Religious: a large conversion FROM Islam

Yes, I was wondering if Iran could go Bahai.

I doubt it, Bahá'í as a faith is really only attractive to a specific demographic (that being religious and spiritual universalists), and Shi'a Islam has become part of the Iranian identity; countries don't just convert like that.
 
Like you mentioned in the OP, a number of Albanian intellectuals toyed with the idea of a mass conversion in order to solicit further western support. Catholicism is not a viable option due to previous tensions and antagonism between Muslim and Catholic tribes in the North. Historically, Protestantism attracted the most attention and I think with an early enough POD you might be able to get something going...here's one idea.
Your POD is really interesting.
Speaking of Albanian Evangelical Church, where's the exact headquarters of this denomination? And speaking of Protestantism in Albania itself (at least in your PoD), are there any Albanians who are members of other Protestant denominations?
 
The "Age of Miracles" timeline features a Muslim Pashtun tribe migrating into Northern India and converting en masse to Buddhism I think. I don't remember the specifics, but they're far away from other Pashtuns (who would try to prevent the conversion and might punish them for apostasy) and in a non-Muslim land.

Separation from the main body of their co-religionists, a major shake-up to their world, and perhaps a charismatic leader might work.
 
Now that I think of it, historical instances are known to have happened in Russia, although again, it was fairly political (getting along with the Muscovite princes/tsars).
 
Large expansion of Muslim merchants leading to conversions along the trade routes and then economics shifts/collapse that leave the merchant communities poor and cut off. Something along these lines is said to have happened to the (tiny) Muslim community in Shilla-dynasty Korea.
 

Delvestius

Banned
A Mughal converting from Islam to Hinduism could mean a mass conversion of northern Indian Muslims, possibly allowing India and Pakistan to remain a separate entity after colonization, provided butterflies are't too crazy.
 
A Mughal converting from Islam to Hinduism could mean a mass conversion of northern Indian Muslims, possibly allowing India and Pakistan to remain a separate entity after colonization, provided butterflies are't too crazy.

Considering Islam was part of the core of the Mughal identity (the Mughals being Persianized) I really don't see that happening, plus their WAS a Mughal Emperor who tried to create a Universalist religion based on Islam and Hinduism, he got a handful (their were never more than 19 followers) of converts among the aristocracy but was more or less just tolerated, and when he died the whole system was removed very quickly.
 
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I am not entirely sure if this has been posted in here yet but the reason most people didn't convert away from Islam was an event that happened when the Prophet Muhammad's corpse wasn't even cold yet.

A very large number of Arabian tribes left Islam, claiming they had converted for Muhammad and not for Abu bakr (the first Caliph) or an institution. More or less the entirety of Yemen, Oman, and Nejd converted back to their tribal beliefs, often times influenced by the Sassanian Persians. This triggered a war and theological debate of if you even could convert away from Islam. The result was a resounding no and the Rebellions were more or less crushed and returned to the fold of Islam.

So you have your mass conversion away from Islam, since it happened IOTL, as well as a POD where you could have the remaining Muslims agree that people should not be forced to be Muslims if they did not want to. That would likely allow more of these mass conversion away from Islam scenarios.
 
Now, in the case of a population in which Islam is the long established religion I really don't see it happening en masse, I mean individual and even small scale mass conversions (as in a single village) are possible and have happened, but unless being forced for generations, I really don't see it ever happening; the Abrahamic religions are very good at retaining believers and Islam is even better at that than the others; the only real 'threat'/likely population shift is to simply no longer believe in religion at all and becoming Irreligious (Atheist or Agnostic), however by that point the population is'nt going to see any other religion as the true path since they'll view religion in general critically.
I actually think that you could get a good sized conversion on similar principals. You just need some scandal or misplaced political support by a major Islamic leader that looks really bad for Islam without affecting other religious groups. Religions often suffer when picking the losing side in a civil conflict. Have that happen in a heavily Islamic country that is democratizing and has sizeable minorities of another religion and you could see those minorities explode, especially if they have a palatable connection to the nation's past that the nationalists are attracted to.

So, just to use the first idea that comes into my head, post Ottoman Egypt (in a scenario without British control of Egypt) might work. They have a democratic revolution in which Muslim authorities support the Muhammad Ali Dynasty, and the Coptic Christian leaders support the revolution. Eventually Coptic Christianity becomes associated with the revolution and their idealized nationalistic vision of Egypt, while Islam is considered to be imposed by foreigners and not culturally Egyptian. The revolution succeeds, but doesn't force people to convert. Early democratic rule is very successful, and inspires large numbers of conversions. Similar revivals of pre-Islamic religions might possibly take place in other countries provided they have a large enough minority religion to still be considered relevant.

Not incredibly likely I'll grant, but neither is any possible peaceful mass conversion.
 
I actually think that you could get a good sized conversion on similar principals. You just need some scandal or misplaced political support by a major Islamic leader that looks really bad for Islam without affecting other religious groups. Religions often suffer when picking the losing side in a civil conflict. Have that happen in a heavily Islamic country that is democratizing and has sizeable minorities of another religion and you could see those minorities explode, especially if they have a palatable connection to the nation's past that the nationalists are attracted to.

So, just to use the first idea that comes into my head, post Ottoman Egypt (in a scenario without British control of Egypt) might work. They have a democratic revolution in which Muslim authorities support the Muhammad Ali Dynasty, and the Coptic Christian leaders support the revolution. Eventually Coptic Christianity becomes associated with the revolution and their idealized nationalistic vision of Egypt, while Islam is considered to be imposed by foreigners and not culturally Egyptian. The revolution succeeds, but doesn't force people to convert. Early democratic rule is very successful, and inspires large numbers of conversions. Similar revivals of pre-Islamic religions might possibly take place in other countries provided they have a large enough minority religion to still be considered relevant.

Not incredibly likely I'll grant, but neither is any possible peaceful mass conversion.

Egypt is not a very good example here since it's long considered itself to be a Center of the Islamic World and takes great national pride in it.
 

katchen

Banned
Something like this:
www.elam.com/articles/How-Churches-are-Planted-in-Iran
is happening, apparently, all through the Islamic world today. Evangelical Christian missionaries are working with "Home Church" congregations in defiance of strict anti-conversion laws in Muslim nations, taking full advantage of the Internet and drawing upon years of experience evangelizing in Communist nations on how to set up underground churches.
Underground Christianity is apparently a lot larger in Muslim nations than most observers give it credit for being (although perhaps not as large as Christians purport it to be). http://www.bing.com/search?q=home c...F&form=CONMHP&conlogo=CT3210127&ShowAppsUI=1#
 
Egypt is not a very good example here since it's long considered itself to be a Center of the Islamic World and takes great national pride in it.
France had the same relationship with Catholicism, but the church kept picking the wrong side in civil conflicts. France didn't have a viable religious minority to turn to, so irreligion was the result, but Egypt does, so assuming the Copts pick correctly I could see a national myth that portrays them favorably arising and garnering some converts.
 

Delvestius

Banned
France had the same relationship with Catholicism, but the church kept picking the wrong side in civil conflicts. France didn't have a viable religious minority to turn to, so irreligion was the result, but Egypt does, so assuming the Copts pick correctly I could see a national myth that portrays them favorably arising and garnering some converts.

Indeed, in regards to Egypt something like this could happen even earlier. Coptic was the language of Egypt until the fourteenth or fifteenth century, so perhaps a faction that wanted to establish an "Egyptian" identity rather than Arab might choose to re-convert to their previous religion.
 
A thought: the Kaifeng Jews lost the distinctiveness of their Jewish identity, if not necessarily their Jewish identity itself, because they were cut off from other sources of Jewish civilization. This never happened to China's Muslims because they were always connected historically to the Muslim world. Now, in a world where China's connections with the Muslim world are cut off (I'm not sure how this would happen without a very early POD), we could see a shift in religion from Islam to the general Chinese melange. The people themselves are still likely to remember their Islamic heritage though, though their religious practice might change.
 
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