Muslim. I'm so used to Shi'ites having Schisms over religious authority and it's really foreign for me to consider that it might have happened within Sunni Islam) or would they be as reviled as Shi'ites?

It's a weird, weird, weird world we've created here. The problem the Andalusis have is that the supposed Caliphal authority is so important to legitimizing the hajib that they cannot set the Umayyads aside and place the name of the Abbasid Caliph in the khutbah without losing their own central authority.

The Abbasids view the Umayyad Caliph himself as a kafir, but mainline Muslims in the west - they are mostly Maliki, but also Zahiri and some others, provided they acknowledge the Umayyads - are not viewed as unbelievers, merely misguided; the schism is not quite as deep as the differences with Alids, as Sunnis who follow the Abbasids and those who follow the Umayyads are not very far apart doctrinally. Their differences are more in terms of cultural norms. Doctrinally, the biggest dividing point is leadership: Malikis ITTL, along with other minor disciplines in the Maghreb (the western Zahiris) reject As-Saffah and his descendants as legitimate Caliphs and believe that the Iberian Umayyads are the correct continuation of the Caliphal line.

The differences beyond that are more along the lines of finicky points of jurisprudence.

For example, to take an obscure one: The issue of whether drinking mare's milk is haram is one area where the two Caliphs differ. In Al-Andalus, where there is no tradition of Turkic horsemen riding in off the plains, the most widely accepted ruling is that the Quran draws a distinction between "the grazing livestock" and horses, mules and donkeys and emphasizes that drinks like kumis tend to be fermented, hence drinking fermented horse milk is haram. In the east, where Turkmen and Karluk ruling classes are Very Much A Thing That Happens, the typical ruling is that there is no explicit prohibition against drinking the milk of the horse, and therefore it is not haram.

 

[Al-numbers]

Iskender, who was proclaimed Kaysar by the army, was fluent in Greek, Bulgarian and Patzinak, and he calmed a restive populace by rolling back the jizya for Greek and Slavic converts and allowing the Ecumenican Patriarch to return to Constantinople.

Well, even apocalyptic plagues must end. How much has Constantinople (Kostantiniyya?) recovered from their cursed status?

 

[haider najib]

Well, even apocalyptic plagues must end. How much has Constantinople (Kostantiniyya?) recovered from their cursed status?

Its definitely not the jewel city anymore, Baghdad, Cordoba or the Song capital can claim that now but maybe better than the state after the fourth crusade and better than dying days Constantinople.

 

[Al-numbers]

The thing is is still believe this muslim world will be smaller as Indonesia and India are less likely to convert to islam and them alone make a massive majority of Islamic population. Otl may become smaller than Andalusian islam as its expanding to america and Africa.

Islam is still likely to reach Indonesia, even if it doesn't become the religion of majority

I'd say that at least Malaya, northern Sumatra, and the western and northern coasts of Borneo will be Islamized ITTL. While the faith was spread with Arab and Persian merchants traveling eastwards, it was also spread by proselytizing Indian, Persian, and Arabian Sufi orders. Accounts from Marco Polo and the authoring of the Hikayat Raja-Raja Pasai indicates that northern Sumatra was Islamized as early as the 13th century, despite both Srivijaya and Majapahit being in their prime (well, more of the latter and less of the former). In fact, the earliest recorded Muslim kingdom in maritime Southeast Asia is not the Malacca Sultanate like so many people have thought, but Samudera Pasai on what is today Indonesia's Aceh Province, being Islamized as early as 1282.

There are still no barriers for the merchants and sufi orders to prevent them from traveling eastwards ITTL, so the major port cities of the Malacca Straits and coastal Borneo will probably be Islamized due to the sustained contact of trade with the Islamic west. However, the rice basket of the archipelago (Java) could remain Hindu-Buddhist with a few Muslim enclaves in the urban centers. With that, the Majapahit could still control the trade routes to the Spice Islands and maybe even settle the Moluccas. In short, Nusantara could become divided into two maritime blocs, divided by faith and distance.

 

[Planet of Hats]

Well, even apocalyptic plagues must end. How much has Constantinople (Kostantiniyya?) recovered from their cursed status?

Well, the plague's gone! There's a lot of infrastructure damage, but there's no better place to rule Rumaniyah (Cosmic name retcon bat, GO!) than from than the Queen of Cities. One of Iskender's priorities is to restore Constantinople, and he's brought in architects from around his empire to do it, including Persians. The Hagia Sophia is now a mosque and the palace of Blachernae is being heavily restored and built up as the Bataids' castle. But the population of Constantinople has dropped significantly, probably to around 100,000 people tops - it's smaller than even the current, declining Córdoba, which lost a lot of its population during the Plague and has been sluggish to re-grow due to the pressure to move trade to Seville. Nevertheless, as far as Constantinople goes, the Queen is still the Queen, even if she's a little tarnished.

Córdoba is not the Jewel of the World, though. It's certainly one of the more splendid cities, but the gem of the world is unquestionably Kaifeng, with about a million citizens living in the seat of the glorious Song Emperor. For now. Baghdad is similarly gigantic. Other "jewel"-type cities include Debul at the mouth of the Indus (~200,000?), Genoa (~100,000?), Cairo, Fes, and sub-200k cities like Milan, Van (smaller but spectacularly beautiful), Ava over in Burma, Paris and Florence. Amalfi is also a small but splendid and prosperous city.

There are some up-and-comers, though. They include Seville, Marselha/Marseilles, Grimsby, Samarkand, Palermo and Vladimir.

 

[Planet of Hats]

I'd say that at least Malaya, northern Sumatra, and the western and northern coasts of Borneo will be Islamized ITTL.

That's accurate. There are Muslims on either side of the Strait and on Borneo simply due to trade, but Buddhism is doing well elsewhere in Indonesia. I mean, the Song don't really care what religion these people are, so long as trade flows through the Strait. But they tend to like to promote Buddhism, and they tend to seek out Buddhists somewhat more preferentially when looking for locals who are willing to kowtow to the Dragon.

As for the Americas: I don't want to tip my hand too much. But one thing that is inevitable is that indigenous peoples in the Americas do not have ingrained immunity to Old World illnesses, and even if I were to wank the absolute crap out of Andalusian medical science and send over shiploads of modern physicians (note: I haven't done this), the prospect of epidemic diseases spreading like wildfire through the New World is almost impossible to avert. Almost any contact scenario beyond the light levels of contact we see in the case of the Norse and the isolated Innu and Beothuk peoples will inevitably mean grim tidings for the New World simply because of the effects of epidemic disease.

 

[KidCabralista]

@Planet of Hats Any info on how the Party of Ali is doing by the current date? I've always been more than a little interested in the Shi'i branches of Islam.

 

[Planet of Hats]

@Planet of Hats Any info on how the Party of Ali is doing by the current date? I've always been more than a little interested in the Shi'i branches of Islam.

There is no real Alid power at the moment outside Yemen's Zaydi-ruled area and a few semi-independent landholders in the Persian Gulf area and parts of Persia, though other than that they're doing fine. Twelvers continue to be dominant in Mesopotamia; the end of the Fatimids, meanwhile, has put the Ismaili sect in a steep decline.



On another note: I've made some amendments to the most recent chapter, mainly adjusting the name used for the Muslim Roman polity to "Ar-Rumaniyah" as a region and "Bataids" or "Bataid Empire" as a more generic term. I think Ad-Dawlatu' l-Bataiyya and Ad-Dawlatu 'l-Rumaniyah are also close as more official terms. Basically the polity itself is broadly both "The Romanian State" and "The Bataid State."

 

[KidCabralista]

On another note: I've made some amendments to the most recent chapter, mainly adjusting the name used for the Muslim Roman polity to "Ar-Rumaniyah" as a region and "Bataids" or "Bataid Empire" as a more generic term. I think Ad-Dawlatu' l-Bataiyya and Ad-Dawlatu 'l-Rumaniyah are also close as more official terms. Basically the polity itself is broadly both "The Romanian State" and "The Bataid State."

I wonder if the "who's the REAL Third Rome?" arguments will be nastier or calmer in MiaJworld's AH.com equivalent. It'd be funny to see Despotate stans in the modern day, that's for sure.