1.
Islam
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Islam is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion which professes that there is only one and incomparable God and that Muhammad is the last messenger of God. It is the worlds second-largest religion and the major religion in the world, with over 1.7 billion followers or 23% of the global population. Islam teaches that God is merciful, all-powerful, and unique, and He has guided mankind through revealed scriptures, natural signs, and a line of prophets sealed by Muhammad. The primary scriptures of Islam are the Quran, viewed by Muslims as the word of God. Muslims believe that Islam is the original, complete and universal version of a faith that was revealed many times before through prophets including Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses. As for the Quran, Muslims consider it to be the unaltered, certain religious rites and customs are observed by the Muslims in their family and social life, while social responsibilities to parents, relatives, and neighbors have also been defined. Besides, the Quran and the sunnah of Muhammad prescribe a comprehensive body of moral guidelines for Muslims to be followed in their personal, social, political, Islam began in the early 7th century. Originating in Mecca, it spread in the Arabian Peninsula. The expansion of the Muslim world involved various caliphates and empires, traders, most Muslims are of one of two denominations, Sunni or Shia. Islam is the dominant religion in the Middle East, North Africa, sizable Muslim communities are also found in Horn of Africa, Europe, China, Russia, Mainland Southeast Asia, Philippines, Northern Borneo, Caucasus and the Americas. Converts and immigrant communities are found in almost every part of the world, Islam is a verbal noun originating from the triliteral root s-l-m which forms a large class of words mostly relating to concepts of wholeness, submission, safeness and peace. In a religious context it means voluntary submission to God, Islām is the verbal noun of Form IV of the root, and means submission or surrender. Muslim, the word for an adherent of Islam, is the active participle of the verb form. The word sometimes has connotations in its various occurrences in the Quran. In some verses, there is stress on the quality of Islam as a state, Whomsoever God desires to guide. Other verses connect Islām and dīn, Today, I have perfected your religion for you, I have completed My blessing upon you, still others describe Islam as an action of returning to God—more than just a verbal affirmation of faith. In the Hadith of Gabriel, islām is presented as one part of a triad that also includes imān, Islam was historically called Muhammadanism in Anglophone societies. This term has fallen out of use and is said to be offensive because it suggests that a human being rather than God is central to Muslims religion
2.
Islamic calendar
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The Islamic, Muslim, or Hijri calendar is a lunar calendar consisting of 12 months in a year of 354 or 355 days. It is used to date events in many Muslim countries and it is also used by Muslims to determine the proper days of Islamic holidays and rituals, such as the annual period of fasting and the proper time for the pilgrimage to Mecca. The Islamic calendar employs the Hijri era whose epoch was retrospectively established as the Islamic New Year of AD622, during that year, Muhammad and his followers migrated from Mecca to Yathrib and established the first Muslim community, an event commemorated as the Hijra. In the West, dates in this era are usually denoted AH in parallel with the Christian, in Muslim countries, it is also sometimes denoted as H from its Arabic form. In English, years prior to the Hijra are reckoned as BH, the current Islamic year is 1438 AH. In the Gregorian calendar,1438 AH runs from approximately 3 October 2016 to 21 September 2017, four of the twelve Hijri months are considered sacred, Rajab, and the three consecutive months of Dhū al-Qa‘dah, Dhu al-Ḥijjah and Muḥarram. As the lunar calendar lags behind the solar calendar by about ten days every gregorian year, the cycle repeats every 33 lunar years. Each month of the Islamic calendar commences on the birth of the new lunar cycle, traditionally this is based on actual observation of the crescent marking the end of the previous lunar cycle and hence the previous month, thereby beginning the new month. Consequently, each month can have 29 or 30 days depending on the visibility of the moon, astronomical positioning of the earth and weather conditions. However, certain sects and groups, most notably Dawoodi Bohra Muslims and Shia Ismaili Muslims, use a tabular Islamic calendar in which odd-numbered months have thirty days, in Arabic, the first day of the week corresponds with Sunday of the planetary week. The Islamic weekdays, like those in the Hebrew and Baháí calendars, the Christian liturgical day, kept in monasteries, begins with vespers, which is evening, in line with the other Abrahamic traditions. Christian and planetary weekdays begin at the following midnight, Muslims gather for worship at a mosque at noon on gathering day which corresponds with Friday. Thus gathering day is regarded as the weekly day of rest. A few others have adopted the Saturday-Sunday weekend while making Friday a working day with a midday break to allow time off for worship. Inscriptions of the ancient South Arabian calendars reveal the use of a number of local calendars, at least some of these calendars followed the lunisolar system. For Central Arabia, especially Mecca, there is a lack of epigraphical evidence, both al-Biruni and al-Masudi suggest that the Ancient Arabs used the same month names as the Muslims, though they also record other month names used by the pre-Islamic Arabs. Nevertheless, the Islamic position equating Nisan with Dhū al-Ḥijja has prevailed, for a comparison between the Islamic and pre-Islamic months, see Islamic and Jahili months. The Islamic tradition is unanimous in stating that Arabs of Tihamah, Hejaz, the forbidden months were four months during which fighting is forbidden, listed as Rajab and the three months around the pilgrimage season, Dhu al-Qa‘dah, Dhu al-Hijjah, and Muharram
3.
Medina
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Medina, also transliterated as Madīnah, is a city in the Hejaz region of Saudi Arabia that is also the capital of the Al Madinah Region. The city contains al-Masjid an-Nabawi, which is the place of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It served as the base of Islam in its first century where the early Muslim community developed. Medina is home to the three oldest mosques, namely the Quba Mosque, al-Masjid an-Nabawi, and Masjid al-Qiblatayn, Muslims believe that the chronologically final surahs of the Quran were revealed to Muhammad in Medina, and are called Medinan surahs in contrast to the earlier Meccan surahs. Similar to Mecca, non-Muslims are forbidden from entering the core of Medina or the city centre by the national government. The Arabic word al-Madīnah simply means the city, before the advent of Islam, the city was known as Yathrib. The word Yathrib has been recorded in Surat al-Ahzab of the Quran, an alternative name is al-Madīnah an-Nabawīyah or al-Madīna-tu an-Nabī. As of 2010, the city of Medina has a population of 1,183,205, in addition to its Arab inhabitants, during the pre-Islamic era Yathrib was inhabited by Jewish tribes. Later the citys name was changed to al-Madīna-tu n-Nabī or al-Madīnatu l-Munawwarah, Medina is celebrated for containing al-Masjid an-Nabawi and also as the city which gave refuge to him and his followers, and so ranks as the second holiest city of Islam, after Mecca. Muhammad was buried in Medina, under the Green Dome, as were the first two Rashidun caliphs, Abu Bakr and Umar, who were buried next to him in what used to be Muhammads house. Medina is 210 miles north of Mecca and about 120 miles from the Red Sea coast and it is situated in the most fertile part of all the Hejaz territory, the streams of the vicinity tending to converge in this locality. An immense plain extends to the south, in every direction the view is bounded by hills and mountains. The historic city formed an oval, surrounded by a wall,30 to 40 feet high, dating from the 12th century CE. Of its four gates, the Bab-al-Salam, or Egyptian gate, was remarkable for its beauty, beyond the walls of the city, west and south were suburbs consisting of low houses, yards, gardens and plantations. These suburbs also had walls and gates, almost all of the historic city has been demolished in the Saudi era. The rebuilt city is centred on the vastly expanded al-Masjid an-Nabawi, the graves of Fatimah and Hasan, across from the mosque at Jannat al-Baqi, and Abu Bakr, and of Umar, the second caliph, are also here. The mosque dates back to the time of Muhammad, but has been twice reconstructed, because of the Saudi governments religious policy and concern that historic sites could become the focus for idolatry, much of Medinas Islamic physical heritage has been altered. Medinas importance as a religious site derives from the presence of al-Masjid an-Nabawi, the mosque was expanded by the Umayyad Caliph Al-Walid I
4.
Salamiyah
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Salamiyah is a city and district in western Syria, in the Hama Governorate. It is located 33 km southeast of Hama,45 km northeast of Homs, the city is an important center of the Shiite Nizari Ismaili and Taiyabi Ismaili Muslim sects and also the birthplace of poet Muhammad al-Maghut. The population of the city is 66,724, Salamiyah is an ancient city which was first known during Babylonian times in 3500 BC. It was the dwelled in by Sumerians at around 3000 BC, the Amorites around 2400 BC, the Aramaeans around 1500 BC, the city was destroyed for the first time by the Assyrians in the year 720 BC. According to Ismaili Muslims, their Imam, Ismail ibn Jafar died and was buried in the city after going into hiding during the eighth century. It was from Salamiyah, that the Ismaili Imams secretly guided the activities of their followers from North Africa to Persia, Azerbaijan, thereafter, a schism split the movement, provoked by Abdullahs claims on the imamate for himself and his descendants. Hamdan Qarmat and Abdan, who may have previously drifted slightly away from the doctrine propagated by the leadership, in 903, Salamiyah was destroyed for the third time by an invasion from the rebel Qarmatians under Yahya ibn Zikrawayh. The final major Ismaili immigration to Salamiyah occurred in 1919, Salamiyah is currently the largest population center of Ismaili Muslims in the Arab world. The remains of Prince Aly Khan, the father of the current Nizari Ismaili Imam Aga Khan IV, are buried in the city, the headquarters of the Ismaili Shia Higher Council of Syria are in the city, as are dozens of Jamaat Khana. Currently, a more than half of the citys residents are Ismaili. In 1934, Muhammad al-Maghut, the credit for being the father of free verse Arab poetry, was born in Salamiyah. In 1991, visitors from the Dawoodi Bohra sect of Ismaili Shia Islam in Yemen built the Mosque of Imam Ismail adjacent to the grave of the Ismaili Imam Ismail. The mosque was built by order of their leader the Dai al-Mutlaq Mohammed Burhanuddin according to an inscription on the mosques wall, although currently used for worship by Sunni Muslims, the mosque and mausoleum are visited in religious pilgrimages by Dawoodi Bohra worldwide. The towns citizens have participated in protests during the Syrian Civil War. The government has avoided using direct violence against the protesters. Since 2013, the town has been bombed by Jabhat al-Nusra. They told him there was a Hashimite merchant from Basra who was desirous of settling in the town. He readily accepted and pointed out to them a site along the street in the market
5.
Syria
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Syrias capital and largest city is Damascus. Religious groups include Sunnis, Christians, Alawites, Druze, Mandeans, Shiites, Salafis, Sunni Arabs make up the largest religious group in Syria. Its capital Damascus and largest city Aleppo are among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, in the Islamic era, Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and a number of military coups. In 1958, Syria entered a union with Egypt called the United Arab Republic. Syria was under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most constitutional protections for citizens, Bashar al-Assad has been president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was in office from 1970 to 2000. Mainstream modern academic opinion strongly favours the argument that the Greek word is related to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, in the past, others believed that it was derived from Siryon, the name that the Sidonians gave to Mount Hermon. However, the discovery of the inscription in 2000 seems to support the theory that the term Syria derives from Assyria. The area designated by the word has changed over time, since approximately 10,000 BC, Syria was one of centers of Neolithic culture where agriculture and cattle breeding appeared for the first time in the world. The following Neolithic period is represented by houses of Mureybet culture. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gyps, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations. Cities of Hamoukar and Emar played an important role during the late Neolithic, archaeologists have demonstrated that civilization in Syria was one of the most ancient on earth, perhaps preceded by only those of Mesopotamia. The earliest recorded indigenous civilisation in the region was the Kingdom of Ebla near present-day Idlib, gifts from Pharaohs, found during excavations, confirm Eblas contact with Egypt. One of the earliest written texts from Syria is an agreement between Vizier Ibrium of Ebla and an ambiguous kingdom called Abarsal c.2300 BC. The Northwest Semitic language of the Amorites is the earliest attested of the Canaanite languages, Mari reemerged during this period, and saw renewed prosperity until conquered by Hammurabi of Babylon. Ugarit also arose during this time, circa 1800 BC, close to modern Latakia, Ugaritic was a Semitic language loosely related to the Canaanite languages, and developed the Ugaritic alphabet. The Ugarites kingdom survived until its destruction at the hands of the marauding Indo-European Sea Peoples in the 12th century BC, Yamhad was described in the tablets of Mari as the mightiest state in the near east and as having more vassals than Hammurabi of Babylon. Yamhad imposed its authority over Alalakh, Qatna, the Hurrians states, the army of Yamhad campaigned as far away as Dēr on the border of Elam
6.
Muhammad at-Taqi (Ahmed ibn Abadullah)
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Muhammad at-Taqi is the ninth Ismāʿīlī Imam. As the Imam, he was the spiritual leader of the Ismāʿīlī community from his appointment until his death. The Nizari and Mustaali trace their Imamate lines from him and his descendants who founded the Fatimid Empire and he was succeeded by his son, Ḥusayn ibn Aḥmad /Raḍī ʿAbd Allāh. The 8th to 10th Ismāʿīlī Imams were hidden from the public, because of threats from the Abbasid caliphate, and were known by their nicknames
7.
Muhammad ibn Isma'il
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Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl was the son of Ismail ibn Jafar and an Ismāʿīlī Imam. The majority of Ismāʿīlī follow his descendants through his son Wafi Ahmad and his descedants further founded the Fatimid Empire, also called the Nizari and Mustaali. Muhammad was born on 12 th Rabi al-Awwal 128 AH/746 AD and his early childhood was spent under the protection of his grandfather Imam Jafar as-Sadiq in Medina. Throughout his time in Medina he wore a disguise to protect his identity, with only selected missionaries, the Abbasid caliph of the time, Harun al-Rashid, was investigating Muhammads whereabouts and had forces deployed throughout Medina in search for him. Due to Harun al-Rashids wife, Rabaida, and her loyalty to Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl, Muhammad was able to evade enemy forces and he remained in Kufa for an extended period of time and completed his Imamate, which lasted 45 years. He died on 11 th Shawwal 193 AH/27 July 809 AD in the region of Farghana and his father Imam Ismāʿīl died during the lifetime of Imam Jafar as-Sadiq. He was succeeded by his son Abdullah ibn Mohammad, who became the 8th Ismāʿīlī Imam, the 8th, 9th and 10th Ismāʿīlī Imams are believed to have gone into seclusion because of the constant threat of death from the Abbasid dynasty. MUHAMMAD BIN ISMAIL Maymūn’āl-Qaddāh Encyclopaedia Iranica, ʿABDALLĀH B
8.
Imamah (Ismaili doctrine)
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The doctrine of the Imamate in Ismailism differs from that of the Twelvers because the Ismailis had living Imams for centuries after the last Twelver Imam went into concealment. They followed Ismail ibn Jafar, elder brother of Musa al-Kadhim, as the rightful Imam after his father, Jafar al-Sadiq. The Ismailis believe that whether Imam Ismail did or did not die before Imam Jafar, according to some early Ismailis, the Seveners, as well as the Qarmatians, a splinter group, the number of imams was fixed, with seven Imams preordained by God. These groups considers Muhammad ibn Ismail, the foundation Imam of the Ismaili branch of Shia Islam, to be the Mahdi and to be preserved in hiding, the Twelver Shia also believe their final Imam is the Mahdi and in the Occultation. According to the early Seveners and Qarmatians, God sent seven great prophets, known as nātiq speakers, in order to disseminate, all of these great prophets has an assistant, the Sāmad Imam. After six silent imams, a nātiq was sent to reinvigorate Islam, after Adam and his son Seth, and after six “Nātıq” – “Sāmad” silsila, the silsila of “Nātıqs and Sāmads have been completed with. Ahmad al-Wafi Muhammad at-Taqi Radi Abdullah
9.
Arabic
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Arabic is a Central Semitic language that was first spoken in Iron Age northwestern Arabia and is now the lingua franca of the Arab world. Arabic is also the language of 1.7 billion Muslims. It is one of six languages of the United Nations. The modern written language is derived from the language of the Quran and it is widely taught in schools and universities, and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, government, and the media. The two formal varieties are grouped together as Literary Arabic, which is the language of 26 states. Modern Standard Arabic largely follows the standards of Quranic Arabic. Much of the new vocabulary is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the post-Quranic era, Arabic has influenced many languages around the globe throughout its history. During the Middle Ages, Literary Arabic was a vehicle of culture in Europe, especially in science, mathematics. As a result, many European languages have borrowed many words from it. Many words of Arabic origin are found in ancient languages like Latin. Balkan languages, including Greek, have acquired a significant number of Arabic words through contact with Ottoman Turkish. Arabic has also borrowed words from languages including Greek and Persian in medieval times. Arabic is a Central Semitic language, closely related to the Northwest Semitic languages, the Ancient South Arabian languages, the Semitic languages changed a great deal between Proto-Semitic and the establishment of the Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include, The conversion of the suffix-conjugated stative formation into a past tense, the conversion of the prefix-conjugated preterite-tense formation into a present tense. The elimination of other prefix-conjugated mood/aspect forms in favor of new moods formed by endings attached to the prefix-conjugation forms, the development of an internal passive. These features are evidence of descent from a hypothetical ancestor. In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside of the Ancient South Arabian family were spoken and it is also believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages were also spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hijaz, Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages, in Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested
10.
Fatimid Caliphate
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The Fatimid Caliphate was an Ismaili Shia Islamic caliphate that spanned a large area of North Africa, from the Red Sea in the east to the Atlantic Ocean in the west. The dynasty ruled across the Mediterranean coast of Africa and ultimately made Egypt the centre of the caliphate, at its height the caliphate included in addition to Egypt varying areas of the Maghreb, Sudan, Sicily, the Levant, and Hijaz. The Fatimids claimed descent from Fatima bint Muhammad, the daughter of Islamic prophet Muhammad, in 921 the Fatimids established the Tunisian city of Mahdia as their new capital. In 948 they shifted their capital to Al-Mansuriya, near Kairouan in Tunisia, in 969 they conquered Egypt and established Cairo as the capital of their caliphate, Egypt became the political, cultural, and religious centre of their empire. The ruling class belonged to the Ismaili branch of Shiism, as did the leaders of the dynasty, the existence of the caliphate marked the only time the descendants of Ali through Fatimah were united to any degree and the name Fatimid refers to Fatimah. The different term Fatimite is sometimes used to refer to the caliphates subjects, after the initial conquests, the caliphate often allowed a degree of religious tolerance towards non-Ismaili sects of Islam, as well as to Jews, Maltese Christians, and Egyptian Coptic Christians. The Fatimid caliphate was also distinguished by the role of Berbers in its initial establishment and in helping its development, especially on the military. During the late eleventh and twelfth centuries the Fatimid caliphate declined rapidly and he founded the Ayyubid dynasty and incorporated the Fatimid state into the Abbasid Caliphate. The Fatimid regime lasted until the twelfth century, though its leaders made little headway in persuading the Egyptian population. The Fatimid Caliphates religious ideology originated in an Ismaili Shia movement launched in the 9th century in Salamiyah, Syria by their eighth Imam and he claimed descent through Ismail, the seventh Ismaili Imam, from Fatimah and her husband ʻAlī ibn-Abī-Tālib, the first Shīʻa Imām. Thus his name was al-Fātimiyyūn Fatimid, the eighth to tenth Imams, remained hidden and worked for the movement against the periods times rulers. According to legend, Abdullah and his son were fulfilling a prophecy that the mahdi would come from Mesopotamia to Sijilmasa. They hid among the population of Sijilmasa, then an independent emirate, for four years under the countenance of the Midrar rulers, al-Mahdi was supported by dedicated Shiite Abu Abdullah al-Shii, and al-Shii started his preaching after he encountered a group of Muslim North African during his hajj. These men bragged about the country of the Kutama in western Ifriqiya, and the hostility of the Kutama towards, and their independence from. This triggered al-Shii to travel to the region, where he started to preach the Ismaili doctrine, the Berber peasants, who had been oppressed for decades by the corrupt Aghlabid rule, would prove themselves to be a perfect basis for sedition. Instantly, al-Shii began conquering cities in the region, first Mila, then Sétif, Kairouan, and eventually Raqqada, in 909 Al-Shii sent a large expedition force to rescue the Mahdi, conquering the Khariji state of Tahert on its way there. After gaining his freedom, Abdullah al-Mahdi Billah became the leader of the state and assumed the position of imam. The Fatimids existed during the Islamic Golden Age, the dynasty was founded in 909 by the eleventh Imam ʻAbdullāh al-Mahdī Billah
