Roman societal view on Islam

So I've been planning a Roman timeline for a while, and whilst I've been reconsidering aspects as I've been reading, one topic I've not really understood (besides Romanitas, which was fun to explore and I want to include) is how Roman society felt about Islam/Muslims.

I mean, its all well and good to go all "Crusader Kings, They Baddies", but that's cartoonish.

Did the Romans consider them especially evil heathens? Misguided? An honourable foe? What was Islam to the Roman people(s)

Note : The time period I was looking at is the 1400s, so views for that period, after losing much of its heartland is deeply relevant.
 
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Skallagrim

Banned
Uh, no. "They baddies", while simplistically formulated, is not cartoonish. The Eastern Roman Empire was deeply Christian, and involved in inter-Christian sectarian struggles. To the point where bishops were literally brawling on the floor during Church councils. That kind of thing. There was a Christian presence in Western Arabia, and some tendency towards ("heterical!") monophysitism was present there. Initially, it was believed that Mohammed was a monophysite schismatic of some sort. In other words: a Christian heretic, from the Church's perspective. Already an 'enemy', in that regard. (Of both Church and State, when you consider the fact that the Easten Roman Emperor was the man who called Church councils, and seved as protector of the Church.)

When the islamic armies marched north, it became clear that this new cult was something else entirely-- but it also became impossible to see it as anything other than the creed of sworn enemies. These guys were invading! The aforementioned sectarian struggles within the ERE actually led quite a few Christians to welcome the Muslims, believing that they'd get more freedom to express their deviating (from official doctrine) views under Muslim rule. This turned out to be... not quite the case. (But it does explain a few things about how quick the Islamic conquests were!)

The thing is, the regions that were most inclined to be schismatic were on the periphery. North Africa, that old hotbed of gnostic heresies. Syria, with its own Syriac rites. The Muslims swallowed up the most 'troublesome' areas first. So what remained of the ERE was less divided against itself, religiously, and what dissent remained was stifled by the presence of a much greater extenal foe (Islam). An outside threat, after all, is a strong unifier.

It is safe to say that the Eastern Roman view of Islam was that it was the religion of the sworn enemy. In fact, it was even the other way around: rather than a people with a religion, Islam was more a religion with a people. So instead of merely being the religion of the enemy, any people adopting it became the enemy. Don't forget that the Easten Roman Emperors considered themselves to be the leaders and defenders of true Christendom. They explictly cast the conflict between themselves and the Islamic foes in religious terms.
 
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There wasn't any pagan Romans left during Prophet Mohammad's lifetime.
He’s planning to do a Roman timeline,so I’d presume he’s talking about how the Romans would view the Muslims if Islam somehow wasn’t butterflied. I mean if you wan’t to know how Christian Romans thought about the Muslims,you should just look at ERE writings on the subject. Pretty certain that the East Romans thought that the Islam was just a heresy.
 
You talking about pagan Romans?
I mean, I imagine their numbers are next to nowt, but it'd be an interesting perspective if I had any remaining pagans in the TL.

They were not Romans.
Everyone that was not Roman was not even worthy of being mentioned in the same sentence with them.

As illustrated, that is a little cartoonish. There were few equals to Romans, but yeah, the idea of a superiority complex/xenophobic vibes is something I've come across before.

Uh, no. "They baddies", while simplistically formulated, is not cartoonish. The Eastern Roman Empire was deeply Christian, and involved in inter-Christian sectarian struggles. To the point where bishops were literally brawling on the floo during Church councils. That kind of thing. There was a Christian presence in Western Arabia, and some tendency towards ("heterical!") monophysitism was present there. Initially, it was believed that Mohammed was a monophysite schismatic of some sort. In other words: a Christian heretic, from the Church's perspective.

When the islamic armies marched north, it became clear that this new cult was something else entirely-- but it also became impossible to see it as th creed of sworn enemies. These guys were invading! The aforementioned sectarian struggles within the ERE actually led quite a few Christians to welcome the Muslims, believing that they'd get more freedom to express their deviating (from official doctrine) views under Muslim rule. This turned out to be... not quite the case. But it does explain a few things about how quick the Islamic conquests were.

The thing is, the regions that were most inclined to be schismatic were on the periphery. Noth Africa, that old hotbed of gnostic heresies. Syria, with its own Syriac rites. The Muslims swallowed up the most 'troublesome' areas first. So what remained of the ERE was less divided against itself, religiously, and what dissent remained was stifled by the presence of a much greater extenal foe (Islam). An outside threat, after all, is a strong unifier.

It is safe to say that the Eastern Roman view of Islam was that it was the religion of THE sworn enemy. In fact, it was even the other way around: rather than a people with a religion, Islam was more a religion with a people. So instead of merely being the religion of the enemy, any people adopting it became the enemy. Don't forget that the Easten Roman Emperors considered themselves to be the leaders and defenders of true Christendom. They explictly cast the conflict between themselves and the Islamic foes in religious terms.

However, is that the perspective of the Church, the State, the soldier, or the person? As when conquered by the Ottomans, the Romans still considered themselves Romans, even some who converted - so it doesn't appear to be that it was the sworn enemy of the conquered - or at least that perspective may have shifted.

I should note (I'll edit the OP to reflect this) is that we're looking at 1400s Romans, not say 1000s Romans.
 
Running through the main authority on this topic, Hoyland's Seeing Islam as Others Saw It, and looking just at the seventh century.

Teachings of Jacob, Greek antisemitic tract representing orthodox imperial opinion, c. 634:

[The Jews] were saying that the prophet had appeared, coming with the Saracens, and that he was proclaiming the advent of the anointed one, the Christ who was to come. I, having arrived at Sykamina, stopped by a certain old man well-versed in the scriptures, and I said to him: "What can you tell me about the prophet who has appeared with the Saracens?" He replied, groaning deeply: "He is false, for the prophets do not come armed with a sword. Truly they are works of anarchy being committed today and I fear that the first Christ to come, whom the Christians worship, was the one sent by God and we instead are preparing to receive the Antichrist. Indeed, Isaiah said that the Jews would retain a perverted and hardened heart until all the earth should be devastated. But you go, master Abraham, and find out about the prophet who has appeared." So I, Abraham, inquired and heard from those who had met him that there was no truth to be found in the so-called prophet, only the shedding of men's blood. He says also that he has the keys of paradise, which is incredible.
Appendix to Roman monk John Moschus's Pratum Spirituale, ca. 670:

The godless Saracens entered the holy city of Christ our Lord, Jerusalem, with the permission of God and in punishment for our negligence, which is considerable, and immediately proceeded in haste to the place which is called the Capitol. They took with them men, some by force, others by their own will, in order to clean that place and to build that cursed thing, intended for their prayer and which they call a midzgitha [Arabic for mosque is masjid].
Sermon of Sophronius, Patriarch of Jerusalem, c. 634:

But the present circumstances are forcing me to think differently about our way of life, for why are [so many] wars being fought among us? Why do barbarian raids abound? Why are the troops of the Saracens attacking us? Why has there been so much destruction and plunder? Why are there incessant outpourings of human blood? Why are the birds of the sky devouring human bodies? Why have churches been pulled down? Why is the cross mocked? Why is Christ, who is the dispenser of all good things and the provider of this joyousness of ours, blasphemed by pagan mouths (ethnikois tois stomasi) so that he justly cries out to us: "Because of you my name is blasphemed among the pagans," and this is the worst of all the terrible things that are happening to us. That is why the vengeful and God-hating Saracens, the abomination of desolation clearly foretold to us by the prophets, overrun the places which are not allowed to them, plunder cities, devastate fields, burn down villages, set on fire the holy churches, overturn the sacred monasteries, oppose the Roman armies arrayed against them, and in fighting raise up the trophies [of war] and add victory to victory. Moreover, they are raised up more and more against us and increase their blasphemy of Christ and the church, and utter wicked blasphemies against God. These God-fighters boast of prevailing over all, assiduously and unrestrainably imitating their leader, who is the devil, and emulating his vanity because of which he has been expelled from heaven and been assigned to the gloomy shades. Yet these vile ones would not have accomplished this nor seized such a degree of power as to do and utter lawlessly all these things, unless we had first insulted the gift [of baptism] and first defiled the purification, and in this way grieved Christ, the giver of gifts, and prompted him to be angry with us, good though he is and though he takes no pleasure in evil, being the fount of kindness and not wishing to behold the ruin and destruction of men. We are ourselves, in truth, responsible for all these things and no word will be found for our defence.​

The general view was that the Arabs were clearly God's terrible punishment for the sins of the Romans.
 
Running through the main authority on this topic, Hoyland's Seeing Islam as Others Saw It, and looking just at the seventh century.

The general view was that the Arabs were clearly God's terrible punishment for the sins of the Romans.

Interesting, I don't have that book, do you own a copy/have access to it online?

Does it have anything in it about the 1300s/1400s views?
 
Yeah, from what I can see, though I'm more familiar with the Muslim sources of the Conquests, there's a flipping of how Islam is viewed from some heretical Christian sect to a wave of alien "others" who were the scourge of God, much like how a lot of other cultures saw their respective invading groups. This perception of being divine punishment seems to have solidified in the wake of the shocking victories of the Rashidun Army at Ajnadayn, Damascus and Yarmouk.

My question is (now I'm simply gathering sources for my own TL :p) how the Romans would have viewed an Islam that was more like Eastern Orthodoxy in outward appearance? If the Rashidun Caliphate had survived for longer, keeping up its dhimmi/convert-friendly policies instead of the Arabization and marginalization of dhimmi communities overseen by the Umayyads, I don't think it's beyond the pale to imagine that the large amounts of dhimmis in the government bureaucracy and trading with their Muslim neighbors to exert a heavier influence on the young faith. Certainly nothing core doctrinal, I don't think those kinds of changes would be acceptable to the early Muslim faithful, but something like increased veneration of relics, the presence of Byzantine-influenced paintings of Muhammad and Jesus in masjids, and other "window dressing." I mean, the earliest Muslims were quite in awe of the Romans for being an old and powerful kingdom of People of the Book, even if they did view them as having strayed from the true message of Jesus Christ. The Chapter of the Romans in the Qur'an opens by consoling the Muslims over the Roman loss at Antioch, the Prophet Muhammad had a day of celebration in honor of Heraclius' success in the Cappadochian Campaigns, and Khalid ibn al Walid frequently eulogized the Roman counterparts that he vanquished in poetry. Clearly the Muslims didn't hate and fear the Romans the way the Romans hated and feared them, though tbf, it's easier to be gracious when you're the one doing the curb-stomping.

My guess would be that the Romans would be more inclined to keep up their belief that the Muslims were just weird Christians if they look more Christian from the outside. Would we see a detente between a Romanized Caliphate and the ERE? The ERE could turn its focus westward and the Rashidun would serve as a useful drain-tap for heretical Christians, who could simply move to the Caliphate, pay the jizya, and be left alone instead of constantly agitating in the Roman Empire.
 
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So I've been planning a Roman timeline for a while, and whilst I've been reconsidering aspects as I've been reading, one topic I've not really understood (besides Romanitas, which was fun to explore and I want to include) is how Roman society felt about Islam/Muslims.

I mean, its all well and good to go all "Crusader Kings, They Baddies", but that's cartoonish.

Did the Romans consider them especially evil heathens? Misguided? An honourable foe? What was Islam to the Roman people(s)

Note : The time period I was looking at is the 1400s, so views for that period, after losing much of its heartland is deeply relevant.
Interesting would be a traditional Roman philosophical ( maybe new school of Platon)or even a Hellenic Point of view on the News Religion be. Would be interesting If in der ATL timeline Hellenic tradition has a similiar impact as Persian culture on the Religion.
 
The problem was that ,Islam was willing to make no compromise .They would invade ,now or later .

This is pretty reductionist, mate. It's true that the either joining the Ummah as a Muslim, dhimmitude, or conquest were the options that the Rashidun gave the old Empires, but much like the later Caliphate settled and looked for other places to expand once it was clear the Romans had organized themselves again after their thrashing, there's no reason why a culturally-Romanized Caliphate that reaches the same stage of stalemate wouldn't also turn their expansions elsewhere like OTL.
 

mad orc

Banned
The issue was that ,how would the Romans create such a state if they themselves would be weak .

Now if they did try to negotiate ,it would be some time after the initial expansion by which time ,Islam was far more stronger than them .

You can only create a state like that if you are the stronger one of the bunch .
 
I will concede that I'm far less well versed in ERE history than I am Caliphal history, but I'd think that the loss of places like Mauretania, Crete, Cyprus and a slice of Southern Anatolia to a somewhat expanded Rashidun Caliphate (which would be more like the OTL Rashidun-to-Umayyad Caliphates without the Fitna) would be far from a death blow to Rhomania. If they lived after losing places like Syria and Egypt to the OTL Caliphate, those places won't hurt it much comparatively. I don't think even a more stable Romanized Caliphate could take much more land than the modest gains over OTL that I listed above, even the amount they took in OTL seems almost ASB.

If (more like when) Rhomania recovers and puts up stiff defence that beats off the equivalent of the last Umayyad excursions into Byzantine territory, I'd think that said culturally-Romanized Caliphate would look less like the Arabized (and later culturally-Sassanized) "Oriental Other" that terrified the Romans in OTL and more like some bizarre heretic group of Arabs who at least have the "good sense" to act like their Roman "betters"
 
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