by Emmet Scott
To describe the treatment of the dhimmi communities of Jews and Christians as one of benevolent tolerance is thus to do violence to the meaning of words: The dhimmi, by definition, had virtually no rights before the law.
But even the grudging acceptance of the existence of dhimmi communities has to be viewed in the context of how Islam came to power: the conquering Muslims of the seventh, eighth and ninth centuries could scarcely enslave or forcefully convert the entire populations of the subdued territories. Such a policy would perchance have involved them in dangerous revolts, revolts which may easily have extinguished the numerically small numbers of conquering Arabs. Far better to appease the conquered peoples with a semblance of toleration and recognition, whilst at the same time imposing punishing financial burdens and closing to them the most important and prestigious positions in society. This has been explained most lucidly by Bat Ye’or:
“The conditions of minorities in Christian countries has often been compared with the fate of the dhimmis under Islam, although such generalizations concerning vast territories and periods of time are inappropriate. Rather than looking for similarities between the two, one should acknowledge an essential difference. During the first two centuries of their conquest – and certainly at the outset – the Arabs were themselves a minority. In order to impose their laws, their language, and their foreign culture on ancient civilizations, they had to proceed with caution. A general uprising of the subject populations would have compromised the success of their conquest.”[21]
The financial question too is one that cannot be ignored. Christians and Jews, we have noted, were compelled to pay a “poll tax” or jizya, an annual tribute which, considering the great numbers of conquered Christians, amounted to a fabulous sum for the government of the caliphate. In such circumstances, it will be obvious that it was financially advantageous to have Christians and Jews as subjects, and to keep them as Christians and Jews. Muslims were exempt from this kind of taxation. So lucrative was the jizya system that Muslim rulers did not, in most cases, actually want Christians to convert. Christian conversions meant loss of revenue. In the words of Louis Bertrand, “In general the Caliphal government did not want to see the Christians turn Musulman. The treasury lost too much if they did, inasmuch as it was they who paid the major part of the taxes.”[22] Bat Ye’or comments: “Baladhuri related that when Iraq fell to the Arab conquerors, the soldiers wanted to ‘share out’ the region of Sawad between themselves. The Caliph Umar b. al-Khattab permitted them to divide the booty, but decreed that the land and the camels should be left to the local farmers so as to provide for the Muslims: ‘If you divide them among those present, there will be nothing left for those who come after them.’ And Ali, the Prophet’s son-in-law said of the non-Muslim peasants of Sawad, ‘Leave them to be a source of revenue and aid for the Muslims.’”[23] Bertrand rightly concludes; “It is difficult to find, as most of our historians do, an attitude of tolerance and broad-mindedness in this entirely self-interested line of conduct.”[24]
Thus, as we noted earlier, Islam’s acceptance of the continued existence of Jews and Christians was that they should form the basis of a servile population upon which the Muslims, the ruling elite, could enjoy what can only be described as a parasitical existence in perpetuity.
This then was Arab policy: heavy taxation coupled with periodic violent persecutions of the subject Christians. Egypt, for example, remained predominantly Christian until the thirteenth century, when a ferocious campaign of massacre and repression initiated by the Mameluk rulers compelled the majority to convert to Islam. The end result of such policies, enacted throughout the Muslim-controlled territories, was a progressive diminishing of Christian numbers – eventually in many places to vanishing point – and a commensurate augmentation of Muslim numbers.
We should note too that whilst the Muslims had a doctrinal reason for honoring the founder of Christianity, Christians had no such reason for revering the founder of Islam. Christian prophecy did not look forward to the coming of a prophet who would wage violent war against their faith, and who would both practice and sanction several of the most obnoxious things condemned by Christ: aggressive violence, polygamy, the death sentence for adultery, strict rituals surrounding clean and unclean food, easy divorce, etc. Indeed, if Muhammad were to find a place in the predictions and imaginings of the early Christian writers, it was as the Antichrist – a figure with whom he was, by very many Christian authorities, identified.
And just how tolerant can we really consider a faith that considers it not only legitimate but a duty to spread its message by force of arms; and which, at the same time, prescribes the death penalty for those abandoning it? How tolerant is a faith which reduces to second class citizenship even the followers of those other few religions which it actually permits to exist? And how tolerant is a faith which considers it legitimate to plunder and destroy the temples and shrines of those religions it considers idolatrous or polytheistic; and which regards the adherents of such faiths as fair game, to be killed or enslaved, or forcibly converted, at the whim of the Muslim conquerors?
All things considered, we can only conclude that those who describe Islam as tolerant and peace-loving do not understand it.
The long-term result of Muslim policies towards non-Muslims was baleful in the extreme. In Mohammed and Charlemagne Revisited, I have shown how it was the application of Sharia Law which within a very short time indeed during the seventh century reduced the previously fertile and populous North African and Near Eastern provinces of the Byzantine Empire to a virtual desert. Sharia principles insisted that Muslims had the right to subsist off the labor of the infidel communities which were now subject to the caliph. And the Arab armies were followed closely by Bedouin nomads with their herds of goats and camels. These they allowed to graze freely in the cultivated fields and vineyards of the conquered Christians. Any of the latter who complained were liable to be accused of blasphemy against the Prophet and since, as we saw, the word of a Muslim always trumped that of an infidel, the complainant normally found himself put to death. Under such circumstances, Christian and Jewish farmers learned quickly to say nothing, whilst they watched the goats and camels of their conquerors destroy their livelihoods. Within a short time, huge stretches of previously fertile land was reduced to semi-desert, and the great cities of the region abandoned.
The latter can be seen to this day throughout the whole of North Africa and the Middle East.
Aside from the injunction to “fight with the unbelievers” until the whole world would recognize that “there is no God but Allah,” another inducement to aggressive warfare provided by Islam (and mentioned by Gibbon) is its acceptance of slave- and concubine-taking. Indeed, it is possible that the hunt for comely captives was even more important as a spur to war than the desire to spread the faith or even acquire material plunder. Once again, it is Muhammad himself who is said by Muslims to have shown the way and provided the example. In at least two of the Jewish settlements his followers captured he took the most beautiful women as his wives, very shortly after the killing of their husbands. And in the Qur’an he sanctions the taking of women into sexual slavery where he enjoins his followers to abstain from sexual relations with women other than their wives and that which “your right hand possesses” (4:24), in other words, captives or slaves.
It is a fact that to its followers, or its male followers at least, Islam confers almost unlimited sexual license. Even the Islamic Paradise is a carnal one, where faithful Muslims enjoy the favors of 72 dark eyed virgins in perpetuity. This may come as a surprise, given the popular perception in the West of Islam as a morally conservative faith, one which abhors the moral laxity of the modern world. Are not Muslim women encouraged and even forced to dress modestly; and do not the most severe sanctions against sexual immorality apply in the more conservative Muslim lands? This of course is true; yet, it is equally true that the Muslim world is i
mmersed in hypocrisy and denial. This is a civilization, we must not forget, whose supposed founder married at least thirteen wives, the youngest of whom, Ayesha, was a mere nine years of age. This is a society where traditionally a man was permitted four wives and any number of sex slaves (euphemistically described in all mainstream histories as concubines), and where a man could divorce his wife by telling her three times she was dismissed. No man was therefore under any moral requirement to faithfully stand by his aging wife and could quite happily be rid of her (or them) and wed a younger model; and Muslim men have in fact availed themselves of this “right” throughout the ages. This is a civilization in which the rights of men over this property are absolute – including the right to life itself. It is no coincidence that so-called “honor killing” of Muslim women by their male relatives is a widespread scourge throughout the Islamic world to this day.
The contrast between Christendom and the Islamic world in regard to sexual morality could not be greater. Amongst Christians strict monogamy has always been enforced and divorce never permitted; the sexual or physical abuse of women was from the beginning regarded as gravely sinful, and women always enjoyed rights and privileges unheard of in the Islamic world. Arab and other Muslim travelers to Europe throughout the Middle Ages were astonished and generally horrified at the freedoms accorded to Christian women; a phenomenon examined at some length by Bernard Lewis. A well-known example of this, that of the Turkish writer Evliya Celebi, who visited Vienna in 1665 as part of an Ottoman diplomatic mission. In the course of a detailed account of the imperial capital, Evilya describes a “most extraordinary spectacle” that he saw:
In this country I saw an extraordinary spectacle. Whenever the emperor meets a woman in the street, if he is riding, he brings his horse to a standstill and lets her pass. If the Emperor is on foot and meets a woman, he stands in a posture of politeness. The woman greets the emperor, who then takes his hat off his head to show respect for the woman. After the woman has passed, the emperor continues on his way. It is indeed an extraordinary spectacle. In this country and in general in the lands of the unbelievers, women have the main say. They are honored and respected out of love for Mother Mary.[25]
Bernard Lewis notes that, “The difference in the position of women was indeed one of the most striking contrasts between Christian and Muslim practice, and is mentioned by almost all travelers in both directions. Christianity, of all churches and denominations, prohibits polygamy and concubinage. Islam … permits both. European visitors to the Islamic lands were intrigued by what they knew or, more accurately, what they heard concerning the harem system, and some of them speak with ill-concealed and ill-informed envy of what they imagine to be the rights and privileges of a Muslim husband and master of the home. Muslim visitors to Europe speak of astonishment, often with horror, of the immodesty and forwardness of Western women, of the incredible freedom and absurd deference accorded to them, and of the lack of manly jealously of European males confronted with the immorality and promiscuity in which their womenfolk indulge. We find this observation even in the most unlikely places. Thus, for example, a Moroccan ambassador who was in Spain in 1766 speaks of the free and easy ways of Spanish ladies, and the absence of a virile sense of honor among their husbands. If this was his impression of the Court of Spain, one shudders to think of what he would have written had he continued his journey into Europe to, for example, the Court of Versailles.”[26]
A fact ignored by Lewis and by modern commentators in general is that Islam’s attitude to and treatment of women has no parallel elsewhere. The women of ancient Egypt, for example, and Babylonia, had much more freedom than their descendants living under Islam.[27] In Egypt, polygamy was normally confined to the royal family, whilst women could not be summarily dismissed by their husbands. Ancient Egyptian women went abroad unveiled and often achieved important positions in society. Aside from the prominent royal women who at times virtually ruled the country (and actually did rule it on several occasions), women could fill important roles as priestesses, whilst skilled females, such as musicians, took part in great royal and religious events. Several of Egypt’s most popular and best-loved deities were female. Women were valued in Egypt and a flourishing literature celebrating the love of men and women existed.
Winston Churchill’s view of Islam is reasonably well known, and deserves to be more so. In his opinion, “no stronger retrograde force exists in the world” than Islam. His critique takes in the full gamut of Islamic ideology, yet the Islamic attitude to women is identified for specific criticism:
“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. …The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities - but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.”[28]
How refreshingly honest and straightforward is Churchill’s language; what contrast with the evasiveness, euphemism and downright dishonesty of the intellectual and moral little men who now control the organs of state and public opinion.
There can be no question that the desire to acquire nubile females (as well as pre-pubescent males) as sex-slaves was an important factor in spurring Muslim princes and potentates throughout the centuries to war against the infidel. Just how important a factor it was shall become obvious in the next chapter and thereafter throughout the remainder of the present volume.
[1] Gibbon, Decline and Fall, Ch. 50.
[2] Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs, (Summer, 1993).
[3] Bat Ye’or, The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians under Islam (London, 1985), p. 46.
[4] Robert Irwin, “Islam and the Crusades: 1096-1699,” in Jonathan Riley-Smith (ed.) The Oxford History of the Crusades (Oxford, 1995), pp. 237.
[5]Ibid.
[6] If we exclude the inroads of Muhammad bin Qasim, three centuries earlier, around 710-720. However, as we shall see in the Appendix, there are grounds for believing that Mahmud of Ghazni and the latter were one and the same person.
[7] Stanley Wolpert, A New History of India (Oxford University Press, 1982), p. 107.
[8]Ibid.
[9] Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History Vol. 1, Trans. Franz Rosenthal, Bollingen Series 43 (Princeton University Press, 1958) p. 163. Cited from Bat Ye’or, op cit., p. 161.
[10]Ibid. The Dhimmi, p. 162.
[11] Bertrand, op cit., p. 35.
[12]Ibid., p. 36.
[13]Ibid., pp. 37-8.
[14]Ibid., p. 37.
[15]Ibid., p. 45.
[16]Ibid.
[17] See e.g. Bernard Lewis, What Went Wrong? Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response (Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 82ff.
[18] There is much evidence to suggest that the Jesus of the Qur’an is actually based upon Joshua of the Old Testament, who led the Israelites in t
heir conquest of Canaan after the Exodus from Egypt. Joshua and Jesus are one and the same name in Hebrew. This question is considered in the Appendix.
[19] Bat Ye’or and Andrew Bostom, “Andalusian Myth, Eurabian Reality,” retrieved from www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/001665.php (The above-quoted authors are well-known critics of Islam; yet the facts they highlight are not controversial and are denied by no one. The only difference is that while Bat Ye’or and Andrew Bostom state the facts, politically correct writers tend to gloss over them or not mention them at all.)
[20]Ibid.
[21]Ibid., 67-8.
[22] Bertrand, op cit., p. 33.