Michael Jan de Goeje

“ The appearance of the Prophet with the great changes that ensued, the conquests that made the Arabs—till then a despised race—lords of half the civilized world, supplied a vast store of new matter for relations which men were never weary of hearing and recounting. They wished to know everything about the apostle of God, whose influence on his own time was so enormous, who had accomplished all that seemed impossible and had inspired the Arabs with a courage and confidence that made them stronger than the legions of Byzantium and Ctesiphon. ”

“ Every petty amir then tried to seize sovereign power for himself, and the people groaned under the consequent anarchy. Weary of these commotions, the Arabs of Spain at last came to an understanding among themselves for the election of a caliph, and their choice fell upon one of the last survivors of the Omayyads, Abdarrahmān b. Moawiya, grandson of the caliph Hishām. This prince was wandering in the deserts of Africa, pursued by his implacable enemies, but everywhere protected and concealed by the desert tribes, who pitied his misfortunes and respected his illustrious origin. ”

“ The ancient Persians were the first to invent tales and make books of them, and some of their tales were put in the mouths of animals. The Ashghanians, or third dynasty of Persian kings, and after them the Sasanians, had a special part in the development of this literature, which found Arabic translators, and was taken up by accomplished Arabic literati, who edited it and imitated it. The earliest book of the kind was the Hezār afsāne or Thousand Tales, which had the following origin. A certain Persian king was accustomed to kill his wives on the morning after the consummation of the marriage. ”

“ Genealogy, which often called for elucidations, led on to history. Beládhorí's excellent Ansáb al-Ashráf (Genealogies of the Nobles) is a history of the Arabs on a genealogical plan.
The oldest extant history is the biography of the Prophet by Ibn Isḥák (d. 150) [2] . This work is generally trustworthy. Mohammed's life before he appeared as a prophet and the story of his ancestors are indeed mixed with many fables illustrated by spurious verses. ”

“ Moawiya was, in fact, a religious man and a strict disciple of the precepts of Islam. We can scarcely, therefore, credit the charges made by the adversaries of his chosen successor Yazid, that he was a drinker of wine, fond of pleasure, careless about religion. All the evidence shows that, during the reign of the Omayyads, life in Damascus and the rest of Syria was austere and in striking contrast to the dissolute manners which prevailed in Medina. ”

“ Yet with all their faults the Nights have beauties enough to deserve their popularity, and to us their merit is enhanced by the pleasure we feel in being transported into so entirely novel a state of society. ”

“ Ṭabarí and his contemporaries, senior and junior, such as Ibn Ḳotaiba, Ya'ḳúbí, Dínawarí, preserve to us a good part of the information about Persian history made known through such translations. [4] But even more important than the knowledge conveyed by these works was their influence on literary style and composition. Half a century later began versions from the Greek either direct or through the Syriac. The pieces translated were mostly philosophical ; but the Arabs also learned something, however superficially, of ancient history.
The 3d century was far more productive than the 2d. ”

“ Meantime, Naṣr had moved from Nishapur to Merv, and here the two Arabic armies confronted each other. Then, at last, the true significance of Abu Moslim’s work was recognized. Naṣr warned the Arabs against their common enemy, “who preaches a religion that does not come from the Envoy of God, and whose chief aim is the extirpation of the Arabs.” In vain he had entreated Merwan and Ibn Hobaira to send him troops before it should be too late. ”

“ In this case the writer recurs to the first method, already described, only when the different traditions are greatly at variance with one another. In yet a third type of history the old method is entirely forsaken and we have a continuous narrative only occasionally interrupted by citation of the authority for some particular point. But the principle still is that what has been well said once need not be told again in other words. The writer therefore keeps as close as he can to the letter of his sources, so that quite a late writer often reproduces the very words of the first narrator. ”

“ God would not suffer it any longer. As soon as the time was ripe that time could not be far off—He would send a saviour—and out of the house of the Prophet, the Mahdi, who would restore Islam to its original purity. All who desired to co-operate in this holy purpose must pledge themselves to unlimited obedience to the Imam, and place their lives and property at his disposal. As a proof of their sincerity they were required at once to pay a fixed sum for the Imam. The missionaries had great success, especially among the non-Arabic inhabitants of Khorasan and Transoxiana. ”

“ A grandson of Hisham, Abdarrahmān, son of his most beloved son Moawiya, reached Africa and founded in Spain the Omayyad dynasty of Cordova.
With the dynasty of the Omayyads the hegemony passes finally from Syria to Irak. At the same time the supremacy of the Arabs came to an end. Thenceforth it is not the contingents of the Arabic tribes which compose the army, and on whom the government depends; the new dynasty relies on a standing army, consisting for the greater part of non-Arabic soldiers. The barrier that separated the Arabs from the conquered nations begins to crumble away. ”

“ With Ibn Zobair perished the influence which the early companions of Mahomet had exercised over Islam. Medina and Mecca, though they continued to be the holy cities, had no longer their old political importance, which had already been shaken to its foundations by the murder of Othman and the subsequent troubles. Henceforward we shall find temporal interests, represented by Damascus, predominating over those of religion, and the centre of Islam, now permanently removed beyond the limits of Arabia, more susceptible to foreign influence, and assimilating more readily their civilizing elements. ”

“ Having determined to fix the order of succession in so formal a manner as to take away all pretext for future contentions, he executed a deed by which he appointed his eldest son Mahommed his immediate heir, and after him the second, Abdallah, and after Abdallah the third, Qāsim. Mahommed received the surname of al-Amīn (“the Sure”) , Abdallah that of al-Maʽmūn (“he in whom men trust”) , and Qāsim that of al-Moʽtamin billāh (“he who trusts in God”) . Hārūn further stipulated that Mamun should have as his share during the lifetime of his brother the government of the eastern part of the empire. ”

“ In 758 Mansur, informed that a revolt was in preparation, came himself to Medina and ordered Abdallah to tell him where his sons were. As he could not or would not tell, he together with all his brothers and some other relatives were seized and transported to Irak, where Abdallah and his brother Ali were beheaded and the others imprisoned. Notwithstanding all these precautions, a vast conspiracy was formed. On the same day Mahommed was to raise the standard of revolt in Medina, Ibrāhīm in Baṣra. But the Alids, though not devoid of personal courage, never excelled in politics or in tactics. ”

“ But the majority were merely a band of men without views, whose aim was a change not of system, but of persons in their own interest. Everywhere in the provinces there was agitation against the caliph and his governors, except in Syria, where Othman’s cousin, Moawiya, son of Abu Sofiān (see below) , carried on a wise and strong administration. The movement was most energetic in Irak and in Egypt. Its ultimate aim was the deposition of Othman in favour of Ali, whose own services as well as his close relationship to the Prophet seemed to give him the best claim to the Caliphate. ”

“ The kingdoms of Ghassan and Hira, advanced posts hitherto, now became the headquarters of the Arabs; the new empire had its centres on the one hand at Damascus, on the other hand at Kufa and Baṣra, the two newly-founded cities in the region of old Babylonia. The capital of Islam continued indeed for a while to be Medina, but soon the Hejaz (Hijaz) and the whole of Arabia proper lay quite on the outskirt of affairs.
The ease with which the native populations of the conquered districts, exclusively or prevailingly Christian, adapted themselves to the new rule is very striking. ”

“ The Abbasids, on the contrary, were a Persian dynasty, under which the Arab tribal system, as regulated by Omar, fell to pieces; the Persians of Khorasan were the real rulers, and the government became despotic as in the days of Chrosroes.” The reign of Abuʽl-Abbas and the first part of that of Mansur had been almost a continuation of the former period. But now his equals in birth and rank, the Omayyads and the Alids, had been crushed; the principal actors in the great struggle, the leaders of the propaganda and Abu Moslim were out of the way; the caliph stood far above all his subjects ”