LESSON 2
MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS AND RELIGIONMuhammad, the prophet of Islam, lived in Arabia in the early 7th century. Islam developed as a response to the religious, social, economic and political situation in Arabia and nearby countries with which the Arabs had contact.
The Eastern Roman Empire governed Egypt, Palestine and Syria up to the Persian border near the Tigris river. In the Roman Empire orthodox Christianity ruled, but for political reasons most of the bishops of Egypt and Syria, subject to the Eastern Roman Empire, had broken away from the Catholic Church and embraced Monophysitism. That was the teaching that Jesus had a divine but not a human nature; it also meant that the Church was a spiritual and not a human society.
Further east, in modern Iran, lay the Persian Empire. For long it had been at war with the Roman Empire, and its minority Christians were persecuted for belonging to the religion of the enemy. To escape this persecution they adopted the tolerated Nestorian heresy, which said that Jesus' divinity dwelt in him but did not make him anything more than a mere man; so they said Mary was not the Mother of God.
In desert spots between Jerusalem and Mecca there were many groups of Judaeo-Christians. These were Jews who accepted Jesus as the Messiah, but still insisted on the observances of the Old Law (cf. Paul's letter to the Galatians). These were the Christians Muhammad had most contact with. There are many similarities between Judaeo-Christianity and Islam:
1. They were called "Nazarenes" ("Nasârâ" in the Qur'ân), while the term "Christian" was used for all other Christians (Acts 11:26).
2. The Judaeo-Christians, like the Samaritans, accepted no prophets between Aaron and Christ. They did not accept Isaiah, Jeremiah etc. The latter prophets are likewise unknown in the Qur'ân. The Judaeo-Christians, however, probably accepted David, as did the Qur'ân.
3. The Judaeo-Christians accepted as inspired Scripture only the Torah (in part) and the Gospel according to Matthew in a revised Hebrew translation. They likely also recognized the Psalms. Similarly the Qur'ân recognizes only the Torah, the Psalms and one Gospel revealed to Jesus.
4. In the books of the Old Testament that they accepted they rejected some passages as false which contained anthropomorphic descriptions of God or tales of immoral deeds of the Patriarchs. For the same and other reasons the Qur'ân considers the Bible corrupt and tampered with.
5. As for the nature of Jesus, Judaeo-Christians did not say he was divine, but some admitted that he preexisted as an angelic creature and had the titles "the great king" and "Son of God". They accepted Jesus' virgin birth from Mary, although some denied it. They held that Jesus was son of God by adoption at his baptism, that he was the Prophet foretold by Moses (Dt 18:15-22) who fulfilled and reformed the Law, eliminating sacrifice altogether, not even proposing the atoning sacrifice of his own death. Similarly the Qur'ân says that Jesus is not divine, was not a saviour and did not die on the cross, but he was born of the Virgin Mary and he reformed the Mosaic Law.
6. The Judaeo-Christians held that the Holy Spirit was an angelic creature and that he was either Jesus or the sister of Jesus. In the Qur'ân the Holy Spirit appears at one point (16:102) to be a creature of God (identified in Muslim tradition with Gabriel); elsewhere he is identified with Jesus (4:171).
7. Judaeo-Christians, as Jews, prayed facing Jerusalem. This also was the first qibla of the Muslims, although direct Jewish contact could also explain this practice.
8. The Judaeo-Christians were devoted to daily ablutions to obtain cures from illnesses, deliverance from demon-possession, and forgiveness of sin. Islamic ablutions bear some resemblance to this practice.
In Arabia there were many Jews and Judaeo-Christians, but traditional religion prevailed around Mecca. People believed in an overall God called Allâh, but turned mostly to lesser divinities or spirits for their needs. These had shrines in various places which were centres of annual pilgrimages; al-Lât, for instance, was worshipped in at-Tâ'if. The Ka`ba in Mecca was an even more important shrine and pilgrimage centre. It was surrounded by a demarcated sacred area in which various activities, such as hunting and fighting, were prohibited. The Arabian Traditional Religion was weakening before the time of Muhammad because of foreign religious influence and because of the social changes resulting from urbanization.
The traditional livelihood of the Arabs consisted in grazing animals and a little farming and horticulture, particularly of date palms. Formerly trade between India and China on the one hand and Europe on the other passed through the old "silk route" from Asia through Persia and Syria. The Byzantine-Persian wars blocked this route and forced it to divert to the Indian Ocean. Goods were carried by ship as far as Yemen (The Red Sea was hard to navigate because of shallowness and lack of wind), then unloaded and sent by camel caravan up the Arabian peninsula across to Egypt and beyond. This diversion put Mecca right in the path of an international trade route, and its merchants became wealthy independent middlemen in this trade. More nomads were attracted to settle in the cities, exacerbating the social problems. These were: 1) the lack of an authority to control feuding clans who were now living in close quarters instead of the vast expanse of the desert, and 2) a privatization of life, so that rich people exploited or did not take care of the poor of their clan, and particularly of orphans.
The situation called for both a political reformer to impose law and order on Arabia, and a religious reformer to enable people to live in a different kind of society that was exposed to the world at large.
QUESTIONS
- Name and define the three main non-orthodox forms of Christianity prevalent in the Middle East in the time of Muhammad.
- What led to the Qur'ân's accusing Christians of "taking Jesus and Mary as divinities apart from Allah" (Q. 5:116)?
- Explain how politics and religion were closely connected throughout the 7th century Middle East.
- Explain why a political and religious reformer was needed in Arabia?
«—Back West Africa and Islam Lesson 3—»