Was the Islamic world a revised version of the Roman Empire?

Answer 1

Islam as a religion is generally thought to have been started by the prophet Mohammed. However, although he left advice on such things as prayer, and charity, he gave no advice about politics. He does not seem to have thought the Muslims would have formed a special kind of state. He was concerned with their behaviour in praying and thinking about god. While he was alive he resembled a cult leader.

Islam grew in an area with very weak government - modern Saudi Arabia where there were city states such as Makkah, run by informal councils of merchants. There were also kingdoms in the area. Many of the new Muslims were beduin from nomadic groups who had an informal leadership. Others were townspeople.

When he died the group of Muslims in Madina (city of the prophet, formerly Yathrib) had to decide who would rule them in his place as successor (Khalif= deputy). There were a group of four Khalifs in Madina, who step by step became more like rulers and less like religious leaders. Muhammed is said to have been a humble man living in an ordinary hut. His successors soon began to live like kings. Abu Bakr remained fairly humble but Othman and Omar began to become rich and favoured their relatives. Under these leaders Muslim arabs had burst out of Arabia itself and begun to conquer the territory of the Roman and Persian empires.

The last of the Madina Khalifs was Ali, the son-in-law of Mohammed (he had married Mohammed's daughter). He was soon overthrown by a faction led by another of Mohammed's relatives, Muawiyah, who led a military revolt from Damascus. This of course was the usual means by which a new ruler came to power in the Roman empire. Thus the new Omayyad dynasty that ruled from Damascus had come to power like a Roman emperor. That dynasty ruled for about 100 years and was then overthrown by the descendants of Mohammed's uncle Abbas. The Abbasids ruled from a new city near the old Persian capital of Ctesiphon. It was called Baghdad (gift of god).

The similarity with Rome is thus that there were no limits on the power of the ruler, other than military revolt.

As Mohammed laid down no rules on rulership I see no reason why modern Muslims should not use modern democratic methods as seems likely to happen in Libya, Egypt and Tunisia. Lets hope so.