What contributed to the Arabs conquering all other nations without being defeated?

What contributed to the Arabs conquering all other nations without being defeated?

What prompted Stillman to write about Jews in Arab Lands was his perception of how reason should be the sole arbiter that should be permitted to rule all the world affairs. He says that, if it were not for reason, people would not have accepted to follow apostles and prophets, and neither would they have accepted to believe ancestors and elders nor the truth that came down from them. Stillman further perceives that, if the dictates of reason were the bases used by people to adhere to religions inherited by their forefathers or even following the prophets, the rule of reason should then be granted all that pertains to that.

The intended audience that Stillman targeted was not only scholars but the general audience, and most especially rulers and leaders who used their powers and differences as excuses to oppress others and more so if they were a weaker group. The Arabs, for example, Most of their claims and actions, were that they followed the wills and instructions that their departed leader set for them like making and enforcing non-believers to become bearers of tributes as mentioned in Sura 9:29.  This context influenced the author to believe that, if reason was applied as the main criterion for traditions that were passed over from forefathers like in the Jewish culture, then it would not require people to accept and transmit the traditions to their forebears without testing their soundness. He also said that invoking ancestors and forefathers is no proof, and if it were, it would also act as proof even to the non-believing opponents, for example, the Christians. Stillman concludes this topic by saying that if the imitation of ancestors blindly was an indication of the correctness of what they transmitted on their authority, then that would necessitate the acceptance of Zoroastrian and Christian doctrines as well.

Using the authors view, below are the reasons or grounds why Arabs defeated their rivals and were never conquered; “Byzantium and Sasanian Iran were both in a state of military exhaustion” (Pp 22) this was after being weakened by several wars the last of which had dragged from 602 – 628 C.E.  They had greatly suffered from religious and political strife. Being at war for 26 years in a real-life situation brings about a lot of blood-shed, deterioration of the economy, living in fear and weaknesses. The same situation was applicable to both Byzantium and Sassanian Iran, so they were easily defeated by the strong Arabs at war. Again, the Eastern subjects near the Arabs had no great affection for their regimes from either side. This acted as a strength booster to the Arabs because no one would stand against them. The majority of Syrian and Egypt Monophysites considered themselves to be oppressed by the Greek Orthodox rule. The mind-set of being oppressed made them act like subjects and thus submitted to all the laws or instructions imposed on them without question, and the Arabs comfortably took advantage of this.

The Jews were undergoing specifically trying times due to persecution from Byzantines for many generations. In 614, the Persian enemy invaded and occupied Egypt, Syria, and Palestine for the following 15 years. During this period, the Jews openly sided with the Persian enemy, and were now considered a ‘fifth column,’ and this was a clear way of giving the enemy more power and advantage to attack. Siding with an enemy in wars means you surrender, or you accept defeat. This means that the enemy can use their power to do whatever they want to their enemy after accepting defeat. The Jewish emperor, Heraclius, decided to forego annual protection money payments to Beguoin of Sinai and Negev deserts who acted like irregular troops and operated as buffers against the Arabic Peninsula. The emperor, in an attempt to reunite his fraying kingdom, forcibly ordered some Jews to convert to Christians at around 633, and this gave Arabs a chance to create more enmity between them. The weakness of overall leaders of a nation like the case of the Jewish Emperor and his inability to even control his own national stand and stability is symbol enough that the whole nation is also weak. This is because leaders represent the state of a nation, and their actions determine the fate or success of the nations they lead.

The Nestorian Christians and Jews of the Persian Empire were probably tired of economic and political instability due to the persecutions they had suffered in the late sixth century, although they were not alienated from the state entirely. Instability of political and economic states of any country depicts the general weakness of that place. In some towns and cities, some Samaritans, Monophysite Christians, and Jews collaborated openly with the invaders, and this gave more power and strength in their mission for they struggled less because, all the secrets they wanted to unveil, they would get from those who collaborated with hem from the rival side. The messianic expectations acted as strong waves for both Christians and Jews, and this could have contributed highly to the Arabs winning their conquests, for many took the Arab invasion for a visitation from God due to the wickedness of the Edom kingdom. So the weakness of opponents to the extent of them supporting their enemies was a good sign that the enemy would always be on the win because the opponent has no willingness to fight back even a single moment, they even took themselves to be weak, and sometimes willingly allowed the enemy to do what they wanted on them.

This source expresses a problem of confusion in its context. It says that “…the Arabs simply imposed lump sum tribute everywhere they went and never distinguished between sources of tax revenues.” (Pp 25) But on the other side, it still says that”… terms imposed upon the conquered peoples varied greatly depending upon the conditions surrounding their surrender” (Pp 25) and that any rival that was defeated had to pay more taxes and give more other services as dictated by the Arabs. This is contradicting statements displayed on the same source. The author shows some bias towards the Muslim Arabs. He praises the strengths of the Arabs over the other nations, and he even shows how unacceptable and worthless the other religions were, such as Christianity and Zoroastrian doctrines, for this are some of the bases that the Arabs used to determine who is who, and what was to be offered by them to contribute to the comfort living of the Muslim Arabs. With this, he tries to show that Muslim religion that belonged to the Arabs was of much more importance than any other religion that was in existence.

The author is successful in putting his points across because he gives enough evidence to show how advantageous the Arabs were to conquer nations after nations, and how they even made non-Muslims like the Christians and Jews to convert to Islam to evade torture and especially in giving burdensome poll and land taxes. The Arabs were not very happy with the converts, so they still did not treat them as usual members, because of the more the converts, the less they would benefit from taxes and other services that the non- Muslims offered to them. The Arabs had all the abilities to defeat their enemies, for they were all stronger in almost all dimensions in bringing the enemy down. A conclusion can be made that, for an enemy to be defeated (Arabs in this case), the opponent must have the willingness and ability to fight back the enemy, so that it is no mere prediction and expectation that the enemy will definitely win in all cases.

References

Stillman, N. A. (1979). The jews of Arab lands. Jewish Publication Society. Retrieved from https://books.google.co.ke/books/about/The_Jews_of_Arab_Lands.html?id=bFN2ismyhEYC&redir_esc=y