Talk:History of Islam/Archive 1

message: This article is not a history of Islam at all; it is a history of Muslim societies.  Where is a history of the evolution of religious practice, of philosophical interpretations of the Quran, of cross-cultural influences on Islam?  Despite what Orientalists or certain fundamentalists might have you believe, Muslims do not live by religion alone, and Islam is not unchanging.  It has a history.  The evolution of Islamic law, the rise of Sufism and other topics might seem arcane, but they are of overwhelming importance.  There needs to be a single article which summarizes these and other developments. Agh.niyya 22:21, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What you say here makes sense. So we should have another topic on History of Islam - Red1 D Oon (talk) 12:56, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

text: I agree. Present article is more a history of Muslim rulers, conquests and kingdoms! Shaad's space  talk 12:04, 27 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  History of Islam, not the History of Muslim Societies 

message: I've yet to find information on when and why there was a shift in attitude toward science, culture, learning, etc. that lead to some of the attitudes apparent in the current conservative sects of Islam. Anyone have any information about this? 66.229.182.113 05:54, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shift in attitude toward learning 

message: The following was recently anonymously deleted.
:In Lebanon open warfare erupted between, among many other religious factions, Sunni and Shi'a. In Iraq, the secular Sunni Baathist government oppressed the Shi'a majority. However with the fall of Saddam Hussein the Shi'a majority are now calling for more political power in the new Iraqi government. In Iran the religious Shi'a majority has made life difficult for Sufi, Sunni and other Muslims. In Saudi Arabia, the religious Sunni majority has made life difficult for Shi'a Muslims.
It seems entirely accurate to me. One could question whether it is appropriate material, but deletion of this without comment seems completely inappropriate. I leave it to someone else to decide whether to restore, just pointing it out. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:55, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)
I agree that it is entirely accurate.  However, I can also see the argument that its placement in the article is anachronistic. - Mustafaa 23:55, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  recently anonymously deleted 

message: I spent time I should NOT have spent <g> redoing some of the earlier sections, which were rife with inaccuracy. I am not satisfied with the result, but it's better than the previous version. I removed a lot of extraneous detail, which is better covered in articles with a narrower focus. I have referenced those articles when I know that they exist.
I need to work on the REST of the article, but it's late and I still have some work to do.
The article as it stands seems to be a political history of Islam, and completely ignores the religious, literary, economic, etc. etc. aspects. Those should at least be mentioned, if not put in first place.
I would like to turn the article into an outline, or pointer to more detailed articles. There is no way to treat such an enormous subject properly in one article. Zora 10:02, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  But why? What does that one name add, aside from extra detail? It's available to anyone who looks at the Muhammad article, or even the Islam article. If we put in too much detail, the reader is going to get MEGO (my eyes glaze over). But if it's just one word ... I guess I won't fuss <g>. I put in some battle names, about which I had doubts. Zora 23:12, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Start of major revision 

message: There's a lot here (correctly) about the Islamic expansion in the early centuries.  But (especially perhaps given the current debates about jihad &c) should there not be something about the political/ethical ideas behind the expansion at the time?  Mark O'Sullivan 19:58, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  ethics of expansion 

message: The content added from the ON reference remains in this article, but the reference has been removed. This action is disputed and a conversation is ongoing here.  Uriah923 06:19, 2 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: *Yes, that's basically the problem. If you do follow Uriah's contributions, it becomes extraordinarily clear that he cares more about getting as many links to ON from Wikipedia as possible than improving Wikipedia quality. Despite being asked many many times to stop, he has continued trying to get links to ON. Even to the point of spreading the conversation like this to many talk pages to avoid the consensus against him. So yes, unfortunately the user has created a problem that means the links should be avoided (including removing the above link and pointing to the page history to avoid aiding their SEO). Ill gotten gains should not be allowed or we are just encouraging the exploitation of Wikipedia by SEO practitioners. The general opinion is that the link isn't of high enough quality to override that consensus and that the article would be better off with a five minute search for higher quality references. External links don't help much unless they are to the most prominent sites on a topic or as a weak form of reference. As I and others have said the latter could be done better with other sources. - Taxman Talk 17:38, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: *I hesitate to say anything because Taxman has threatened to block me for making the post on Jmabel's talk page, but the situation is so obviously biased that I can't refrain.  It is hopefully inconsistent for Taxman to question the quality or usefulness of the article in question.  It is of higher quality than most (if not all) of the external links currently in the article as evident by its content, references and presentation.  Uriah923 19:36, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: *Well the consensus is that it is not of high enough quality to serve as a reference and due to the SEO and linkspam implications we should avoid it as an external link. Those two things are not contradictory. The reasons for your block are clear on your talk page and where the consensus was established. And yes you are flirting with violating Wikipedia policy again by continuing the discussion. Anyone can weigh in on the issue in the relavent place, and that is not here. - Taxman Talk 19:46, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Value of ON content and quality of reference 

message: A section about Mongol Invasion ( most importantly Hulagu Khan ) should be added here, as it proved to be a turning point for islamic culture , the start of its downfall .Farhansher 20:59, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Definetly. The section should exist. -- Svest 21:12, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Mongol Invasion

message: I dont know whos pov, but this is pov:
:"Nonetheless the new religion penetrated deeply, to the point where conversions were discouraged since they might have been motivated by avoiding taxes, rather than true belief, and choosing a religion should override such economic concerns."
Ask a Shia and he will say that it was since Umayyads didnt care about Islam, rather money, and therefore did not want converts, since that meant less taxes. --Striver 20:41, 7 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you Zora! --Striver 01:24, 8 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: pov

message: anon wrote in the article:
:Whichever person wrote that Uthman (RA) favored his family over others, is not worth talking to. Uthman was a SAHABA. you can never degrade a sahaba. And by the way, Uthman did NOT favor his family, over others.
A good example of sunnis beliving in the uprightness of all Sahaba.--Striver 15:24, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: nepotism

message: i would like further elaboration on scientific and technological developments of various muslim empires, perhaps this is in a seperate article, in which case ignore this request. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.36.18.146 (talk • contribs) 12 Dec 2005.
: Can anyone show me this "separate article"? I can't seem to find it. Flex Flint (talk) 03:04, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: further elaboration

message: This edit changed "Great centers of learning, conquered by Islamic armies, became Islamic centers of culture and science and produced notable scientists…" to "Arabs made many Islamic centers of culture and science and produced notable scientists…". My own guess (without expertise) is that it is a mix of the two. Certainly, North Africa had a long history of scholarship before it was Arab; in the late years of the Western Roman empire, the more intellectual side of the development of Christianity was largely (though by no means exclusively) on the south side of the Mediterranean. I'm not sure how much of that was intact when the Arabs got there.
Both sides here are making their claims without citation. I'd really like to see some citation on this. -- Jmabel | Talk 19:18, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You are right Jmabel. But I think the sentence is talking about official centers of learning such as Qarawiyin and Al Azhar in North Africa. I believe that the second claim is more accurate. Cheers -- Svest 19:45, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Centers of learning 

message: A religion such as Islam has had a huge effect on world culture, but I have yet to find an article on Wikipedia that deals with that topic.  I'm a new user and am not familiar with this sort of thing, but it would be very helpful if someone would write an article about the effect of Islam on other cultures outside the Middle East. - Eric W 22:02, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Effect of Islam 

message: When mentioning the Mameluk dynasty, does the article refer to the muslim dynasty in India or Baghdad? --TBC???  ??? ??? 12:22, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Mameluk dynasty

message: I second that - wanted to know who Umar was, was wondering why it's not hyperlinked or defined.
Likewise, lower down, in "The decline of political unity" -- I wonder if the first appearance of the word "emirates" should be hyperlinked?  Or is it considered to be too well known to be hyperlinked? (Is there a wikipedia policy for what is to be hyperlinked?) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dgrrr (talk • contribs) 23 April 2006.
24.172.129.107 20:54, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  hyperlink Umar & emirates? 

message: This article is seriously a stub.  There is soooo much more to Islamic histroy than what is in this article.
I urge everyone to be bold and edit and add sourced information. Bless sins 01:49, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article is a stub! 

message: I agree that we don't routinely use Dar al-Islam in English, but what about "Islamic world"? And we can easily explain at first use that we are using this interchangeably with the Arabic expression Dar al-Islam. - Jmabel | Talk 02:51, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Dar al-Islam

message: Is "Sultunate" a correct spelling?  Badagnani 02:04, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No. "Sultanate". - Jmabel | Talk 02:42, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spelling 

message: It seems to me that
:Today, Pakistan ... is one of the most competitive and highly developed nations among the muslim countries. (Emphasis added)
is pretty much POV.  I don't want to remove it, though, without confirmation from some of the other people on this list. Anyone? --Eliyahu S Talk 9:45, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I say remove. No citation, and certainly not obvious. - Jmabel | Talk 02:49, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay. I "toned it down" to read ... one of the more developed .... --Eliyahu S Talk 2:21, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV in Pakistan sub-section? 

message: When the page title was changed from Muslim History to Muslim history that brought up a different Talk page for the main page than this one. So when I click on article I see the correct main page, but when I click on discussion I don't come back to this page, but end up on that other one, instead.  I don't know what to do to fix it, so I'm hoping a more senior person will do the Moves or whatever is necessary, and also enlighten me about the correct procedure. Thanks. --Eliyahu S Talk 2:26, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Its all fixed now. Had to be an admin to fix this right in this case. - Jmabel | Talk 05:26, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk link broken 

message: I've changed the section title )and subject) to the much more relevant Arab-Israeli conflict. At the moment, the section's content is simply an abbreviated intro from the respective article, so perhaps more work is needed to make it better fit into this article. Pecher Talk 07:30, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Establishment of the State of Israel 

message: What is with "(SAV)" after Muhammad's name? - Jmabel | Talk 00:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I removed it. It is the transliteration of PBUH. -- Szvest 10:24, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Suspected it was something like that. Never seen "SAV" before, though. - Jmabel | Talk 06:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

text: In keeping with that, I just removed the (SAV) that cropped back up in the image description under the Muhammad section. -- Eliyahu S Talk 15:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

text: Hi Nadimheyat. Please refer to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Islam-related articles)#Islamic honorifics. You can discuss that there instead. -- Szvest - Wiki me up ® 10:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  SAV 

message: The White Revolution was a reform which has done by the government. It don't think it can be recognized as a revolution. Yu can llok at Revolution#Political and socioeconomic revolutions and List of revolutions and rebellions .I think it should be replaced by Iranian Constitutional Revolution.--Sa.vakilian 06:44, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Two Iranian revolutions

message: We can complete the information by adding some part of the leads of the main articles. I add something from the lead of Safavids and Fatemids.--Sa.vakilian 18:24, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Completion

message: One thing i find funny is how Muslims today complain about racism and this and that, and what the west is trying to do to them. But this is an entire section, how many pages? and WHERE IS AFRICA? there more Muslims in Africa than in Arabia. 1/2 of Africa is Muslim, how many great empires came out of there?, And which country was the only country to protect Islam when it was just a whisper? Writing Black people out of history we use to believe was what white people did, now we understand Islam, Christianity not much difference at all. actually let me correct myself,. MUSLIMS, Christians, not much difference at all.--Halaqah 08:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: WHERE IS AFRICA??????????

message: After reading through most of the article, it strikes me that the article deals mostly with the spread of Islam, not with the different evolutions within Islam. I think the confusing arises because of the fact that the article is called Muslim history instead of History of Islam. I suggest that the current content should be moved to an article that deals with the spread of Islam (e.g., Historic expansion of Islam, Muslim world,...?) and that the (new) article History of Islam deals with the different theological evolutions and interpretations within Islam. For instance: when was the Q'uran written, are there different/later versions/adaptions, what and when did religious differences in Islam appear, are certain differences extinct (such as Arianism in Christianity), what has causes the evolution, what is the impact of different cultures, etc. As a non-muslim wikipedian I hardly can contribute (except for the current European Islam branch, which is a current research topic within sociological communities). Sijo Ripa 01:00, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Evolution of Islam?

message: A concern: There was a modification to the first sentence to add the word "purported" to describe Muhammad's visions. Specifically
:Muslim history began in Arabia with Muhammad's first purported visions in the 7th century.
In a literal sense this is correct and is appropriate for an encyclopedia so as not to treat the beliefs of a particular religion as fact. Nevertheless, IMHO, the phrasing could come across as derogatory toward the faith.
I'd like to propose the following (or something like it) instead.
:Muslim history began in Arabia in the 7th century with the evangelism of Muhammad, a man from the city of Mecca who founded Islam and became a major political leader.
I realize that many Muslims may have a concern that, from the religion's perspective, the religion began with the Muhammad's divine revelations, not with the evangelism (of course, if we are being technical, the religion began long before Muhammad but that's a whole other issue). However, I think this phrasing is perhaps a better compromise in terms of stating fact while least offending Muslims and non-Muslims.
--Mcorazao 06:00, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Intro: Beginning of Islam

message: There are a number of tags on the article. Please justify thier relevence.Bless sins 22:38, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Tags

message: I found the frequent neglect of dates in this article to be frustrating. For example, in the section on the succession of the early caliphs, it doesn't state what year each caliph succeeded another. Aftermath 16:47, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Lack of dates

message: First of all, I think the article lacks coverage in some areas
*21st century, there is nothing about Al-Qaeda, Islamism, Jemaah Islamiyah, Taliban and so forth, but there is a large paragraph about Turkey and secularism - this is undue weight and Islamism is a big thing at the moment
* Some sections are one line and have an expansion request on them
* Many sections are unsourced and seem to include incorrect statements
**"Pakistan is presently the only nuclear power of the Muslim world and is one of the more developed nations among the Muslim countries." - A lot of Muslim countries - Gulf oil states, Turkey and Malaysia are much richer than Pakistan. Does Iran count as a nuclear power?
**There are many subjective comments passed along as fact with no inline citations.
Random prose problems from just one paragraph
*"In 1947, after the partition of India, Pakistan became the largest Islamic Country in the world (by population) and the tenth largest post-WWII state in the modern world" - caps in country
*"The partition of India refers to the creation in August 1947 of two sovereign states of India and Pakistan" - should be "the"
*"In 1971, after a bloody war of independence the Bengal part of Pakistan became an independent state called Bangladesh." - should be Bengali
*apparent pov - random example"
**"The modern age brought radical technological and organizational changes to Europe and Islamic countries found themselves less modern when compared to the many western nations. Europe's state-based government and rampant colonization allowed the West to dominate the globe economically and forced Islamic countries to question change" - why is it then not noted that Islam also spread by force and subjugation of other religions?
** eg "These policies were, however, reversed by the Qing dynasty, when it came to power." a complaint about Muslims being restricted in China, but looking at the India section, there is no mention of demolition of Buddhist and Hindu sites and only a very flowery "It left a lasting legacy on Indian culture and architecture. Amongst the famous buildings built by the Mughals......"
Blnguyen  (bananabucket) 08:51, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  GA failed 

message: I don't think it will ever be possible to write an objective piece on the history of Islam. I'm not saying the people who contribute to it the most are in any way biased, but that if another editor gets offended by a certain statement or if controversial info (especially about extremist groups) is white washed from the page, there will always be a dispute over the page’s neutrality. No matter if the info is properly cited and factually sound, that one person (whether it be a Muslim of any school or otherwise) who will try to distort info to meet their own views or to delete something all together just because they think it reflects badly on Islam. However, I hope that this article will someday pass GA.--Ghostexorcist 01:54, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Objectivity

message: There is another article - Spread of Islam which is not as developed as this one here. I'm thinking they should be merged. Is there really a need for two articles? In fact, what is the difference in what is covered? --Merbabu 00:44, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Spread of Islam]]? 

message: This sentence is unfinished: "By the end of the 10th century, the ruler Abd al-Rahman III (912-61) took over the title of"  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.24.244.10 (talk) 09:42, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bug in the text 

message: This article badly needs maps showing historical spread of Islam. Around 800 and 1500 would be quite useful, and an animated gif would be perfect. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk  23:56, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Maps needed 

message: I don't understand this sentence:" With Mongol conquest in the east, the Ayyubid dynasty ruling over Egypt had been replaced by a man who was born prince struggled as a slave named Mamluks also known as Lion of Ain Jaloot in 1250."
It is certainly not correct English. Can someone rewrite this? Wereldburger758 (talk) 22:31, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is meant? 

message: In this section-
Prophet Muhammad died in June 632. The Battle of Yamama was fought in December of the same year, between the forces of the Rashidun Caliph Abu Bakr and Musailima.
It seems a bit awkward to start a sentence with 'Prophet mohammed'.
I think it would read better if it said, 'The prophet mohammed', or just mohamed.
Using prophet in this way sounds like prophet is either his first name or a title.
I mean how many mohammeds were involved with inventing islam? I think people would understand who was meant without the 'prophet' bit. Using prophet in this way also seems a bit too mohammedan and un-NPOV, like using the proscribed 'pbuh'.
Just a thought.
Doktordoris (talk) 19:19, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Why Prophet Mohammed? Should it not read either just Mohamed, or THE prophet mohammed?

message: *"some definite "antiroyal" freedom-loving tribal ethos"
*"risked to lose its honour"
*"seems not to be applicable to the authority of another type, the "celestial" one"
*"study of climatological, seismological, volcanological and epidemiological history of the period"
:Parts of this article read like they were written by a 10th grader for his history project. Or at least someone not even remotely versed in the customary (or academic, or any other) style of English. That entire paragraph could benefit from a rewrite. 60.242.48.18 (talk) 03:56, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Style 

message: I don't see any mention of terrorism or non-state warfare. As it's been called the War on Terror by the West and the War on Islam by Islamists, shouldn't there be a mention of 9/11 or any of the other related incidents that resemble a World War with/against Islamism throughout the 20th and 21st century? Isn't there a line of incidents from airliner hijackings and Olympics to conflicts in Bosnia and Afghanistan leading to 9/11 and continuing series of arrest and terror attacks attributed to radical Islamists? Redhanker (talk) 18:04, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  War on Terror / War on Islam 

message: There is another article, Muslim conquests that duplicates a lot of information found on this page without adding much if anything new. About 7 months ago, someone suggested there that it be merged, and Muslim conquests be redirected to Muslim history (like is done with Christian history/Christian conquests. No action has been taken in the interim.
I would like to propose a merger of that information into this page, based on:
1) redundant information
2) precedent: "Christian conquests" redirects to Christian History. It seems to follow that "Muslim conquests" should redirect to Muslim History.
Thoughts? I have not put merger proposal tags or anything anywhere, just brought up the topic here and on the other article talk page. There just doesn't seem to be an NPOV reason (unless I'm missing something...) to duplicate the information. The article refers to a specific time period, but I have not known that time period to be referred to specifically with that term. If I am incorrect, please disregard. Jbower47 (talk) 21:10, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: No, this is a bad idea. The Muslim conquests occupy little space in this article. Johnbod (talk) 17:50, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Propose merge with Muslim Conquests