Christianity & Buddhism spread into "pagan space" on the western and eastern edges of Eurasia [...] In contrast, Islam was civilized

A Geographical explanation. Thank you. Simple and elegant, and roughly accurate (european exceptions: the forcible conversion of the Saxons & the crusades against the Balts). Tell me, though, one pagan space which Islam did spread into was the Sahel. I don't know much about the Sahel - was it through cooptation or Jihad (or both?)

was it through cooptation or Jihad (or both?)

both. the former early, the latter later. though, in the case of the fulani sokoto jihads, they were often against "bad muslims."

the explanation is temporal as well as spatial.

(the geographical explanation of why islam has bloody borders is probably an issue too, over at steve's blog someone commented how latin america doesn't have bloody borders but islam does, but the only border latin america shares with other civilizations is the mexico-usa border, unless you count the guyanas)

I dont think that is a good comparison, since latin america, with its pecularities and differences, is still "western" like the USA.

And latin america and the islamic world, altough both are under developed, dont really have much in common.
Latin america and the islamic world are far apart, their people have had almost 0 mutual contact (msot arabs here are lebanese christians).
To illustrate the differences shortly, just think of half naked women in rio shaking their ass in the carnival, and then think of the middle east.

I think the reason for the bloody borders of islam nowadays, isnt expansionism, muslims want to live by their rules and not someone elses, so, in the Philippines, China, the Caucasus and the balkans they try and have tried to secede.
And in other countries like Nigeria or Sudan, or Lebanon a few decades ago, which are divided pretty much equally they try to become the dominant group.

if you look at the works of may Byzantine thinkers [e.g., John of Damascus] there is a tendency to via Islam as simply a heresy that is wholly derivative of Christianity

In Crossroads to Islam, which is admittedly kind of wacky, there's an argument that the Tawhid (There is no god etc.) evolved from proto-Muslim extreme-'left-wing' position in the Christological polemics going on in the Eastern Mediterreanean at the time.

evolved from proto-Muslim extreme-'left-wing' position in the Christological polemics going on in the Eastern Mediterreanean at the time

chicken & egg. same sort of issue as to whether iconaclasm is derived from islam, or whether they both come from the same west semitic discomfort with images in the 6th & 7th centuries.

Razib, your explaination sounded so elegant, I was almost convinced. But then I had second thoughts. Some things just don't fit.
Let's start with the Turks, the major motor of islamic expansion after the year 1000. "Spread with the sword"? The Turks just did what their pre-Islamic TUrkic and Mongolic ancestors did (and those who had not converted to Islam were still doing elsewhere): Keeping on the move and conquering territory, and most of what they conquered was already Islamic. Where it wasn'T, they didn't convert anyone (or did they in India? They surely didn't in Europe, expect the boys taken for imperial service), whoever did convert, eg some Albanians and some slavs in europe, did so of their own free will. I don't see how the imperialist policy of the ottomans can be said to be islamic in any way, and if so, the imperialist policy of spain, england etc, hardly a negligable factor, was definitely christian, and christianity was spread by the sword at least as much as islam, and there's nothing left to explain. At least the christian imperialists did convert people on a large scale (and many of the settlers in the later US felt they had a religious mission).
Now let's go back to before the Turks. Admittedly, I know far less about early Islam than I know about the ottomans (studied them at university). But still: To me, it seems that Islamic civilization (8th, 9th century) was by far superior to what then existed in much of the territory they conquered, eg in westgothic spain? So surely islam was a civilizing influence there? It definitely was a civilizing influence on the Jews in the west, who surely woulnd't have written their major philosophical works in Arabic otherwise, and the Jews were already pretty civilized compared with the rest of Europe then.Remember, the only people in northern Europe who could read at that time were the monks and a number of Jews, and Greek thought came to Europe mediated by Islam and translated from the Arabic.
And part of the attraction of Islam then (as under the Ottomans) was of course religious tolerance (aks the Jews, who had no fun after Spain had been reconquered by the catholics). Only early islamic spread in the east (iran etc) fits the picture at all, but wasn't the expansion of the religion itself there a peaceful process? Wasn't it simply attractive? I just don't know much about it.
I'm not sure whether generalizations like "islam was spread by the sword" (in fact many modern muslims believe it and are proud about it, just like Israeli Jews believe that the Jews always were Zionists at heart) aren't very helpful at a time when US presidents speak of crusades and try to spread democracy and freedom with the sword.

Where it wasn'T, they didn't convert anyone (or did they in India? They surely didn't in Europe, expect the boys taken for imperial service), whoever did convert, eg some Albanians and some slavs in europe, did so of their own free will.

this is false. aside from a few outliers like the mopillas of kerala, the vast majority of the 1/3 of south asians (350 million people) who are muslims are converts from a turkic dispensation (i.e., most south asian muslims follow hanafi law, which is also the law in most turkic lands). in europe they converted many. most "turks" who still live in the balkans are probably converts from the local population, and a large number of european turks resettled in turkey (depressing their number). the genetic evidence does not point to anything more than 20% of turkish anatolian ancestry being non-indigenous, and it is probably closer to 10%.

don't see how the imperialist policy of the ottomans can be said to be islamic in any way, and if so, the imperialist policy of spain, england etc, hardly a negligable factor, was definitely christian, and christianity was spread by the sword at least as much as islam, and there's nothing left to explain. At least the christian imperialists did convert people on a large scale (and many of the settlers in the later US felt they had a religious mission).

definitions are confusing, but, recall that the ottomans were self-proclaimed ghazis, fighters for their faith. ottoman imperium was explicitly religious, as was their claim (which was a late invention, granted) of being caliphs of the sunni world. one resistence to turkish nationalism was the contention that turks had no nation but islam. i am not sure you can make an analogy to most of the christian nations except in a symbolic sense (e.g., the titles of 'most christian king' and all that stuff).

was by far superior to what then existed in much of the territory they conquered, eg in westgothic spain?

terms like "superior" are loaded. what about st. isidore? in any case, islamic civilization in the 8th century was surely superior to what you would find in northern europe since northern europe was savage and barely literate then. but the 5th century middle east was also superior, so the issue you are pointing to is not, i think, fundamentally islamic, but the fact that middle eastern civilization as civilized while bede was the lone light of his people.

stuff like this is complicated, i'll read you comment in more detail later.

stuff like this is complicated,
very much so.

razib, down below you'll find more comments on individual points you made. BUt what I'd wanted to say really transcends all those details, and i wonder whether you could agree with my main point at least partly.
What it comes down to for me is the following:
We've had the Empires of Alexander the Great, of the Monoglians, of the Sassanids, the Byzantines, the Egyptians, the Romans, of the Ottomans, of Napoleon, of the British, of the Nazis, etc.etc. Some empires were very benign (Napoleon's), some relatively benign (the ottoman), some were downright vicious (the Nazi's). There were very different cultures and ideologies behind these empires, and the conquered people(s) were similarly diverse. But by and large, all of these empires were conquered by military means.
I don't really see a system behind all this that could single out the islamic empires as a special case. What I see is that at least until very recently, adding invading foreign territory was seen as an ok thing to do if you had the power to do so, and there was always some nice ideological justification to be found if you needed one.


If you still have time (this is really not very important), just some comments on what you wrote:

terms like "superior" are loaded. what about st. isidore? in any case, islamic civilization in the 8th century was surely superior to what you would find in northern europe since northern europe was savage and barely literate then. but the 5th century middle east was also superior, so the issue you are pointing to is not, i think, fundamentally islamic, but the fact that middle eastern civilization as civilized while bede was the lone light of his people.
all true. i thought i was referring to what i had understood as your idea that islam had to use war and not persuasion to spread because the people they conquered were, as christians/zoroastrians/buddhists etc, less easily persuaded to assimilate to a conquering culture than the supposedly culturally inferior heathens. maybe i had completely misunderstood you.
aside from a few outliers like the mopillas of kerala, the vast majority of the 1/3 of south asians (350 million people) who are muslims are converts from a turkic dispensation (i.e., most south asian muslims follow hanafi law, which is also the law in most turkic lands).
I don't know the first thing about India or other parts of south asia (you are not telling me that turks ever went to Malaysia, are you?). Is there evidence that these were forced conversions? (In india, they could have been because islamic laws does differentiate between monotheists --"people of the book" who can keep their religion-- and heathens who can't.
in europe they converted many.
Forcibly? Anyway, there still was a very sizable Christian (Greek, Armenian orthodox, armenian catholic, syriac...) minority even on the Anatolian mainland, not to speak of the Balkans, up until to the destruction of the empire when they where exported or fled en masse to Greece, to armenia or the USA or were killed, and they same process happened to the balkan turks, thanks to nationalism as the new ideology of the day.
The existence of these large minorities in a way is even support for one of the points i thought you'd been making: THat where the monotheist religions contended with paganism, they were easily assimilated into the existing folk religion, but where their rival was another well developed, civilized religious ideology it was less easy to convince people of your ideas, and merging was less easy.

but, recall that the ottomans were self-proclaimed ghazis, fighters for their faith
yes, and those same ghazis were very busy fighting and conquering territory from the selcuks, tamerlan and other turkish anatolian beys, the arabs or the persians (well, at least the latter were shiite, which made them perhaps less muslim). My point is that if you do want to fight, there's alsways some nice ideological term at hand that's better than plain killer or murderer and that makes you feel good, be it ghazi or freedom fighter for your nation (that's what modern arabs used up to the 1970s, before it became cool again to use islam as your means of identification).
ottoman imperium was explicitly religious,
i don't see the big difference to charles the great who had himself crowned by the pope after all, and to his successors in the german "Holy roman empire", and wherever muslim territory was conquered or reconquered in former times, there was a lot of Christian rhethoric accompanying it as far as i can see.

i thought i was referring to what i had understood as your idea that islam had to use war and not persuasion to spread because the people they conquered were

a, you misunderstood me. my point is that islam engendered more hostility because of the nature of the substratum cultures which is superseded (or attempted to), not because it was necessarily a more violent spread.

Ruth said:
Remember, the only people in northern Europe who could read at that time were the monks and a number of Jews, and Greek thought came to Europe mediated by Islam and translated from the Arabic.

You are incorrect on the last point. The Greek language never died out in Northern Europe, as Irish monks kept it alive, along with Latin, throughout all the dark ages. Indeed many famous works, such as Caesar's "De Bello Gallico" and much of Cicero's and Aristotle's work ONLY SURVIVED in Northern Europe, in Ireland. The Irish monks peaceably converted the Germanic tribes of Britin, then Central Europe to Christanity - albeit Celtic Christianity, which emphasised the role of the individual, rather than the collective , and IMO laid the ground work for the later emergence of Protestantism, in these same areas.

Giving without reserve

It is with reticence that I write this. I do not wish to place myself on the moral high ground, or to sermonise anyone. This chapter tries to show the truth and importance of dreaming of our Holy Prophet Muhammad (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Messenger). These words seek to confirm that ours is a Prophet of Mercy, a Witness, and a Bearer of Good Tidings. It also aims to portray the consequence of du’aa in the Masjid al-Haram. It is moreover meant as a method of encouragement for our children to some day continue with the Prophetic Tradition of raising an orphan for the sake of Allah, The One of Unbounded Grace. So that they may by this means know that there is more to life than just prayer and fasting. And that they should give of themselves unreservedly. That they might through it also, temper their adhkaar with compassion.

We were asleep at the Mashrabiyya Hotel in Khalid bin Walid Street in Shubayka, Makkah al-Mukarramah when, by the Mercy of Allah, I had the most beautiful dream. I saw myself standing in the holy presence of our Truthful Prophet Muhammad (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet). The appearance of Our Holy Messenger matched scriptural records. Our Prophet (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Messenger) was spotlessly dressed in white robes and a white turban. I stared aghast. Our Prophet stood about two meters away and faced me directly. I do not have the words with which to suitably portray this most wonderful man, the Seal of the Prophets. I have never seen anyone so unimaginably holy, so indescribably handsome. I reached for my turban, embarrassed for not wearing it. “Leave it,” I said to myself. “You are in the Company of the Prize of creation.” A brilliance shone from our Guided Prophet (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet). Our Prophet (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet) smiled at me. The smile radiated light. I stood alert, too humbled to speak. I wished that the dream would last forever. The heavenly smile lasted between ten and fifteen minutes, it felt like.

Alhamdu-lillaah. I had never considered myself deserving of such an enormous honour. This was a spiritual experience of the first magnitude. “What does that smile mean?” I asked myself over and over again.

Part of my da'waat in the Holy Mosque in Mecca, was to ask Allah, The One Who Makes Clear to us His signs so that we may be grateful, to Grant to ourselves the opportunity and blessings of raising an orphan for His sake.

My wife and I had, over a number of years, tried to adopt a baby by applying at several local agencies, and were given all sorts of excuses which disqualified, and sometimes discouraged us. Reasons given were that we were not married according to South African law, that few babies from local Muslim parents came up for adoption, and the fact that we have children of our own. We were also faced with, what was to my mind, the worse aspect of the South African race laws. These regulations and those administering it, in this case, the social workers, prescribed that a ‘brown’ orphaned child had to be matched with ‘brown’ adoptive parents. A ‘yellow’ baby could only be placed with prospective ‘yellow’ adoptive parents, a ‘white’ orphan could not be raised by ‘black’ adoptive parents, and so on. They played dominoes with human lives. Some social workers were more ready to read the ‘race act’ than others. In an interview and in response to a question on whether we would mind adopting a child from a 'lower rung' of the colour scale, I told them that “a nice green one would do.” A jab to my ribs from my wife quickly halted the acid flow down the sides of my mouth. Stirring the ire of our then masters by criticising their political beliefs would not help, she meant. “When the white boss tells a joke, and regardless of its lack of humour – laugh!” she chided me later. Race inequalities existing at the time ensured that hundreds of black orphans went begging in more ways than one. It virtually excluded us from adopting a child. No orphans that matched our race and blood mix were on offer and they weren’t likely to easily present themselves for adoption, we were told. My wife is of Indian (as in “Indian” from India, as opposed to “American” Indian) stock and I am of (well) mixed blood.

On the morning of Wednesday, 1st June 1994, just three days after arriving back home from Haj, we received a telephone call from Melanie Van Emmenes of the Child Welfare Society. She explained that a five-month old girl had come up for adoption. The baby had earlier undergone successful abdominal surgery and she asked whether we would adopt the child. We jumped at the chance.

A rush of adrenaline replaced the after-effects of travel. We were rejuvenated. Capetonians usually visit local pilgrims before departure and also on their arrival back home. We excused ourselves from the few visitors and asked my mother-in-law to host them in our absence. My wife and I immediately went to the Adoption Centre in Eden Road, Claremont. We signed the necessary papers.

Afterwards, we told our children that we were about to receive an addition to the family. We plodded through a maze of red tape in order to legalise the process. (My wife and I had to marry in court because Muslim marriages were not recognised then, believe it or not). A few days later, my wife, brother and I collected the petite infant from a foster-mother in Newfields Estate. I shall never forget the joyous feeling when I first carried the frail waif past the front door. Her name is Makkia. We named her after the great city from which we had just returned.

Taking her into our home is one of the better things that we have done. Makkia has added a marvellous dimension to our lives. She is part of our life’s-work. I shall always be grateful to the people who had assisted us with the adoption.

The meaning behind the glowing smile from our Trustworthy Prophet Muhammad (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet) had played itself out in the most delightful way. In our Prophet (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet) we have a beautiful pattern of conduct. Like a lamp that spreads light, the Messenger of Allah invites to the Grace of Allah by His leave. Our Divinely-inspired Prophet is the first of the God-fearing. No person is better than him. Our Prophet Muhammad is the leader of the prophets. He is without sin. Our Prophet (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Messenger) is faultless and the foremost of those who submit to the Will of Allah. An exemplar to those who worship God, our Kind-hearted Prophet Muhammad (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet) is the beacon of the pious. He is an inspiration to those who are thankful to God and the leader of those who remember Allah. How should I express gratitude to the Holy Messenger of Allah for his kind intervention? I am unworthy of untying the thongs of our Prophet’s sandals.

Allah, The One Who Is Sufficient For those who put their trust in Him, Had Granted our want through the barakah of our Beloved Prophet Muhammad (May Allah Convey His Peace and Blessings upon the Holy Prophet).

I’ve been fairly constant about wearing a turban during ’ibaadah since.