The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam [Paperback]

Bat Ye'or (Author), David Maisel (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 444 pages
• Publisher: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; Rev Exp edition (January 1985)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0838632629
• ISBN-13: 978-0838632628
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #714,620 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

95 of 99 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Disturbing Account Of Religious/Racial Prejudice, September 19, 2003

By 

M. D Roberts (Gwent, United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam (Paperback)

This is a disturbing book which reveals what is described as a socially acceptable Islamic conduct against peoples who were classed as "inferior".

For the most part the book describes these peoples as Jews and Christians who were classed as "dhimmi". "Dhimmitude" being further elaborated as the religious, cultural, and political fate of non-Muslims living under Islamic rule, usually when their lands have been subject to Islamic conquest.

Where the politicisation/allegations of racial prejudice, segregation, apartheid and indeed genocide have become quite common-place in the Middle East against the Jewish state, a book such as this is very timely in showing another side to the story. A book that reveals the painful, disturbing policy of prejudice, racial hatred and segregation of countless people who the book describes were classed as "inferior"on the basis of their religion alone.

Many examples are referred to in this study and many issues are discussed. The book draws a number of distinctions drawn and prejudices applied upon Jews and Christians who refused to accept and bow to Islam. Just by way of a single example, page 56 of this study deals with the "Invalidity of the Dhimmi's Oath".

With legal cases being dealt with under Quranic law, every case involving a Muslim and a dhimmi received a "peculiar" treatment in that a dhimmi was forbidden to give evidence against a Muslim. The Dhimmi's oath being deemed unacceptable in an Islamic court, which made it virtually impossible for any Muslim opponent to be condemned. To further any defence, the book describes that the dhimmi would be obliged to "purchase" Muslim witnesses, often at great expense.

This refusal of Muslim religious courts to accept such testimony of the dhimmi being based on hadiths which maintained that the infidels were of a "perverse and mendacious character because they deliberately persisted in denying the superiority of Islam". The same law preventing any Muslim from being put to death on account of an infidel.

This principle alone is further elaborated in this book with the example of the frequent accusations directed at Jews and Christians of having "blasphemed" the Prophet or Islam, an offence punishable by death. In such a case, the dhimmi was clearly in no position to contradict the testimony of a Muslim making the accusation and could therefore only save his life by conversion to Islam. (Although some exceptions have been recorded, this was the abiding principle nearly always adhered to.)

This is a classic study of this subject and it is not a "light" read, but a subject which demands attention. Thank you.

80 of 83 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent source book for those interested in Islam, June 16, 1999

By 

[e-mail] (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam (Paperback)

The history of Jews and Christians living under Islam is not widely known. When thinking of it at all, one looks to the glories of Islamic Spain or to the Ottoman Empire. The general historical reality is different from these however. Bat Ye'or provides an excellent overview of this history in the first part of her book and a wide variety of source documents in the second.

Here we learn of the religiously sanctioned forced conversions, daily humiliations, massacres, oppression, inequitable taxation, and the like, which eventually led to the near disappearance of the extensive Christian and Jewish communities which had flourished throughout the Near East and North Africa prior to the advent of Islam.

As "dhimmi" (people of the contract) Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians and others of the accepted religions had no rights of citizenship within a Muslim state. As "protected peoples" they had no right to self-defense. They were at best tolerated and at all times living without security - subject to the law but not protected by it.

For example, Jews and Christians are specifically accused in the Qur'an of having falsified God's word. In past Islamic societies therefore, Jews and Christians were considered to be willfully and knowingly adhering to a lie. As religiously convicted liars, they were given no standing in courts of law and could be convicted of crimes on the unsupported word of two Muslim males. The abuses of this system were extensive.

All-in-all, Bat Ye'or's two books ("The Dhimmi" and "The Decline of Near Eastern Christianity under Islam") do much to re-illuminate the forgotten history of Jews and Christians under Islam. They deserve a wide readership.

As an aside here to prove the non-partisanship of my review, it's worth pointing out that the historical behavior of Christian societies toward indigenous Jews and heretics was no better.

81 of 86 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A silent history finds a voice, January 15, 2002

By 

"aldhimmi" (Kew, VIC Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam (Paperback)

This is the classic study of dhimmitude - the condition of non-Muslims who are permitted to live as permanent tributaries under the dhimma, a pact of submission to Islamic conquest. A profoundly moving human document, The Dhimmi is deeply challenging to the 'Andalusian myth', that Muslim relations with those of other faiths have been the epitome of peaceful coexistence. In The Dhimmi, Bat Ye'or provides her classical definition of the psychology of dhimmitude, which is of fundamental importance for understanding the current role of Islam in its full global context.

Dhimmi history is hard to study, in part because the conquerors have written their own version, and promulgated it with supreme moral self-confidence. It is also hard to access dhimmi documents, which are written in Greek, Latin, Farsi, Coptic, Ethiopian, Hebrew, Armenian, Serbian, English, French, Hindi etc etc. A great strength of this book is it's very rich collection of translations from dhimmi and Arab documents.

A must read in these times.