Muslim Spain: Brief Reflections

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In the Name of Allah (God), the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful

(a selected article from Alianza Islámica™ Magazine)

Muslim Spain: Brief Reflections

by Muhammad Imran and Askia El-Amin

The year was 710 C.E. (Christian Era), Musa ibn Nusair was the Muslim governor of North Africa. Count Julian, the Byzantine governor of Ceuta, was impressed by Musa's efficient and peaceful governor ship. He invited Musa's general, Tariq ibn Ziyad to invade Spain and deliver its people from the cruel and corrupt King Roderick. In 711 C.E., Tariq landed on the Iberian peninsula near the mountain which stills bears his name, Jabal al-Tariq or Tariq's Mountain (of which the modern name, Gibraltar, is a corruption). This was the beginning of Muslim Spain.

For nearly eight hundred years (i.e. 712 to 1492 C.E.) Muslims ruled Spain, longer than anyone or any faith. Spain became a great nation, in which Islamic culture was to reach one of its greatest moments. Hate and ignorance were turned into love and knowledge. They made Spain their home and everyone was treated fairly. Many people embraced Islam. Christian and Jews were allowed to exist in peace. They could have easily converted the people by force, but this never took place.

"Let there be no compulsion in religion. Truth stands out clear from error. Whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah hearth and knoweth all things." (The Qur'an 2:256)

The famous University of Granada, founded by Muslims in the early 15th century, and the following inscription over its entrance: "The world is supported by four pillars: the wisdom of the learned, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous, and the valor of the brave." These great virtues are missing from modern Spain. This has been the cause today of Spain's lost status in the world.

The Muslims found Spain a jungle and turned it into a "Garden of Roses." Victor Robinson (The Story of Medicine, p. 104) remarks: "Europe was darken at sunset, Cordoba shone with public lamps; Europe was dirty, Cordoba built a thousand baths; Europe was covered with vermin, Cordoba changed its undergarments daily; Europe lay in mud, Cordoba streets were paved; Europe's palaces had smoke-holes in the ceiling, Cordoba's arabesques were exquisite; Europe's nobility could not sign its name, Cordoba's children went to school; Europe's monks could not read the baptismal service, Cordoba's teachers created a library of Alexandrian dimensions."

In Muslim Spain, according to a distinguished Dutch scholar Dozy, "nearly everyone could read and write," today has one of the lowest reading and writing percentages in Europe. Though the country enjoys political stability, it is only at the cost of personal liberty. In spite of U.S. aid the economic situation has changed little; thousands of Spaniards are going over to France, Germany, and Switzerland to work.

Through careful research of Muslim Spain, writer T.B. Irving (Al-Hajj Ta'lim Ali) acknowledges the tremendous debt of obligation that the modern civilization owes to Islam: "Arab Spain was the epitome of refinement and courtesy. While the rest of Europe lived in stables and slept on straw, the Andalusian had all the delicious luxuries known to Syria, Persia, and Byzantine: patios and fountains; balconies carved in wood and stone; arabesques traces on stucco and metal; frail columns and ornate chandeliers; furniture made of precious mother-of-pearl, ivory, gold, silver, lapis lazulite or rock crystal; exquisite porcelains and priceless mosaics; jewelry and filigree; marble baths with hot and cold running water; libraries and schools..... It was from the Spanish Arabs and their pupils like Roger Bacon, Michael Scott, William Ockham, and Peter Abelard, that Europe received the spirit which has enabled man to dominate the world and utilize it to his own ends." (Falcon of Spain, pp. 132 & 144)

Islam is a symbol of peace and harmony, as well as tolerance. Muslim rule over Spain is considered to be one of the greatest eras in the history of the world. For nearly eight centuries, under her Muslim rulers, Spain set an example to all Europe of a civilized an enlightened state. Since the beginning of time, God provided Spain, as well as other parts of the world, with rich fertile land. The Muslims made it productive a hundred fold, bring new industries and engineering skills that even today are apart of our life. Art, literature, and science prospered as they then prospered nowhere else in Europe. Many students came from England, France, and Germany to learn from Muslim teachers. Architecture, art, astronomy, chemistry, geography, history, music, natural sciences, philosophy, physics, political sciences, and sociology were mastered in Spain. In addition to the material progress made under the Muslims, Islam gave to Spain new spiritual values, new cultural ideas, and a new philosophy of life.

With the fall of Granada in 1492 (This is the same year, Christopher Columbus accidentally found the Americas, with help from some of the Moors' and African's navigation expertise), the cross replaced the crescent on its minarets. King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella failed to follow the terms of their peace treaty which were to allow Muslims freedom to practice their faith. Within seven years, under the leadership of the Queen's confessor, they went back on their word. A vigorous campaign of forced conversion of Muslims to the Christian faith began. This was done by terror and persecution. In Granada, as well as other places, the Arabic-Islamic books were burned. Many great works of science and literature have been lost forever! The Inquisition was then instituted and kept busy. It was estimated that about 3 million Muslims were executed and a far greater number expelled!

The new government in Spain believed that the Muslim problem was now solved. But as Lane-Poole (The Moors in Spain, p. 280) remarked: "The Moors (the name applied to the Muslims of Spain) were banished; for a while Christian Spain shone, like the moon, with borrowed light; then came the eclipse, and in that darkness Spain has groveled ever since. The true memorial of the Moors is seen in desolate tracts of utter bareness, where once Muslims grew luxuriant vines and olives and yellow ears of corn; in a stupid, ignorant population were once wait and learning flourished in the general stagnation and gradation of a people which has hopelessly fallen in the scale of the nations, and has deserved its humiliation."

Lane-Poole again remarks: "The misguided Spaniards knew not what they were doing. The exile of Moors delighted then; nothing more picturesque and romantic had occurred for some time. They did not understand that they had killed their golden goose. For centuries Spain had been the center of civilization. The seat of arts and sciences of learning, ad every form of refined enlightenment. No other country in Europe had so far approached the cultivated dominion of the Moors. Whatsoever makes a kingdom great and prosperous, whatever tends to refinement and civilization, was found in Muslim Spain."

"In 1492 C.E. the last bulwark (stronghold) of the Moors gave away before the crusade to Ferdinand and Isabella, and with Granada fell all Spain's greatness..... Then followed the abomination of desolation, the rule of the Inquisition, and blankness of darkness in which Spain plunged ever since. In the land where science was once supreme, the Spanish doctors became noted for nothing but their ignorance and incapacity, and the discoveries of Newton and Harkew were condemned as pernicious to faith. Where once seventy public libraries had fed the minds of scholars, and half a million books had been gathered together at Cordoba for the benefit of the world, such indifference to learning afterwards prevailed that the new capital, Madrid, possessed no public library in the eighteenth century..... The arts and industries of Toledo and Almeria faded into insignificance; the very baths, public building of equal ornament and use, were destroyed because, cleanliness savored too strongly of ranks infidelity. The land deprived of the skillful irrigation of Moors, grew impoverished and neglected; the richest and most fertile valleys languished and were deserted; most of the populous cities which had filled every district of Andalusia fell into ruinous decay; beggars, friars, and bandits took the place of scholars, merchants, and knights. So low fell Spain when she had driven away the Moors. Such is the melancholy contrast offered by her history." (The Moors in Spain, pp. 279, 280, & Preface)

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Part II


Islam has survived today in many hostile non Muslim governments such as Russia and China (100 million plus) and shall also survive, God willing, in Spain. Today there are over 12,000 Spaniard Muslims, who once, did not openly declare their faith for fear of persecution. But this is changing, Spanish people are quite thirsty for truth. Islam is based on truth that comes only from God (The Most High). Open Muslim communities of Spaniards are now growing rapidly in such cities as Cordoba, Granada, Madrid, and Seville. The Muslim in Spain today are working hard, translating many Arabic Islamic books into Spanish.

Muhammad Imran relates an account given by Professor Nayyer Wasti, a leading Hakim (physician) from Pakistan, who visited Spain in 1968 C.E. said: "The land of Andalusia provided me new angles for thought and consideration and bestowed fresh hopes and inspirations. I had the opportunity of meeting all sorts of people there. Their innocent questioning and a buried passion stirred me. One person asked me: "Do you know about Tariq?" Whatever I knew, I told him. But he insisted that I should repeat this story time and again and in the meantime he gathered together many eager listeners. When we reached the hotel we had with us a large gathering of interested people. There too they listened about Tariq. I asked one of them as to why they were so much interested in our history? Thereupon he heartily replied" The history is also ours. Every inch of this land bears your (Muslim's) indelible marks. Our language, our culture. libraries, our houses, and in short, every aspect of our life refreshed your memory. What a nice people your were!"

"When he uttered these words, tears started rolling down his eyes and in the heart of every man present in the gathering there was an unknown seething struggle. I felt in the heart of my hearts that if suitable arrangements were made for the preaching of Islam, this land can again become the center and citadel of Islamic civilization within a few decades..... Islam from its very beginnings had spread in spite of stiff opposition and mounting difficulties."

Islam attracts the attention of every serious thinker, not only because it a civilized religion and the greatest spiritual force in the modern world, but also because it offers all the solutions to the problems which confront mankind in today's modern world. This fact was recognized by George Bernard Shaw who said: "I have always held the religion of Muhammad (Islam) in high estimation because of its wonderful vitality. It is the only religion which appears to me to possess that assimilating capacity of the changing phases of existence which can make it self appeal to every age. I have studied him, the wonderful man, and in opinion far from being the anti-Christ he must be called the saviour of humanity. I believe that if a man like him was to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness. I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad (Islam) that it would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to the Europe of today." (The Genuine Islam, Singapore, 1936, Vol. I, No. 8)

A scholar once said: "Islam is the religion of the universe. Islam is the destiny of mankind. That destiny must come to fulfillment sooner or later."

"He (Allah) it is Who hat sent His messenger (Prophet Muhammad) with the guidance and the Religion of Truth, that He may cause it to prevail over all religion, however much the idolaters may be averse." (The Qur'an 9:33)

In closing, Marquerite Brown (Magnificent Muslims, The Story of Spain's Arab Centuries, pp. 96 & 97) wrote: "Writing a perfectly fair history, like any other aspect of perfection, is an unattainable goal. History is written by humans whose prejudices, no matter how good their intent, will show. Let us consider for a moment the contrast between the images we have of Muslims with those of Vikings. Both were aggressive invaders who occupied large areas of Europe and the Mediterranean shores at about the same period. The Vikings, pagan and primitive, left only destruction and death in their wake; yet they are pictured in our history books as clean, brave, adventurous explorers - a bit uncouth perhaps but basically good."

"Muslims, on the other hand, are portrayed as bloodthirsty barbarians who surged across continents loping off heads of unbelievers. In fact, as we have noted, Muslims respect for those of other faiths is at least equal to that of the other two great religions of the west. They have always offered their subject peoples the opportunity to embrace Islam; the only penalty for refusal was a higher tax, and many Christians and Jews who did refuse still rose to high positions in Muslim governments..... One can not but wonder how such mistaken notions have persisted even in our supposedly enlightened age. Could it have been that Western historians, most of them Christian, could except illiterate Vikings, especially after they abandoned their gods of fire and water for the Christian way of life, but felt threatened by Islam which shared their faith in the same God and which developed a fabulous civilization throughout so much to the World?"

Spain was modern when the Muslims ruled her, and became medieval only when they had forgotten to practice the true teachings of Islam, and lost it to the barbaric West. The real losers were the people of Spain.



To learn more about Muslim Spain, read the following books (available in English): Blood on the Cross, Islam in Spain in the Light of Christen Persecution through the Ages by Ahmad Thomson (1989, TaHa Publishers Ltd., London, United Kingdom); Falcon of Spain by T.B. Irving (1962, Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, Lahore, Pakistan); Golden Age of the Moor edited by Ivan Van Sertima (1992, Journal of African Civilizations Ltd., Inc., New Brunswick, NJ); Magnificent Muslims, The Story of Spain's Arab Centuries by Marguerite Brown (1981, New World Press, New York, NY); Moorish Spain by Enrique Sordo (1963, Crown Publishers, New York, NY) Muslim Contributions to Civilization by Haidar Bammate (1962, Crescent Publications, Takoma Park, MD); Muslim Spain, Its History and Culture by Anwar G. Chejne (1974, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN); Position and Prospects of Islam in Latin America by Muhammad Imram (1979, Malik Sirajuddin & Sons, Lahore, Pakistan); Some Aspects of the Socio-Economic and Cultural History of Muslim Spain by S.M. Imamuddin (1965, E.J. Brill, Leiden, ); The Arabs In Spanish Scholarship by James T. Monroe (1970, E.J. Brill, Leiden, ); The Moorish Spain by S.S. Ahmad (1972, Farooq Kitab Ghar Publishers, Karachi, Pakistan); and The Story of the Moors in Spain by Stanley Lane-Poole (1887/reprint 1990, Black Classic Press, Baltimore, MD). For books available in Spanish, see our books.

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[Islamic Revival]

Stanley Lane-Poole in ‘The Moors in Spain’: Introduction.
"For nearly eight centuries, under the Mohamedan rule, Spain set all Europe a shining example of a civilized and enlightened state. Her fertile provinces rendered doubly prolific, by the industrious engineering skill of the conquerors bore fruit a hundredfold, cities innumerable sprang up in the rich valleys in the Guadalquivir and the Guadiana whose names, and names only commemorate the vanished glories of their past.

"...To Cordoba belong all the beauty and ornaments that delight the eye or dazzle the sight. Her long line of Sultans form her crown of glory; her necklace is strung with the pearls which her poets have gathered from the ocean of language; her dress is of the banners of learning, well-knit together by her men of science; and the masters of every art and industry are the hem of her garments.
"Art, literature and science prospered as they then prospered nowhere else in Europe...

"Mathematics, astronomy, botany, history, philosophy and jurisprudence were to be mastered in Spain, and Spain alone. Whatever makes a kingdom great and prosperous, whatever tends to refinement and civilization, was found in Muslim Spain...
"With Granada fell all Spain's greatness. For a brief while, indeed, the reflection of the Moorish splendour cast a borrowed light upon the history of the land which it had once warmed with its sunny radiance. The great epoch of Isabella, Charles V and Philip II, of Columbus, Cortes and Pizarro, shed a last halo about the dying monuments of a mighty state. When followed the abomination of dissolution, the rule of inquisition and the blackness of darkness in which Spain has been plunged ever since.

"In the land where science was once supreme, the Spanish doctors became noted for nothing but their ignorance and incapacity. The arts of Toledo and Almeria faded into insignificance.

"The land deprived of skillful irrigation of the Moors, grew improvished and neglected, the richest and most fertile valleys languished and were deserted, and most of the populous cities which had filled every district in Andalusia, fell into ruinous decay; and beggars, friars, and bandits took the place of scholars, merchants and knights. So low fell Spain when she had driven away the Moors. Such is the melancholy contrast offered by her history."

Conde as Quoted in Prescott, ‘Philip II of Spain,’ Vol. III.
"And so vanquished for ever from the Spanish territory this brave, intelligent and enlightened people, who with their resolution and labour inspired life into the land, which the vain pride of the Goths condemned to sterility, and endowed it with prosperity and abundance and with innumerable canals, this people whose admirable courage was likewise, in happiness and adversity, a strong rampart to the throne of the Caliphs, whose genius, progress and study raised in its cities an internal edifice of light which sent its rays into Europe and inspired it with the passion of study, and whose magnanimous spirit tinted all its acts with an unrivalled colour of grandeur and nobility, and endowed it in the eyes of posterity with a sort of extraordinary greatness and charming colour of heroism which invokes the magical ages of Homer and which presents them to us in the garb of Greek half-gods.

"The Arabs suddenly appeared in Spain like a star which crosses through the air with its light, spreads its flames on the Horizon and then vanishes rapidly into naught. They appeared in Spain to fill her suddenly with their activity and the fruit of their genius, and endowed her with a glorious glamour which enveloped her from the Pyrenees to Gibraltar and from the oceans to the Barcelona. But a burning love for liberty and independance, a fickle character disposed to frivolty and merriness, neglect of old virtues, an unfortunate disposition of revolution, provoked always by an inflamed imagination, violent passions and ambitions, a spirit to dominate, and other factors of decay, worked in the course of time, to demolish this grand edifice raised by men like Tariq, 'Abdul Rahman al-Nasir, Muhammad ibn al-Ahmer, and led the Arabs to internal dissention, which sapped their power and pushed them to the abyss of naught.
"Millions of Moors quitted Spain carrying their property and arts - the patrimony of a state. What have the Spaniards created in their place? We could say nothing, but an eternal sorrow fills this land in which the gayest natures breathed before. Indeed there are some ruined monuments which still look upon these gloomy districts, but a real cry resounds from the depths of these monuments and ruins: honour and glory to the conquered Moor and decay and misery to the victorious Spaniard!"

Martin Hume in 'Spanish People'
"The Sultan Abd-er-Rahman was one of the Heaven-sent rulers of men. Prompt yet cautious in council and in war, unscrupulous, overbearing and proud, he was as ready to wreak terrible vengeance, as he was politic to forgive when it suited him. Berber and Yamanite alike acknowledged that at last they had found their master....He ruled until his death, in 788, with the tempered severity, wisdom, and justice which made his domain the best organized in Europe, and his capital the most splendid in the world."

S.P. Scott in 'The History of the Moorish Empire in Europe.'
"Yet there were knowledge and learning everywhere except in Catholic Europe. At a time when even kings could not read or write, a Moorish king had a private library of six hundred thousand books. At a time when ninety-nine percent of the Christian people were wholly illiterate, the Moorish city of Cordova had eight hundred public schools, and there was not a village within the limits of the empire where the blessings of education could not be enjoyed by the children of the most indigent peasant, ...and it was difficult to encounter even a Moorish peasant who could not read and write."

Dozy in 'The Moslems in Spain.'
“Cruel and fanatical, the Leonese rarely gave quarter; when they captured a town they usually put all the inhabitants to the sword. Tolerance such as that accorded by the Muslims to the Christians could not be expected of them.”

H. Kamen, 'The Spanish Inquisition.'
"As a result of his (Cardinal Ximenes' coercive) endeavours, it is reported that on l8th December 1499 about three thousand Moors were baptized by him and a leading mosque in Granada was converted into a church. 'Converts' were encouraged to surrender their Islamic books, several thousands of which were destroyed by Ximenes in a public bonfire. A few rare books on medicine were kept aside for the University of Alcala...(Ximenes) claimed...the Moors had forfeited all their rights under the terms of capitulation (of Granada). They should therefore be given the choice between baptism and expulsion...At Andarax the principal mosque, in which the women and children had taken refuge, was blown up with gun-powder...all books in Arabic, especially the Qur'an, were collected to be burnt...Cardinal Ximenes:...was reported during his conversion campaign among the Granada Moors in 1500 to have burnt in the public square of Vivarrambla over 1,005,000 volumes including unique works of Moorish culture."

H.C. Lea, 'The Moriscos of Spain.'
"...that cemeteries could be established near the churches changed from mosques, but old Christians were not to be debarred from burial there if they wished....it continued until 1591 when it was ordered that they should be buried inside of the churches, which was so abhorrent to them that they vainly offered more than thirty thousand ducats if king or pope would allow them to be interred elsewhere, even though in dunghills.
"... tailors were not to make garments nor silver-smiths jewels after their (Moorish) fashion; their baths were prohibited; all births were to be watched by Christian midwives to see that no Moorish rites were performed; disarmament was to be enforced by a rigid inspection of licences; their doors were to be kept open on feast-days, Fridays, Saturdays, and during weddings, to see that Moorish rites were abandoned and Christian ones observed...no Moorish names were to be used and they were not to keep 'gacis' or unbaptised Moors either free or as slaves."