Islam Grows
• New Leader: Muhammad died in 632, so the Muslim community needed to make the decision on who would be their next religious leader and they selected one of Muhammad’s good friends named Abu-Bakr to become the first caliph meaning successor.
• Issues: Not everyone was welcoming of the caliph, some tribes around the Arabian Peninsula abandoned Islam completely, others wouldn’t pay taxes, some individuals even declared themselves to be prophets.
• Attempts to resolve: Abu-Bakr declared a jihad which has two meanings: 1. An inner struggle with evil. 2. An armed struggle against non-believers (holy war)
• Expansion by Military: the Muslim community began to expand under Abu-Bakr as well, the next 3 caliphers after Abu-Bakr expanded into the Sassanid and Byzantine empires
• Reasons for Success: They did very well in conquests between these empires, because they had been fighting each other for many years before this, well disciplined, great leaders with good strategies, the other two empires weren’t tolerant of the religions in their conquered area so their Muslims in the empires would often help the other Muslims that invade the empires
• Treatment of Conquered people: The Qur’an does not allow for Muslims to force others to convert to this religion, Muslims allowed the Christians and Jews to practice their religions but they couldn’t spread it, they made the Christians and Jews pay a tax however because they did not fight for the Islam military groups.
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