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Authors: Michael Axworthy
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killed at Merv in 651—not by the invaders but by one of his own subjects, like Darius III). The Arabs established their dominion over the Iranian plateau (though towns like Qom and Kashan fought hard before surrendering, 5 and resistance in the Caspian provinces of Tabarestan continued for many years). Khorasan was conquered by 654 and despite resistance in the outlying territories along the southern coast of the Caspian and in the north-east these were all taken and Balkh captured by 707.
The conquest was not followed, for the most part, by mass murder, forced conversion or what today we would call ethnic cleansing. Instead the new Arab masters were content, as a matter of policy, simply to replace the ruling elites of the territories they had conquered. The Arab troops set up armed camps in the new lands, on the fringe of existing cities or in the form of new settlements, often on the margin between cultivated land and uncultivated territory that could be used to graze animals. The Arabs generally allowed existing proprietors, peasants and merchants to go about their business as normal, expropriating only state land, the estates of the Zoroastrian temples, and those of members of the old elites who had fled or had died in the fighting.
Religious policy was marked by the same tolerance and restraint, once the conquest was over. Mohammad had specified tolerance for Christians and Jews (‘people of the Book’) on condition that they paid tribute, which became a special tax for non-Muslims (the jizya ). But this left Iranian Zoroastrians in a grey area, 6 and many fire temples were destroyed and priests killed before it became normal for Zoroastrians to be treated with similar tolerance, subject to the jizya. The example of the new rulers, and the settlement of Arab soldiers into the new territories began a slow process of Islamisation, made the easier by the similarity of many of the precepts of Islam to the familiar features of Mazdaism—righteous thought and action, judgement, heaven and hell, and so on. There was a religious ferment through this period, within which many concepts and formulae might be held in common across different sects. Consider the following:
… at whatever moment he dies eighty maiden angels will come to meet him with flowers… and a golden bedstead, and they will speak to him thus: do not fear etc.… And his fruitful work, in the form of a wondrous divine princess, a virgin, will come before him, immortal,… and she herself will guide him to heaven . 7
This remarkable passage links the idea of the houris of paradise, familiar from the Qoranic context, with the idea of the Mazdaean daena leading the soul to heaven, which we encountered in Chapter 1 . But this text is a Manichaean one, in the Iranian Sogdian language, from Central Asia. Bausani has given a series of significant parallels between passages in the Zoroastrian scriptures and passages in the Qor’an. 8 Despite the firm, clear, guiding principle of the Mohammadan revelation, other earlier ideas continued to bubble away, sometimes to appear again later in some of the more diverse and eclectic Islamic sects.
The propertied and élite classes of Iran had an interest in converting to Islam, in order to avoid the jizya. They and more modest folk converted, and often attached themselves to Arab clans or families as mawali (clients), sometimes taking Arabic names. But most inhabitants of Iran remained non-Muslim for several centuries. The restraint of the conquerors is probably another important explanation for the success of the conquest: many of the subjects of the new empire may have been less heavily taxed than previously, and ordinary Iranians probably benefited from the replacement of a strongly hierarchical aristocratic and priestly system by the more egalitarian Islamic arrangements, with their emphasis on the duty of ordinary Muslims to the poor. But as in other epochs, the victors wrote the history; if more contemporary
The conquest was not followed, for the most part, by mass murder, forced conversion or what today we would call ethnic cleansing. Instead the new Arab masters were content, as a matter of policy, simply to replace the ruling elites of the territories they had conquered. The Arab troops set up armed camps in the new lands, on the fringe of existing cities or in the form of new settlements, often on the margin between cultivated land and uncultivated territory that could be used to graze animals. The Arabs generally allowed existing proprietors, peasants and merchants to go about their business as normal, expropriating only state land, the estates of the Zoroastrian temples, and those of members of the old elites who had fled or had died in the fighting.
Religious policy was marked by the same tolerance and restraint, once the conquest was over. Mohammad had specified tolerance for Christians and Jews (‘people of the Book’) on condition that they paid tribute, which became a special tax for non-Muslims (the jizya ). But this left Iranian Zoroastrians in a grey area, 6 and many fire temples were destroyed and priests killed before it became normal for Zoroastrians to be treated with similar tolerance, subject to the jizya. The example of the new rulers, and the settlement of Arab soldiers into the new territories began a slow process of Islamisation, made the easier by the similarity of many of the precepts of Islam to the familiar features of Mazdaism—righteous thought and action, judgement, heaven and hell, and so on. There was a religious ferment through this period, within which many concepts and formulae might be held in common across different sects. Consider the following:
… at whatever moment he dies eighty maiden angels will come to meet him with flowers… and a golden bedstead, and they will speak to him thus: do not fear etc.… And his fruitful work, in the form of a wondrous divine princess, a virgin, will come before him, immortal,… and she herself will guide him to heaven . 7
This remarkable passage links the idea of the houris of paradise, familiar from the Qoranic context, with the idea of the Mazdaean daena leading the soul to heaven, which we encountered in Chapter 1 . But this text is a Manichaean one, in the Iranian Sogdian language, from Central Asia. Bausani has given a series of significant parallels between passages in the Zoroastrian scriptures and passages in the Qor’an. 8 Despite the firm, clear, guiding principle of the Mohammadan revelation, other earlier ideas continued to bubble away, sometimes to appear again later in some of the more diverse and eclectic Islamic sects.
The propertied and élite classes of Iran had an interest in converting to Islam, in order to avoid the jizya. They and more modest folk converted, and often attached themselves to Arab clans or families as mawali (clients), sometimes taking Arabic names. But most inhabitants of Iran remained non-Muslim for several centuries. The restraint of the conquerors is probably another important explanation for the success of the conquest: many of the subjects of the new empire may have been less heavily taxed than previously, and ordinary Iranians probably benefited from the replacement of a strongly hierarchical aristocratic and priestly system by the more egalitarian Islamic arrangements, with their emphasis on the duty of ordinary Muslims to the poor. But as in other epochs, the victors wrote the history; if more contemporary
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