DECISIVE MOMENTS IN THE HISTORY OF ISLAM BY MUHAMMAD ABDULLAH ENAN By the same Author 1. AlHakim biAmr Allah and the mysteries of the Fatimide Doctrine. Arabic 2. Ibn Khaldun his Life and Work English 3. History of the Inquisition and the Famous Trials of History. Arabic 4 MisrulIslamiah Islamic Egypt. Arabic 5. History of AlAzhar Mosque, Arabic 6. History of the Muslim Dynasties in Spain new and enlarged edition. Arabic Translated from the Second Arabic Edition Preface to the Second Arabic Edition THE original idea of this book is fully represented by its title. It deals with the decisive encounters between East and West,Islam and Christendom. This is one of the most important subjects of Islamic history, indeed perhaps the most important of all. Besides its abundant and eventful episodes, it throws much light on this eternal struggle between the East and West. The encounter of Islam and Christendom in the fields of war or peace, was always decisive and had the most farreaching effects on their destinies. Such is the field which inspired me with the idea of this work and most of its chapters, and from it I chose those decisive encounters which I here present to the reader. They are all united with this common bond, and all are representative of the idea. The book is not, therefore, as it may seem, at the first glance, a collection of miscellaneous studies but, with the exception of a few chapters, is a harmonious unity dealing with one and the same subject I did not, of course, deal with all such decisive events, the subject being so vast and inexhaustive, but have tried to present some of the most important and with most farreaching effects on the course of Islamic history, I have dealt with special care with two of these, namely, the Arab siege of Constantinople and the battle of Tours Pavement of the Martyrs, the greatest decisive encounters of Islam and Christendom. The failure of the Arabs, under the walls of Cons tantinople, was a check to the torrent of young Islam from penetrating into Europe from the East, and gave it a new life to the Byzantine Empire, which lasted for some more centuries. The retreat of the Arabs before the Franks, in the plains of Tours, was a check to Islam from penetrating into the nations of the West and the North, the seal of its victory in the West, the field of deliverance for Christendom, and the cradle of resurrection and life for the European nations. Likewise the victory of the Muslims in the plains of Zallaka was not only the victory of Muslim Spain it was the defeat of Christendom by Islam, and the prelude of the Crusades. And the Crusades were nothing but a new phase of this eternal struggle between East and West, and Islam and Christendom. The fall of Andalusia and the Moorish civilization was a blow not only to Islam, but to the greatness of Spain itself. Let us imagine for example that the Muslims conquered Rome instead of their failure under its walls, or that the Crusaders were able to crush Egypt and establish themselves in the East what would have then been the fate of Islam and the Tslamic world ? These decisive events and moments in the history of Islam and Christendom, are the data which supplied the subject of these studies. Many of them are very scantily dealt with by the Islamic Chronicles, and are seldom treated in our modern historical research. We are, therefore, obliged to refer for many of their details to Western sources and scholars despite their being often influenced by religious and national motives, which could be eli minated only by a dispassionate and impartial inquiry. Cairo, March 1943.
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
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2.0 out of 5 stars
Islamic History pre 1800,
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This review is from: Decisive Moments in the History of Islam (Hardcover)
"Decisive Moments in the History of Islam" by Muhammad Abdullah Enan, formerly of the Egyptian Bar and Egyptian Society for Historical Research; originally published in 1940 in Lahore (Pakistan); revised third ed. in 1949; revised fifth ed. in 1974. Written by a Muslim who contended that the pagans living in North Africa were generally `happy' to be informed of the peaceful message of the Prophet Mohammad - as long as they paid their dhimmi jizyah tribute-taxes (p. 22). The author quoted both the English historian Gibbon and the German von Schlegel about the dhimmis' happiness. The author tried to down play the military aspects of the Muslim's `peaceful conquests' by the early Muslim militias (or as the author defined these military campaigns: "the Arab Outburst"), but in a moment of candor the Muslim author gushed that in Oct. 732: "The Muslims captured and pillaged Poitiers [France] and burned its famous cathedral. They then attacked Tours...captured it and destroyed its cathedral...the Berber tribes were anxious to retire with their great spoils...They plundered all its rich churches and monasteries...and carried away innumerable treasures, spoils and captives" (p. 61). The author discusses other various Muslim battles: Constantinople, Crete, Sicily, Sardegna, Corsica, the battle of Manzikert, Hattin, Mansurah, De Joinveill's Memoirs, slavery in the Middle Ages [eight short pages of banal generalities; no discussion from the hadith], the Fall of Toledo and Granada, and bemoans the collapse of Muslim Spain (or as the author titled it: The Fall of the Moorish Civilization). Not really an extensive nor detailed in-depth analysis of the history of the early Muslim era, but probably interesting when it was originally written. If you are already familiar with Islamic history, I don't see this mid-1950s book adding much to a reader's knowledge. Past its prime; stale-dated.
2.0 out of 5 stars
Brief Islamic History: 650-1500,
By
This review is from: Decisive Moments In The History Of Islam (Paperback)
"Decisive Moments in the History of Islam" by Muhammad Abdullah Enan, formerly of the Egyptian Bar and Egyptian Society for Historical Research; originally published in 1940 in Lahore (Pakistan); revised third ed. in 1949; revised fifth ed. in 1974. Written by a Muslim who contended that the pagans living in North Africa were generally `happy' to be informed of the peaceful message of the Prophet Mohammad - as long as they paid their dhimmi jizyah tribute-taxes (p. 22). The author quoted both the English historian Gibbon and the German von Schlegel about the dhimmis' happiness. The author tried to down play the military aspects of the Muslim's `peaceful conquests' by the early Muslim militias (or as the author defined these military campaigns: "the Arab Outburst"), but in a moment of candor the Muslim author gushed that in Oct. 732: "The Muslims captured and pillaged Poitiers [France] and burned its famous cathedral. They then attacked Tours...captured it and destroyed its cathedral...the Berber tribes were anxious to retire with their great spoils...They plundered all its rich churches and monasteries...and carried away innumerable treasures, spoils and captives" (p. 61). The author discusses other various Muslim battles: Constantinople, Crete, Sicily, Sardegna, Corsica, the battle of Manzikert, Hattin, Mansurah, De Joinveill's Memoirs, slavery in the Middle Ages [eight short pages of banal generalities; no discussion from the hadith], the Fall of Toledo and Granada, and bemoans the collapse of Muslim Spain (or as the author titled it: The Fall of the Moorish Civilization). Not really an extensive nor detailed in-depth analysis of the history of the early Muslim era, but probably interesting when it was originally written. If you are already familiar with Islamic history, I don't see this mid-1950s book adding much to a reader's knowledge. Past its prime; stale-dated.
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