WIF Muslim Kievan Rus

As much as I'd like to see a Muslim Russia, I'd have to agree with the fact that Vladimir adopting Orthodox Christianity was inevitable. The Byzantines were coming close to their absolute apex as an empire at this time (Macedonian dynasty and Basil II), and it's hard to see the Rus not choosing the Byzantines over any other power. A much better option for a Muslim Russia however would probably be a successful Golden Horde which subjugates or destroys Moscow and manages to maintain their hold of Easternmost Europe. Over time they'd gradually become Slavicized and might even adopt Russian as an official language.
 
The collapse of the Khazars and the Abbasids in the same time period killed off most the northern/Caspian route of the Silk Road, and this trade had been a very large part of the Kievan Rus' economy. Keep those two empires, or even just Khazaria, alive and prominent, and the Rus' won't need to turn to Byzantium.

In fact if the Khazars retain their alliance with the Byzantines, the Rus' may have an antagonistic relationship with both immediate neighbors. For this to turn into a Rus' conversion to Islam would require a strong dynasty in the Islamic world that can attack either the Byzantines or Khazars, to merit making a direct alliance. This could be the Abbasids, or a mamluk dynasty after an earlier Abbasid collapse, after which the mamluks solidify their rule.
 
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The rest of your post can be credited as an insult upon Islam, frankly. Assuming Muslims have no faith or opinions and are so base that they can give up commands from Allah, for a chest of fur. Any ruler of Kiev that sends a letter regarding making khamr an accepted product, will be declared a kafr regardless of politics. Further, no Ulema would do business with such a ruler and the Kiev-Rus will not benefit from such conversion.
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It isn't an insult to Islam to suggest that authorities, regardless of faith, have almost always been willing to make exceptions under the right conditions. That is just the nature of power and good politics.
The Turks for instance were accepted during the Abbasid era, despite drinking being incredibly potent in their culture and practices which were downright Pagan in nature. So vast where the differences between the Islam of the middle east and mediterranean to the northern Turks, that the Russian Empire gave up on classifying demographics based on religion because they had a hard time pinning down where Tengriism ended and Islam begun amongst many of the communities who carried on practices from the conquest of Transoxiana.

Back more to the point though, it isn't an insult to suggest that human powers are made up on human beings, and are thus willing to be lax when it comes to their morality if they believe it serves a greater good.
 
It isn't an insult to Islam to suggest that authorities, regardless of faith, have almost always been willing to make exceptions under the right conditions. That is just the nature of power and good politics.
The Turks for instance were accepted during the Abbasid era, despite drinking being incredibly potent in their culture and practices which were downright Pagan in nature. So vast where the differences between the Islam of the middle east and mediterranean to the northern Turks, that the Russian Empire gave up on classifying demographics based on religion because they had a hard time pinning down where Tengriism ended and Islam begun amongst many of the communities who carried on practices from the conquest of Transoxiana.

Back more to the point though, it isn't an insult to suggest that human powers are made up on human beings, and are thus willing to be lax when it comes to their morality if they believe it serves a greater good.

It is one thing to not execute and distribute punishment upon slave warriors whose position in society regardless of function, was still that of a slave and their Turkic brethren who by the time of our POD here, have yet to convert to Islam north of Kwarezm. However, it is completely a different matter for the dictates of Islam to be changed as was suggested earlier. It is forseen that new converts or a newly converted people to slowly gain the Islamic traits, however, the idea that the Caliph or an Ulema will change or fabricate clear cut Islamic issues for a chest of fur, that is the insult.

It is akin to assume individuals present at the Council of Nicea the next year, would agree to abrogate their previous claims for money. This sort of thought process is very unorthodox for historical thought and relies upon modernistic and western norms which do not apply constantly and at the heart of it, a lack of understanding for religion and spirituality.
 
It is one thing to not execute and distribute punishment upon slave warriors whose position in society regardless of function, was still that of a slave and their Turkic brethren who by the time of our POD here, have yet to convert to Islam north of Kwarezm. However, it is completely a different matter for the dictates of Islam to be changed as was suggested earlier. It is forseen that new converts or a newly converted people to slowly gain the Islamic traits, however, the idea that the Caliph or an Ulema will change or fabricate clear cut Islamic issues for a chest of fur, that is the insult.
First of all, I imagine the fur thing was hyperbolic. If it wasn't, then fair enough it is insulting.

2nd, not all the Turks were slaves, and condemnation of their practices didn't result in executions when they were significant in their own right, or merchants on the silk road.

It is akin to assume individuals present at the Council of Nicea the next year, would agree to abrogate their previous claims for money. This sort of thought process is very unorthodox for historical thought and relies upon modernistic and western norms which do not apply constantly and at the heart of it, a lack of understanding for religion and spirituality.
You are putting way too much onto the argument.
There is a huge difference between "someone at the council of Nukes changing position" and "it is possible that an individual/s could have been bribed. Its the difference between "anyone can be bribed to give up their convictions" and "some people can be bribed to give up their convictions".

That's not ahistorical or modernist, nor disrespectful to religion. It is a recognition that humans have done that kind of thing all the way through history in every society.
Hell, its even Biblical. If Matthew is to be believed, a high Jewish council knew of Christ's resurrection alongside 2 soldiers who were bribed to lie.
Its not unorthodox, its human.
 
It is one thing to not execute and distribute punishment upon slave warriors whose position in society regardless of function, was still that of a slave and their Turkic brethren who by the time of our POD here, have yet to convert to Islam north of Kwarezm. However, it is completely a different matter for the dictates of Islam to be changed as was suggested earlier. It is forseen that new converts or a newly converted people to slowly gain the Islamic traits, however, the idea that the Caliph or an Ulema will change or fabricate clear cut Islamic issues for a chest of fur, that is the insult.

It is akin to assume individuals present at the Council of Nicea the next year, would agree to abrogate their previous claims for money. This sort of thought process is very unorthodox for historical thought and relies upon modernistic and western norms which do not apply constantly and at the heart of it, a lack of understanding for religion and spirituality.

From reading @alexmilman post it seems that he is not an adherent of Islam and most likely has a poor knowledge of Sharia. He also appears to be expressing doubt in ITTL's Hypothetical Russian Ulama sticking to Orthodoxy in order to spread or maintain the faith ITTL. I doubt that expressing cynicism in religious clerics is a sin let alone an insult against Islam.
 
@CountPeter My argument is not based upon the fact that some ruling will be relaxed for a period. The issue at hand was the belief that the Russian rulers invite Muslim Ulema from Baghdad to assist him in the religion and in civic issues; a process of transforming Kiev. The poster suggested that the ruler simply bribe these Muslim Ulema to fabricate Hadith or lie. These sorts of bribes are not realistic. It would be realistic however, for these Ulema to make exceptions and establish truths to the people and over time alcohol and other Vice becomes more limited.

I stand by the idea that a bribe to fabricate Hadith from Ulema will result in the Ulema leaving the realm and the Kiev-Rus simply revert to its previous religion as there is now nothing to gain from Islam.
 
@CountPeter My argument is not based upon the fact that some ruling will be relaxed for a period. The issue at hand was the belief that the Russian rulers invite Muslim Ulema from Baghdad to assist him in the religion and in civic issues; a process of transforming Kiev. The poster suggested that the ruler simply bribe these Muslim Ulema to fabricate Hadith or lie. These sorts of bribes are not realistic. It would be realistic however, for these Ulema to make exceptions and establish truths to the people and over time alcohol and other Vice becomes more limited.

I stand by the idea that a bribe to fabricate Hadith from Ulema will result in the Ulema leaving the realm and the Kiev-Rus simply revert to its previous religion as there is now nothing to gain from Islam.
Ah. I misread, my apologies.
 
Yeah, I think that's what I was trying to say - the big problem with the alt history you're proposing is how do we stop the spread of Christianity and the prestige of Rome - both need to be mitigated or weakened until Islam has time to come on the scene in a big enough way.

But in the case of Rus prestige was not of Rome but of Constantinople. The Catholics lost the "competition" (which is a different subject).

Now, from the perspective of (future "Saint") Vladimir & Co choice of the Greek Orthodox Creed had certain advantages: (a) existing cultural links and probably even "Constantinople lobby" in Kiev, (b) secular power clearly having an upper hand over the Church, (c) strong trade relations and (d) not to be neglected, impressive rituals ("we thought that we are in Heaven" as one of those present at the religious service in Constantinople put it).

Would this make Islam case hopeless? I don't think so:

(a) Culturally, Rus of that time could go any way because in each of these choices there were some features well adjusted to the existing life style.
(b) Trade links with the world of Islam had been old and well established (huge amounts of Islamic coins had been found all the way to the Baltic coast).
(c) Unlike Byzantine Empire, Caliphate never was an enemy.
(d) Adoption of Islam would result in a lesser religious dependency than was OTL case with the Greek Church (it took the fall of Constantinople for the Russian Church to elect the 1st mitropolit of its own and an extra century to establish its own patriarchate. Baghdad was too far and too irrelevant militarily and politically to establish the same level of religious dependency.
(e) Alliance with Caliphate could be useful in a fight against the permanent enemy of the Kievan Rus: the nomadic tribes that lived in the Volga-Don steppes. While the Byzantines were not helpful at all against them (and sometimes were even, with a good reason, suspected in encouraging them), alliance with the Muslim states would mean that these tribes are squeezed between Rus on the North and Caliphate on the South (the Muslim states had been stretching all the way to Azerbaijan).

But the question was not as much possibility of that option (for WHAT IF a non-zero chance is enough because it does not require ASBs) but what would be the consequences of its implementation. For all practical purposes Baghdad Caliphate would be gone in the XIII century and much earlier its real power would be taken by the Seljuks (not to mention competing Caliphates and versions of Islam), leaving Rus practically free of the outside religious influence. In a long run (all other things being more or less the same), this may result in unification of the Muslim Russian lands with the Muslim Horde creating very interesting geopolitical situations. In OTL, while Tsardom of Moscow had been copying the trappings of Byzantine Empire, ideology of its absolute monarchy was developed under strong influence of the (Muslim) Golden Horde.

Relations with their Western neighbors could change. Not that they ever had been peaceful but the religious differences would became much more prominent but, realistically, in OTL "outlanders" took out of the "Russian lands" (a very vague term, which includes territories that were not even a part of Kievan Rus) pretty much everything they realistically could and only their weakening by the XVIII century changed the situation.
 
If you ask me it is highly unlikely. Christianization was happening and Yaroslav the Wise just decided not to fight the inevitable.

A tiny problem is in the fact that Baptism of Russia happened during the rule of Vladimir, father of Yaroslav. ;)


The great pressure towards Christianization of the Kyivan Rus' as present during Svyatoslav's reign too, with his mother asking him to convert. He only didn't convery because he was worried about his druzhina (or household guard) no longer respecting him for abandoning paganism. Obviously, it worked fine for Yaroslav since Christianity was always well entrenched in Kyivan culture.

It is also reasonable to assume that Svyatoslav did not adopt Christianity because he spent a big part of his reign fighting Byzantine Empire. His mother and her closest entourage had been representing a Byzantine faction opposed to his policies. His successor, Yaroplok, did not convert either. Vladimir became Prince of Kiev in 978 but "baptism of Rus" happened only a decade later, in 988. Clearly, the "prerssure" was not excessively great.

Rus was officially baptized before Yaroslav so how it worked for him is more or less irrelevant. As for Christianity "always" being entrenched in whatever can pass for "Kievan culture", there were not too many signs of it prior to the regency of Olga. In Novgorod it was enforced by Vladimir's military commanders by the military means and most probably the same goes for many other places.

Islam on the other hand just doesn't make logical sense.

No offense, but who made you a supreme arbiter of what does or does not make logical sense? :cool:

Disregarding religious arguments, there just isn't a good secular reason for the Rus' to convert to Islam. Trade was better with the Byzantines and the internal conflicts that would result from adopting Islam, as opposed to Christianity, would not make it worth it.

And that's it as far as the "logic" is involved?

FYI, trade with the world of Islam was quite extensive and conversion to Islam would not stop it because Byzantine Empire was maintaining an extensive trade with the Islamic world (quite a few arches in the Great Mosque of Cordoba had been sent there as a gift from the Emperor, which should give you some idea about the geographic scope of these relations). The closest Muslim state was Bulgar on Volga and Volga route was opening links to the very lucrative Muslim markets.

OTOH, the trade and family links with the North had been much closer and stronger than with Byzantine Empire. Svyatoslav had a distinct Norse element in his personal band (and used shield wall tactics in the battles with Byzantines) Vladimir started his career by fleeing to his relative Haakon Sigurdsson, ruler of Norway, collecting as many Norse warriors as he could to assist him to recover Novgorod. Yaroslav was getting military help from the Norse more than once, Harald Hardrada spent time at Yaroslav's court prior to his service to Byzantine empire and he married Yaroslav's daughter. Yaroslav's another daughter, Anna was married to the king of France and his sister to the king of Poland so, following the same type of logic Catholicism was at least as reasonable choice as Orthodoxy. Definitely more advantages as far as the foreign relations were involved.

And as far as the "internal conflicts" are involved? Which ones? Do you think that the pagans would be even less happy when forced to adopt Islam than they were when forced to baptize?
 
It isn't an insult to Islam to suggest that authorities, regardless of faith, have almost always been willing to make exceptions under the right conditions. That is just the nature of power and good politics.
The Turks for instance were accepted during the Abbasid era, despite drinking being incredibly potent in their culture and practices which were downright Pagan in nature.

The same goes for the Tatars: it does not look like their conversion to Islam resulted in a significant change of their drinking habits.

And when it came to Nappy in Egypt negotiating conversion of all his army to Islam (not quite seriously, I suspect), the local spiritual authorities easily conceded the drinking part when he insisted that the French can't live without it. [/QUOTE]
 
As much as I'd like to see a Muslim Russia, I'd have to agree with the fact that Vladimir adopting Orthodox Christianity was inevitable. The Byzantines were coming close to their absolute apex as an empire at this time (Macedonian dynasty and Basil II), and it's hard to see the Rus not choosing the Byzantines over any other power. A much better option for a Muslim Russia however would probably be a successful Golden Horde which subjugates or destroys Moscow

At the time of the Mongolian conquest Moscow was nothing in a middle of nowhere, just a tiny town ruled by a junior son of the Great Prince of Vladimir. It was completely destroyed during the Russian Winter Campaign but, as was general situation in Russia, destruction of the town did not mean too much: they were mostly collections of the wooden huts surrounded by a moat and wooden stockade. Easy to destroy and easy to rebuild.

Moscow raise to power was a byproduct of the existence of the Horde, not other way around.

and manages to maintain their hold of Easternmost Europe. Over time they'd gradually become Slavicized and might even adopt Russian as an official language.

The main problem with the "hold" part was two-fold: 1st, the Horde suffered from its own internal instability and 2nd, because of the religious differences it could not expect to "hold" Russian territories forever. Raise of the Muscovite state, specifically, was just occasional - it could be another princedom and, anyway, for quite a while the most senior title was Great Prince of Vladimir (which the princes of Moscow had been getting from the Horde). Either Horde should become Christian or the Russian lands had to be Muslim by the time of Mongolian conquest.
 
This is one of those things that makes a hell of a lot of sense in a hot desert climate and absolutely no sense in deep woodlands. A pig is a pretty dang unclean and destructive animal in a good many contexts. They're also a great source of meat and in climates where food is not always abundant and the growing season is short could probably save your life.

Which makes you wonder - would a missionary religion that came out of Germania ban a different arbitrary, less useful animal? Dunno if that's ever been touched on.

Traditional horse meat was seen as unclean in Denmark, and the eating of it was limited to a select class of wandering "untouchables". I don't know if this was shared by the Germans, who was pretty well known for eating dog meat, another animal those meat was traditional seen as unclean (this may have been a result of the 30YW removing a lot of food taboos). But treating horse meat as unclean makes a lot of sense, as horses demand four time as much land to feed themselves as cattle, so it makes a lot of sense to limit horses to be work animals in regions where pasture are limited and only letting a class of "untouchables" eat the meat of the old animals.
 
@CountPeter My argument is not based upon the fact that some ruling will be relaxed for a period. The issue at hand was the belief that the Russian rulers invite Muslim Ulema from Baghdad to assist him in the religion and in civic issues; a process of transforming Kiev. The poster suggested that the ruler simply bribe these Muslim Ulema to fabricate Hadith or lie. These sorts of bribes are not realistic.

You have very interesting perceptions. What was proposed it that the prohibitions could be taken easily and not followed to the letter. The notion of a "bribe" in the sense you are implying is quite anachronistic: people of the X century had been taking things not the same way as we do in XXI century. The presents were a sign of respect and implied a friendly attitude in return.

An assumption that pretty much any culture of the time was adopting the standards of the XX - XXI centuries in that area is not even funny. What WOULD be insulting is NOT to offer the gifts to someone from whom you are expecting some favors.

It would be realistic however, for these Ulema to make exceptions and establish truths to the people and over time alcohol and other Vice becomes more limited.

And here we go.... How long did it take you to find the way around? 5 minutes? The people of the X century would do it even faster. ;)


I stand by the idea that a bribe to fabricate Hadith from Ulema will result in the Ulema leaving the realm and the Kiev-Rus simply revert to its previous religion as there is now nothing to gain from Islam.

The irrelevant issue of "bribes" aside, there would be the native "cadres" replacing the departing foreigners (and if they did not have time to learn too much, nobody in Rus would care) and which "gain" are you talking about? Vladimir & Co would shrug their shoulders and continue to consider themselves as good <whatever> as they wanted. After all, quite significant splits had been happening within the Islamic world and each side considered itself to be the right one.
 
As for my thoughts about this, I don't see Islam making much sense for the Rus at all, it offer them little and cost them much. Next as people have already said, there was a large Christian community song the Rus already, which was pretty similar to the Norse, who only converted after a large Chridtian community had already been established. In fact the first Christian Danish King was Harald Klak who lived a century before Denmark official concerted, but he failed in converting Denmark, because there lacked a significant Christian community in Denmark at the time. In the same way a top down conversion to Islam would fail in Russia.
 
As for my thoughts about this, I don't see Islam making much sense for the Rus at all, it offer them little and cost them much.

What exactly would it cost them and how much the Greek Orthodoxy was offering?


Next as people have already said, there was a large Christian community song the Rus already,

What "people say" is not quite relevant as long as it is not backed by solid data. Of course there was a Christian party within the ruling elite in Kiev. However, its main "pillar" was Princess Olga who was already dead by the time when Vladimir adopted Christianity and even when she was acting as a regent during the rule of her son, Svyatoslav, the party was not strong enough to oppose paganism even in Kiev. In Novgorod, for example, Vladimir had to enforce Christianity.

We simply don't know enough about the Muslim community in Kiev of the X century but there definitely was a Jewish district (called just like that and mentioned more than once in the chronicles).


In fact the first Christian Danish King was Harald Klak who lived a century before Denmark official concerted, but he failed in converting Denmark, because there lacked a significant Christian community in Denmark at the time. In the same way a top down conversion to Islam would fail in Russia.

Following this logic, community was not big enough during Svyatoslav time (story about him not wanting to upset his "druzina" would be irrelevant: he was out of Kiev most of the time trying to create a new princedom in Bulgaria while his mother had a free hand) but within couple decades a miracle happened: suddenly the Orthodox community in Kiev grew up to the critical mass and even Vladimir's "druzina" not just did not protest but enthusiastically participated in herding people into the river for a group baptism (it seems that majority of the population were not Christians by that time). Would you care to produce some numbers showing growth of the Orthodox community in Kiev over these years?
 
@alexmilman Your statement was “Worst case scenario, just send him some furs.” After you had previously stated, “tell the local religious figure to give you a document (obviously you mean fabricated).” This is known in Islam as, raswah and is mentioned by the prophet Muhammad and elaborated over a hundred years prior to your scenario.

Raswah is gift giving for the goal of improving relations in order to gain benefits. Another form is wasaata, which is intervention for benefits. According to the prophet Muhammad, “may the curse of Allah be upon the one who pays the bribe (raswah) and to the one who takes.”

Generally, the ruling on both is, it is sinful to give a gift with the prospect of improving ones position. Or, it is also not permissible for one to seek intervention, wasaata, for the sake of gaining a position and depriving one who is more deserving. The only case with which raswah or wasaata is allowed is in situations wherein your life depends upon the gift which illicits a response from the receiver. In this case, the person who received the bribe or call for intervention, has committed sin, but the giver has not. These opinions on fiqh al-Raswah were already sophisticated by the year 800. Easily far before the POD.

My reasoning for describing something that you likely do not care for, is to enunciate that yes the Abbasid had concepts and clear knowledge of what a bribe was. They would understand that with a chest of furs, that the Kiev are attempting to gain favors. These favors cannot be fulfilled if it requires the Ulema to fabricate Hadith or make halal what Allah has made haram. If he was to accept this bidah (innovation) he would become a taghoot (the one who has transgressed the limits) to the Ulema and the populace.

This occurred in otl at various occasions, most especially with the practices of the Golden Horde. The Golden Horde Muslim were declared kafr by a fatwa by Ibn Taymiyyah.

I understand your points. My position was never that Islam cannot spread due to alcohol prohibitions. Simply the idea that alcohol consumption would be changed to some degree. With conversion to Islam, many Ulema and likely, warriors, will travel to Kiev to assist the new population; distributing coinage styles, Arabic letters, literature and architectural styles. With this, the goal would be to teach the populace the codes with which they needed to please Allah. This would include the adoption of shariah and other significant features of Islamic Law which would bring much positive qualities to the Kiev. Other practices would be eventual knowledge and spread of circumcision and opinions surrounding Islamically defined vices.

This is my point.
 
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Your statement was “Worst case scenario, just send him some furs.”

Yes, so what? Show of respect with the anticipation of some favor in return. We are talking the X century when the laws against receiving gifts are not, yet, invented.


After you had previously stated, “tell the local religious figure to give you a document (obviously you mean fabricated).”

No, YOU meant that they are going to be fabricated. I meant exactly what I said and the rest is a product of your imagination.

Also, your time frame is all wrong. By the end of the X century Abassid Caliphs lost almost all of their secular power to the Buyid amirs and then to Seljuks and retained mostly a religious role outside Baghdad. They'll regain military strength only in the early XII century, well after the POD, and even then mostly within Iraq.

If in the X century a ruler of a big and powerful state, expressed, by whatever reason, a wish to convert to Islam, Caliph would hardly be in a good position to dictate terms a list of which you produced.

There would be no warriors sent both because they would not be welcomed (Prince of Kiev has enough of his own and does not need foreigners of a questionable loyalty) and because he simply did not have them.

The ulemas would be operating strictly within a religious framework because the Prince of Kiev is not going to give away any of his prerogatives and judicial functions were important (and profitable) part of those. Of course, they can "stand on principle" and leave but Caliph is not in a good position to play "hard to get" and, unless he is a complete nincompoop as a politician, he would not send unbending fanatics to start with: to improve his domestic situation he needs funds and a potential "client" (call him whatever you want) has a lot of them. What is there for the "client"? A religion which tells the subjects that they must obey their ruler. Which is what paganism was not doing and which is why it was doomed to fail.

Taking into an account a noticeable degree of flexibility demonstrated in the case of the Golden Horde, it seems that the Muslim clergy possessed a healthy degree of a common sense. Much greater than you are crediting them with.
 
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