Islam and Culture Encounter: The Case of India. Natashya White

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1 Islam and Culture Encounter: The Case of India Natashya White

2 How Islam Entered India/ Arab invasion Islam entered into India through Arab trade slowly. But the conquest of Sind was what lead the way to Islams spread officially. Sindh one of the provinces of the present day Pakistan and also one of the oldest Indus Valley civilisations, by the Arabs Muhammad bin Qasim led his army of 6,000 to India and were welcomed by Buddhist monks in Nerun on the banks of the Indus river. Without the resistance the cities along the Indus river fell under the control of Muslims. Some oppressed Buddhist monks seeked refuge under the protection of Muslims from Hindu governors By spreading Islam they attained political and religious unity in India. Even though much of the population approved of Muslim expansion the Raja of Sindh, Dahir, opposed the Muslims and sent his army to fight

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4 How Islam Entered India/ Arab invasion Continued... In 712 the armies fought and the Muslims were victorious. And three attempts of trying to take over Sindh they were finally victorious. Then after the victory, Muhammad bin Qasim claimed power over Sindh. Dahir, a Brahmin was the ruler of Punjab at that time. He was killed by Kassim and soon after that the Arabs lost control over Sindh in 779 AD.

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6 Turk Invasion In South Asia Islam found a permanent place in a long-established civilization this was because the Turk-speaking warrior groups from Central Asia who had invaded had just converted to Islam, this intern was the cause for Islam entering India o Because of this the Turks became the third major carrier of Islam, after the Arabs and Persians o They also had Initiated encounters between Islam and a Hindu based civilization The early encounters were very violent as the invaders mainly the Turks had smashed Buddhism and Hindu temples and carried off vast quantities of Indian treasure. Beginning around 1000 the conquest of the Turks gave rise to a series of Turkic and Muslim regimes that governed much of India. With the establishment of the Sultanate of Delhi in 1206 o This made Turkish rule more systematic, even though they had small numbers and internal conflicts which led to very little penetrations of Indian Society

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8 After Turk Rule In the centuries that followed many large Muslim communities emerged in India, mainly in the regions of India that weren t as integrated into the Hindu culture Disillusioned Buddhists as well as low-caste Hindu and the untouchables found Islam most attractive then Buddhism and Hinduism. People just beginning to make the transition into settled agriculture. Others who converted to Islam avoided paying the tax that was imposed on the non-muslims Sufis were very important when facilitating conversion because India always had Valued God filled men who were detached from worldly affairs Sufi missionaries, willing to accommodate local gods and religious festivals, helped to develop a popular Islam that was not always so sharply distinguished from Hinduism. Unlike the earlier experience of Islam in the Middle East, North Africa, and Persia, where Islam became the dominant religion fast in India they could only get 20 to about 25% of the total population.

9 After Turk Rule Continued... This was because the Muslim communities were mainly concentrated in the Punjab and Sind regions of Northwestern India and in Bengal to the East The core regions of Hindu culture in the northern Indian plain weren t seriously challenged by the Islamic faith even though there were centuries of Muslim rule. One reason was because of the sharpness of the cultural divide between the Islamic faith and Islamic faith when the Sufi missionaries around to combine the two. Islam was the most radically monotheistic the world's religions, forbidding any representation of Allah, while as Hinduism was among the most productively polytheistic, generating endless stratus and images of the divine in many different forms. Another reason was the Muslims notion of equality for all believers which strongly contrasted with the hierarchical assumptions of the caste system.

10 After Turk Rule Continued The final reason was the sexual modestly of the Muslims deeply offended the open eroticism of some Hindu religious art. These differences made may have had a stop in the spread of Islam, but it also prevented Islam from being absorbed into the tolerant and inclusive embrace of Hinduism (which it was known to have done because of the other religious ideas, practices, and communities.) But with the firm monotheistic belief and the idea of unique revelation, it basically set a boundary from Hinduism spreading.

11 Bibliography aboutworldlanguages.com/awl-images/sindhi/images/sindhimap.jpg.