The Muslims began their spread into the northwest when they captured Syria and Palestine in the 638. Which split the Byzantine Empire in two. After the Muslim moved towards Egypt. From there they advanced across northern Africa and up towards Spain, gaining many converts along the way. Eventually the Islamic empire was weakened from civil war and political issues.
Along with West Africa, other countries relied on trade for their wealth. As Islam entered West Africa, several aspects began to change. Their trade route expanded to Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. Due to Muslim merchants bringing Islamic practices into West Africa, the local religions combined with Islam. For example, people continued to wear charms as protection (a practice of Muslims), but began to visit mosques daily.
Trade in the Indian Ocean was affected by different changes of many political powers and it was the main factor of spreading of religion, and linking cultures. Then Indian Ocean trade route kept transporting the same goods, but the way these goods were transported from place to place changed as technology advanced. The trade route in the Indian Ocean stayed the same by trading the same goods as they did in the beginning, such as ivory, wood and exotic animals from India from Africa in early trade and also traded spices with India such as: pepper, cinnamon, and ginger. Also, this route stayed the same culturally by having the same continuous spread of religious ideas like Muslim merchants who held the religion together by sharing a common belief and language. The political aspect of The Indian Ocean trade route stayed the same by evolving and successfully growing under the rule of strong empires.
Although these improvements came with the spread of Islam, most of African culture still remained, such as the Swahili language, customs, and the slavery of women. From 1000 C.E to 1750 C.E, the political unity of Western Africa increased tremendously. Islam provided a universalistic
Some political disturbances arose as well. Through all this change, however, some things in economy, religion, and politics had continuity. During the 9th century CE the Ghana Empire, a western Sub-Saharan Empire founded in the fourth century, had a change in belief system and accepted Islam as its religion or belief system. This caused a mass of Muslim-Arab merchants to migrate to and trade their. The abundance of this people led to an increase in trade causing mining in gold to increase drastically.
Previously, Africa although not fully isolated from the centers of other civilizations, remained secluded from communication with them, slowing the indigenous religions to be the main belief system. West Africa’s first major change begun around 1000 CE when followers of the prophet Muhammad came across Africa bringing its religion, Islam, and social changes. Due to its connection with the Islamic world Africa started to connect with other foreign territories through its new trading and long distance commerce system, exchanging new ideas and products. Furthermore, this new connection with the outside world brought occupants to the area, resulting in a population about 30 to 60 million by 1500 CE. These new economic effects deteriorated the native’s beliefs role as the sole influence of its society, sharing that position with Islam.
Mecca is located in what is now present day Saudi Arabia, about half way down the Western side of the Arabian Peninsula. The Kaaba, the black Islamic stone shrine established by Abraham and Ishmael, is located there. Mecca is deeply rooted in tradition, and the stones and Kaaba were erected or associated with Holy Ground, where individuals had a dramatic experience with God or Allah as he is called in Islam. During the time of Mohammed, Mecca had became a easy stopping place for the caravans and merchants along the spice trade which brought new wealth, foreign ideals and social values to Mecca. Being the stopping point brought to Mecca a host of undesirables such as; merchants, prostitutes swindlers and gamblers, whose social values would clash with that of the Arab Bedouin, who clung to traditional ideologies (Grand Canyon University, 2010, p. 1-2, para.
Arabs that followed caravans became familiar with Sanasid Byzantine Empire and many adopted one form or another of Christianity. A Nomadic kinship called Quraysh settled in Mecca and took control of trade. The city grew rapidly to prosperity (partly because it was far away from any other major trade cities to be attacked). The shrine called Ka’ba is regarded by the Jew and Christians as: Abraham as the builder of the Ka’ba of that God asked and right outside the location him to sacrifice his son, but it was not Isaac but Ishmael. Muhammad born in 570, grew up an orphan, married Khadijuh.
This gave them a very strategic edge against those they were conquering, allowing warfare to be quite simple. The use of gun powder was frequent between both civilizations, but not known in others. So, when the Spaniards showed up in the America’s and the Ottomans in Turkey with cannons or guns, there wasn’t much of a battle that could be put up against the two. The militaries of both of these civilizations were also very elite, the Janissaries for the Ottomans and the conquistadors for the Spanish. The Janissaries were a group of Christian boys converted to Islam that were taken from their homes at a very young age, also known as the devshirme system.
The Reasons Of Why Islam Spread So Quickly The main reasons of Islam spread so quickly in the 7th and 8th century are because of the Muslims were unified together at the time, and some nearby empires, such as Byzantine became weaker as a result of war and diseases, and also Muslims showed religious tolerance to the non-Muslim people. After Muhammad died in 632, Abu Bakr became the first caliph means the rightly guided. For the next two years, he applied the jihad in order to pacify the revolt in the Islam world. However, during the process of jihad, Abu Bakr and the next three elected caliphs -Umar, Uthman, and Ali expanded the territory to the east to the Indus River and to the west through North Africa to Spain. That’s how Islam began to spread.