page_title: Islam
section_title: Pre-Modern era (1258–18th century)
hierarchical_section_title: Islam / History / Pre-Modern era (1258–18th century)
caption_attribution_description: Conversion of Ghazan to Islam.
context_page_description: Islam is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion that teaches that Muhammad is a messenger of God. It is the world's second-largest religion with over 1.8 billion followers or 24.1% of the world's population, known as Muslims. Muslims make up a majority of the population in 49 countries. Islam teaches that God is merciful, all-powerful, and unique, and has guided mankind through prophets, revealed scriptures, and natural signs. The primary scriptures of Islam are the Quran, believed to be the verbatim word of God, as well as the teachings and normative examples of Muhammad.
  Muslims believe that Islam is the complete and universal version of a primordial faith that was revealed many times before through prophets, including Adam, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. Muslims consider the Quran in Arabic to be the unaltered and final revelation of God. Like other Abrahamic religions, Islam also teaches a final judgment with the righteous rewarded in paradise and the unrighteous punished in hell.
context_section_description: In scholasticism, Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328) worried about the integrity of Islam and tried to establish a theological doctrine to purify Islam from its alleged alterings. Unlike his contemporary scholarship, who relied on traditions and historical narratives from early Islam, Ibn Taymiyya's methodology was a mixture of selective use of hadith and a literal understanding of the Quran. He rejected most philosophical approaches of Islam and proposed a clear, simple and dogmatic theology instead. Another major characteristic of his theological approach emphazises the significance of a Theocratic state: While the prevailing opinion held that religious wisdom was necessary for a state, Ibn Taymiyya regarded political power as necessary for religious excellence. He further rejected many hadiths circulating among Muslims during his time and relied only on Sahih Bukhari and Sahih Muslim repeatedly to foil Asharite doctrine. Feeling threatened by the Crusaders as well as by the Mongols, Ibn Taymiyya stated it would be obligatory for Muslims to join a physical jihad against the unbelievers. This not only including the invaders, but also the heretics among the Muslims, including Shias, Asharites and "philosophers", who were blamed by Ibn Taimiya for the deterioration of Islam. The Battle of Marj al-Saffar (1303) served as a significant turning point. Nevertheless, his writings only played a marginal role during his lifetime. He was repeatedly accused of blasphemy by anthropomorphizing God and his disciple Ibn Kathir distanced himself from his mentor and negated the anthropomorphizations, but simultaneously adhered to the same anti-rationalistic and hadith oriented methodology. This probably influenced his exegesis on his Tafsir, which discounted much of the exegetical tradition since then. However, the writings of Ibn Taimiyya became important sources for Wahhabism and 21st century Salafi theology, just as Tafsir Ibn Kathir also became highly rewarded in modern Salafism.
  The Timurid Renaissance was observed in the Timurid Empire based in Central Asia ruled by the Timurid dynasty, a phenomenal growth in the fields of arts and sciences, covering both eastern and western world. Outstanding throughout the stages of the Renaissance were the inventions of numerous devices and the constructions of Islamic learning centre, mosques, necropolis and observatories. Herat city for example matched with Florence, the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance, as the focal point of a cultural rebirth. Such aspects were seen to be strongly influenced across Islamic Gunpowder empires, mainly in Mughal India.
  Islam spread with Muslim trade networks, Sufi orders activity and conquests of the Gunpowder Empires that extended into Sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia and the Malay archipelago. Conversion to Islam, however, was not a sudden abandonment of old religious practices; rather, it was typically a matter of "assimilating Islamic rituals, cosmologies, and literatures into... local religious systems." Throughout this expanse, Islam blended with local cultures everywhere, as illustrated when the prophet Muhammad appeared in Hindu epics and folklore. The Muslims in China who were descended from earlier immigration began to assimilate by adopting Chinese names and culture while Nanjing became an important center of Islamic study. The Turkish Muslims incorporated elements of Turkish Shamanism, which to this date differs Turkish synthesis of Islam from other Muslim societies, and became a part of a new Islamic interpretation, although Shamanistic influences already occurred during the Battle of Talas (752). Strikingly, Shamans were never mentioned by Muslim Heresiographers. One major change was the status of woman. Unlike Arabic traditions, the Turkic traditions hold woman in higher regard in society. The Turks must have also found striking similarities between Sufi rituals and Shaman practises. Shamanism also influenced orthodox Muslims who subscribed in Anatolia, Central-Asia and Balkans, producing Alevism. As a result, many Shaman traditions were perceived as 
caption: Ghazan Khan, 7th Ilkhanate ruler of the Mongol Empire, converts to Islam
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