Christians in Iraq After the Muslim Conquest

Christians in Iraq After the Muslim Conquest
Author: Michael G. Morony
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2009
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781593336028

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This brief introduction to the state of Christianity in Iraq during the ascendancy of Islam begins with a discussion of the friction between Christians and Magians. The political role of the church among the Sassanians, both internally and externally, is addressed. With the Islamic conquest various traditions circulated regarding the tolerance of Christianity within Muslim jurisdiction. Morony skillfully navigates these traditions, providing a plausible historical view. The formation of the Assyrian Church of the East's doctrine and identity as well as their schools, monasteries, laws, and their sense of community and separateness are considered. The contrast with Monophysites with their "Nestorian" competitors rounds out the discussion.

Christian Martyrs Under Islam

Christian Martyrs Under Islam
Author: Christian C. Sahner
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2020-03-31
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 069120313X

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A look at the developing conflicts in Christian-Muslim relations during late antiquity and the early Islamic era How did the medieval Middle East transform from a majority-Christian world to a majority-Muslim world, and what role did violence play in this process? Christian Martyrs under Islam explains how Christians across the early Islamic caliphate slowly converted to the faith of the Arab conquerors and how small groups of individuals rejected this faith through dramatic acts of resistance, including apostasy and blasphemy. Using previously untapped sources in a range of Middle Eastern languages, Christian Sahner introduces an unknown group of martyrs who were executed at the hands of Muslim officials between the seventh and ninth centuries CE. Found in places as diverse as Syria, Spain, Egypt, and Armenia, they include an alleged descendant of Muhammad who converted to Christianity, high-ranking Christian secretaries of the Muslim state who viciously insulted the Prophet, and the children of mixed marriages between Muslims and Christians. Sahner argues that Christians never experienced systematic persecution under the early caliphs, and indeed, they remained the largest portion of the population in the greater Middle East for centuries after the Arab conquest. Still, episodes of ferocious violence contributed to the spread of Islam within Christian societies, and memories of this bloodshed played a key role in shaping Christian identity in the new Islamic empire. Christian Martyrs under Islam examines how violence against Christians ended the age of porous religious boundaries and laid the foundations for more antagonistic Muslim-Christian relations in the centuries to come.

Christianity in Iraq

Christianity in Iraq
Author: Suha Rassam
Publisher: Gracewing Publishing
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2005
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780852446331

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Christianity was firmly established in Iraq from the earliest times, and the Churches of Iraq were to play a major role in the development of Christian theology and spirituality for many centuries. By the seventh century evangelization from Iraq had brought Christianity to China, Central Asia and India. Yet few people in the West are aware of Christianity's vibrant past in this region, or of the fact that Christianity has continued to be a significant cultural and religious presence in Iraq right up to the present day. The story of the Churches of Iraq, their interaction with each other and their varied fortunes under successive Parthian, Sassanid, Arab, Mongol and Ottoman rule, is told here with consummate skill. Suha Rassam guides the reader seemingly effortlessly through complex issues of doctrinal dispute and ecclesiastical politics. She helps us explore the ancient heritage of these Churches, and the major contribution they have made to the intellectual development of the region and the wider world. Suha Rassam's book comes to fill a large vacuum in the knowledge of those in the West, many of whom are still not aware of the fact that from ancient times Christianity was firmly rooted in Iraq and the rest of the territory now seen as the 'Arab Middle East'. Archbishop Mikhael Al Jamil, Patriarchal Vicar of the Syrian Catholic Church of Antioch to the Holy See and Vicar Apostolic for Europe Dr Suha Rassam has written a work of remarkable scholarship. But is is also a vivid portrayal of an extraordinary story of conflict, persecution and, for fifty years in the twentieth century, of hope, harmony and prosperity for the Christian community in Iraq. It would be a tragedy if that Christian community were now extinguished. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, Archbishop of Westminster Gives to the general interested public a comprehensive and informed insight into two thousand years of Christianity in Iraq. Dr Erica Hunter, School of Oriental and African Studies, London University

A History of Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Middle East

A History of Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Middle East
Author: Heather J. Sharkey
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 399
Release: 2017-04-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 052176937X

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This book traces the history of conflict and contact between Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Ottoman Middle East prior to 1914.

The Vanishing

The Vanishing
Author: Janine di Giovanni
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 227
Release: 2021-10-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1541756681

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The Vanishing reveals the plight and possible extinction of Christian communities across Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and Palestine after 2,000 years in their historical homeland. Some of the countries that first nurtured and characterized Christianity - along the North African Coast, on the Euphrates and across the Middle East and Arabia - are the ones in which it is likely to first go extinct. Christians are already vanishing. We are past the tipping point, now tilted toward the end of Christianity in its historical homeland. Christians have fled the lands where their prophets wandered, where Jesus Christ preached, where the great Doctors and hierarchs of the early church established the doctrinal norms that would last millennia. From Syria to Egypt, the cities of northern Iraq to the Gaza Strip, ancient communities, the birthplaces of prophets and saints, are losing any living connection to the religion that once was such a characteristic feature of their social and cultural lives. In The Vanishing, Janine di Giovanni has combined astonishing journalistic work to discover the last traces of small, hardy communities that have become wisely fearful of outsiders and where ancient rituals are quietly preserved amid 360 degree threats. Di Giovanni's riveting personal stories and her conception of faith and hope are intertwined throughout the chapters. The book is a unique act of pre-archeology: the last chance to visit the living religion before all that will be left are the stones of the past.

Late Antique Responses to the Arab Conquests

Late Antique Responses to the Arab Conquests
Author:
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2021-12-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004500642

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Late Antique Responses to the Arab Conquests is a showcase of new discoveries in an exciting and rapidly developing field: the study of the transition from Late Antiquity to Early Islam. The Arab conquests are shown to have changed both the Arabian conquerors and the conquered.

The Last Christians

The Last Christians
Author: Andreas Knapp
Publisher: Gospel in Great Writers
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780874860627

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A Westerner's travels among the persecuted and displaced Christian remnant in Iraq and Syria teach him much about faith under fire. Gold Medal Winner, 2018 IPPY Book of the Year Award Silver Medal Winner, 2018 Benjamin Franklin Award Finalist, 2018 ECPA Christian Book Award Inside Syria and Iraq, and even along the refugee trail, they're a religious minority persecuted for their Christian faith. Outside the Middle East, they're suspect because of their nationality. A small remnant of Christians is on the run from the Islamic State. If they are wiped out, or scattered to the corners of the earth, the language that Jesus spoke may be lost forever - along with the witness of a church that has modeled Jesus' way of nonviolence and enemy-love for two millennia. The kidnapping, enslavement, torture, and murder of Christians by the Islamic State, or ISIS, have been detailed by journalists, as have the jihadists' deliberate efforts to destroy the cultural heritage of a region that is the cradle of Christianity. But some stories run deep, and without a better understanding of the religious and historical roots of the present conflict, history will keep repeating itself century after century. Andreas Knapp, a priest who works with refugees in Germany, travelled to camps for displaced people in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq to collect stories of survivors - and to seek answers to troubling questions about the link between religion and violence. He found Christians who today still speak Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic, the language of Jesus. The uprooted remnant of ancient churches, they doggedly continue to practice their faith despite the odds. Their devastating eyewitness reports make it clear why millions are fleeing the Middle East. Yet, remarkably, though these last Christians hold little hope of ever returning to their homes, they also harbor no thirst for revenge. Could it be that they - along with the Christians of the West, whose interest will determine their fate - hold the key to breaking the cycle of violence in the region? Includes sixteen pages of color photographs.

Christians at the Heart of Islamic Rule

Christians at the Heart of Islamic Rule
Author: David Richard Thomas
Publisher: History of Christian-Muslim Re
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2003
Genre: Architecture
ISBN:

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This volume on Christian life and thought in Baghdad under 'Abbasid rule illustrates the vigour of Christianity, and shows that relations between Christians and Muslims, although at times strained, could often be beneficial to followers of both faiths.

Christians and the Middle East Conflict

Christians and the Middle East Conflict
Author: Paul S Rowe
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 211
Release: 2014-06-20
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1317801105

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Christians and the Middle East Conflict deals with the relationship of Christians and Christian theology to the various conflicts in the Middle East, a topic that is often sensationalized but still insufficiently understood. Political developments over the last two decades, however, have prompted observers to rediscover and examine the central role religious motivations play in shaping public discourses. This book proceeds on the assumption that neither a focus on the eschatological nor a narrow understanding of the plight of Christians in the Middle East is sufficient. Instead, it is necessary to understand Christians in context and to explore the ways that Christian theology applies through the actions of Christians who have lived and continue to live through conflict in the region either as native inhabitants or interested foreign observers. This volume addresses issues of concern to Christians from a theological perspective, from the perspective of Christian responses to conflict throughout history, and in reflection on the contemporary realities of Christians in the Middle East. The essays in this volume combine contextual political and theological reflections written by both scholars and Christian activists and will be of interest to students and scholars of Politics, Religion and Middle East Studies.

The Early Muslim Conquest of Syria

The Early Muslim Conquest of Syria
Author:
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 310
Release: 2019-09-23
Genre: History
ISBN: 100069058X

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This book narrates the battles, conquests and diplomatic activities of the early Muslim fighters in Syria and Iraq vis-à-vis their Byzantine and Sasansian counterparts. It is the first English translation of one of the earliest Arabic sources on the early Muslim expansion entitled Futūḥ al-Shām (The Conquests of Syria). The translation is based on the Arabic original composed by a Muslim author, Muḥammad al-Azdī, who died in the late 8th or early 9th century C.E. A scientific introduction to al-Azdīʼs work is also included, covering the life of the author, the textual tradition of the work as well as a short summary of the textʼs train of thought. The source narrates the major historical events during the early Muslim conquests in a region that covers today’s Lebanon, Israel, Palestinian Territories, Jordan, Syria, Turkey and Iraq in the 7th century C.E. Among these events are the major battles against the Byzantines, such as the Battles of Ajnādayn and al-Yarmūk, the conquests of important cities, including Damascus, Jerusalem and Caesarea, and the diplomatic initiatives between the Byzantines and the early Muslims. The narrative abounds with history and Islamic theological content. As the first translation into a European language, this volume will be of interest to a wide range of readership, including (Muslim and Christian) theologians, historians, Islamicists, Byzantinists, Syrologists and (Arabic) linguists.