Were Islamic Empires peaceful?
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I agree with you that starting offensive wars is fundamentally unIslamic and anti-Qur'anic. However the Umayyads especially seem to have been a nasty bunch, whereas the Ottomans (although they made many gross errors such as the sometimes disputed massacre of the Armenians) seem to have been admirable in some ways. If you look at Turkish society even today, because of the Ottoman Empire the people are officially Sunni but their actual beliefs tend towards Alevism, and this is a clear sign of the Turkomen heritage of Turkish Islam which gave its military strength to the Ottoman Empire. So, I think we're dealing with a different kind of Islamic Empire altogether when we're talking about the Ottomans. They were peculiar/unique in many ways.
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Good question. In fact, Umayad, Abbasid and Ottoman empires were agressive.
Peace,
EdipPeace,
Respectfully.Can you provide some references when and how were the Ottoman emprires agressive?
Need it for some research i'm working on.
Thanks a bunch.
God bless you,As salamu alaykum.
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The overwhelming majority of Muslims seem to think that Muslims never waged offensive wars. We know that according to the Qur'an we are allowed to defend ourselves, but we are not allowed to wage offensive wars. Honestly, I know very few Turks who admit that the Ottoman Empire was wrong when they attacked European countries..
What were the Ottomans doing at the gates of Vienna? Why did they wage many offensive wars and still consider themselves righteous? Why are we criticizing the Americans for invading Iraq when we did the same to other countries for centuries? This question has been bothering me for years...
Peace Recluse
Its probably why the Umma is in the state it is in, for years they have waged unneccesary wars in the hope of spreading deen (my opinion). Again in my opinion they did spread the deen but to what cost? Several sects, many different intepretations of the one deen (religion) and cultural infuences make their way into the religion which have no place. Its hard to say why they had so many wars as my history into it is not so good, but it would seem to extend an empire and benefit from spoils of war.
Peace
Hope
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If you look at Turkish society even today, because of the Ottoman Empire the people are officially Sunni but their actual beliefs tend towards Alevism
Actually, Alevis are a minority in Turkey, about 15 million. Most Turks are Sunni and adhere to traditional Islam.
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Peace,
Respectfully.Can you provide some references when and how were the Ottoman emprires agressive?
Need it for some research i'm working on.
Thanks a bunch.
God bless you,As salamu alaykum.
Peace Alen,
Why did the Ottomans attack Iran, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Croatia, Albania, Hungary, Austria etc. ? The Ottomans attacked Iran (which is a Muslim country!), but failed to conquer the Persians. Were all these wars "defensive"? Not at all...
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Actually, Alevis are a minority in Turkey, about 15 million. Most Turks are Sunni and adhere to traditional Islam.
Yes, as I already stated, the Turks are officially Sunni (on the outside) but there is widespread borrowing from Alevism, in the people's private beliefs. In any case, Alevism is rooted in a more traditional form of Islam than the hadith-based Sunnism.
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Peace,
Recluse I understand your dilemma perfectly well, in fact its questions like these that led me to the type of thinking exemplified by numerous people on this forum.
Unfortunately there is no simple answer to your question. But I think a few things can be addressed.
- It is true that groups of people that identified as Muslims engaged in wars of aggression on a massive scale, however, everyone else at the time was doing the same as well. Of course that explanation does not excuse their behavior in the least, but there exists a maxim in the study of history which states "Do not judge the people of the past by the standards of the Present."
I didn't say YOU are responsible. But why do Muslims always claim that Islamic empires were peaceful when this is clearly not the case? Why criticize the West for attacking Muslim countries unprovoked, while our ancestors (I'm from Turkey) did the same for centuries. Do most Muslims know that we are NOT allowed to wage offensive wars?? I don't think so.
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Muslims today and for the last few hundred years have not engaged in any notable wars of expansion or aggression (for a variety of reasons). Furthermore, at our current moment in time, its primarily western powers that have been engaged in wars of conquest, aggression, and pillaging. Muslim identifying people had very little to do with WW2, Korea, Vietnam, all the debacles in Latin America, most of the wars in Africa, etc. In fact, today Muslims tend to be at the receiving end of the barrel. Thus, while its true that Muslims did engage in wars of expansion in the past, they aren't doing so today, while Western powers are. We have no control over what the people of the past did but we do have some control over what is going on today.
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All of the former "Islamic Powers" had laws and regulations that had absolutely nothing to do with Islam. In fact the Shari'a and the hadud as we know it today were created because the Abbasids and the Ummayads before them wanted to create a distinct form of law. If you were to go through the Ottoman, Safavid, Mughal, Songhai, Mombasa, etc law codes you would be shocked at just how un-Islamic they were (and I don't just mean by the standards here at FM but by the of traditional Islam today).
In any case, in most parts of the world, Nationalism has come to replace Islam as the root of identification. Islam has merely been captured by nationalists to further certain nationalistic agendas (whether good or bad). Its this nationalism that teaches us that our former wars of expansion were "good" and "just." If we were to subscribe to a truly Islamic way of looking at the situation we would have to acknowledge that the taking of life for virtually any reason (except in true self defense) is abominable and unjustified.
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Ottomans had a secular code of law and system of courts dealing with a Kanun-type series of bureaucratic edicts that were made on the authority of the Sultan. This ran parallel to Islamic law which was administered in a separate system of law courts under the overall control of some important state officers. Regarding the comments made about Islamic law under the Ottoman administration, an important change by the Ottomans from preceding dynasties was a move to the adoption of a single maddhab as the basis for all sharia law in the Empire (for the sake of consistency), and the relegation of the ulema as a body to an organ under state control and sponsorship. You couldn't do better than the Ottomans in terms of law and organisation.
As for whether their system was properly 'Islamic', who knows.. Everyone is entitled to their view but the Ottomans had their Empire properly sorted out and organised, and their systems actually worked and in that sense were a great improvement on the chaos of the Abbasids.
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In any case, in most parts of the world, Nationalism has come to replace Islam as the root of identification. Islam has merely been captured by nationalists to further certain nationalistic agendas (whether good or bad). Its this nationalism that teaches us that our former wars of expansion were "good" and "just."
I agree with you. However in the case of the Ottomans, they had to face an increasing threat and competition in the form of various forms of nationalism that emerged in the early part of the 20th century. The Ottomans were on the side of 'Islam' (I appreciate that many may disagree, but that was the justification used for their rule) and the nationalists were on the other side clearly opposed to the Ottomans and their natural secularist enemy. Although Turks today are proud of the Ottoman Empire as well as their secular Republic, nationalism was in fact the enemy of Ottomans in the last days of the Empire. The type of nationalism that eventually won out in Turkey was Kamal Ataturk's, but there were other types of nationalists at the same time as him.
It was for a reason, that Ataturk decided to do everything in his power to de-Islamify Turkey (e.g. replacing the Arabic abjad with the Roman alphabet so the people couldn't read the Qur'an, making religious orders illegal, banning all religious dress codes etc). That reason was the Ottomans' creed and entire basis of their rule was Islam, as the last Sunni caliphate. Mr Ataturk was anti-Islam because he was a nationalist.
So where I'm going with this is it's true that modern Turks celebrate the Ottoman Empire for nationalistic reasons but the Ottomans themselves were Islamists on the other side of a struggle for power with Turkish nationalism.
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The overwhelming majority of Muslims seem to think that Muslims never waged offensive wars. We know that according to the Qur'an we are allowed to defend ourselves, but we are not allowed to wage offensive wars. Honestly, I know very few Turks who admit that the Ottoman Empire was wrong when they attacked European countries.. What were the Ottomans doing at the gates of Vienna? Why did they wage many offensive wars and still consider themselves righteous? Why are we criticizing the Americans for invading Iraq when we did the same to other countries for centuries? This question has been bothering me for years...
First and foremost, in my opinion there is no such thing as "islamic Empire", "Islamic Corporation", "Islamic Organization".
As there are no such thing as "honest empire", "honest Corporation", "honest Organization".
Any human organizations is just a group of humans, with all of its good and bad, although they can label / named it anything they wanted.Having said that; I don't see anything in the Quran that forbid any 'offensive wars' and only allow 'defensive war'.
However,
Quran really shows us on WHY we should wage war.. whether it's offensive or defensive.War shouldn't be based on the objective of
- gaining power / influence
- boost pride of self-nation or race
- gaining control over natural resources
- gaining gold, slaves or spoils of war.
- gaining more territorial control.
Instead should be based on the objective of
- ending oppression, as oppression is worse than murder..
- establish justice..
For those who violate those limits, then the judgement of their violation shall came from God..
This judgement from God can be well understood by learning the past history..First is the Persian Cyrus (nicknamed Dzul-Qarnayn in Quran) who waged OFFENSIVE war against the Babylonians...
He succeed and ends the second slavery period of the jews and other people as well, enslaved by the babylonian empire..
He establish justice there, good governance and thus the local cultural and socio-economic flourishes.Until, he waged another offensive war against the Massagetae, which does nothing wrong.. with intention / objective of gaining control / power over them and perhaps enslave them.. this time it's ill-fated for him, he loses the war meet his death there.
Now let's talk about the Ottoman.. cited with (only a few striking and simplified) examples
I believe the Ottoman made a justified offensive war , when they decided to attack Wallachia (now part of Rumania) and end the reign of Vlad The Impaler (which inspire the fictional character of Dracula by Bram Stoker) and establish justice there.I believe the Ottoman made an unjustified and foolish decision to wage war during the world war I.
During those war they exterminate and oppress many Armenians..
And it turns out as ill-fated for them by losing the war and also the rising of Arab revolts which costs them to lose territory plus influence and finally dissolved by internal friction against the 'nationalist'..However, God also sometime uses 'foreign invasion' as a mean of 'punishment' towards a group of people.
A good example of this is perhaps the mongol invasion, the mongol although they splendidly won their war and battle, is certainly not doing a 'justified war' or either doing a pious act. Although in the long-run after they won their war, the mongol was also ill-fated.Salam / Peace
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In a case such as Bosnia there would not be any alternative.
I agree.
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bravo first time we agree? laugh (just kidding)
Nah I think its the 207th time.
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If you look at Turkish society even today, because of the Ottoman Empire the people are officially Sunni but their actual beliefs tend towards Alevism
You are totally misinformed. Most Turks (and in the past, Ottomans) are/were Sunnis. Alevis are considered a "minority". Alevis constitute about 15% to 20% of the Turkish population. Some Alevis, "Kizilbas" (Qizlbash) were very extreme and supported the Safavid Empire (Shi'ite Iranian) and were against the Ottomans.
The Ottomans were on the side of 'Islam' (I appreciate that many may disagree, but that was the justification used for their rule) and the nationalists were on the other side clearly opposed to the Ottomans and their natural secularist enemy. Although Turks today are proud of the Ottoman Empire as well as their secular Republic, nationalism was in fact the enemy of Ottomans in the last days of the Empire. The type of nationalism that eventually won out in Turkey was Kamal Ataturk's, but there were other types of nationalists at the same time as him.
It was for a reason, that Ataturk decided to do everything in his power to de-Islamify Turkey (e.g. replacing the Arabic abjad with the Roman alphabet so the people couldn't read the Qur'an, making religious orders illegal, banning all religious dress codes etc). That reason was the Ottomans' creed and entire basis of their rule was Islam, as the last Sunni caliphate. Mr Ataturk was anti-Islam because he was a nationalist.
What is "islamic" about Abjad?
Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and many more were of those who surrendered (muslims) (see 4213). Did they speak Arabic or use Abjad? Also see 3022 and 4144. What is "Islamic" about the traditional dress-code head-covers?
Also, I think you dont know some of Ataturks contributions he defended his country against Greek, British and French imperialists, who wanted to occupy his country and snatch some of the land of Turkey.
Also, it was a good step to remove the caliphate - he had to, since it was part of the Ottoman rule and through it the Ottomans got supporters from as far away as India to attack their own people, such as Ataturk and his supporters.
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In a case such as Bosnia there would not be any alternative.
I can't comment on the situation , as I don't know of the parameters leading up to the US helping out the bosnians. I do know of the ethnic cleansing etc. But, did the bosnians specifically ask for help? If so, It fits with the quranic view of eliminating oppression, as implied in 475.
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Peace,
You are totally misinformed. Most Turks (and in the past, Ottomans) are/were Sunnis. Alevis are considered a "minority".
Progressive, the poster "TheIndian" did not make this claim. Instead he claimed that Turkish culture has been influenced by certain elements of Alevi thinking.
As for Ataturk, he may have had good intentions for Turkey, and its true that he was a superb general. However, some of his policies in my opinion bordered on the extreme. The intense nationalism he played a part in creating has brought a modicum of stability to Turkey but has also played a large role in suppressing the rights of their large Kurdish communities.
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As for Ataturk, he may have had good intentions for Turkey, and its true that he was a superb general. However, some of his policies in my opinion bordered on the extreme. The intense nationalism he played a part in creating has brought a modicum of stability to Turkey but has also played a large role in suppressing the rights of their large Kurdish communities.
Unfortunately, Turks are the most nationalistic people in the world, even more so than the Iranians or the Chinese (who are also extremely nationalistic). "Turkishness" has replaced religion for some people, sad but true. I find nationalism such a Satanic ideology brickwall