Compare the Muslim Societies That Emerged in Mali and India

Question

Examlex · Accepted Answer

The Answer is The spread of Islam dramatically changed sub-Saharan Africa's relationship to the rest of the world. Once the camel bridged the Sahara, a booming trade emerged that spawned new political organizations. The Empire of Mali extended previously existing Mande trade routes that connected West Africa with the Atlantic and Mediterranean. No longer was Africa an isolated periphery. In fact, when Mali's King Mansa Musa went on the hajj to Mecca, his visit was a sensation because of his impressive wealth and spectacular display. Mali boasted two of West Africa's largest cities: Jenne and Timbuktu. The latter became a center of Muslim intellectual life in West Africa. Scholars gathered to debate the tenets of Islam and to ensure that the faithful, even when distant from the Muslim heartland, practiced their religions with no taint of pagan observances. These clerics acquired Islamic treatises from all over the world to add to their personal libraries. In India, Turkish warlords eventually conquered the rajas of India. There, they established sultanates that integrated elements of indigenous cultures with their own. They recruited local artisans to build mosques and palaces. The Turkish sultans did not force their subjects to convert and embraced the religious tolerance that was the hallmark of the Islamic empire. The newcomers practiced their faith while the locals continued to practice their own. But some customs began to merge. The local population embraced some elements of Turkish culture, adopting Central Asian-style clothing and some manufacturing and artistic techniques. The sultanates allowed the locals to worship as they saw fit and to administer their own communal law. The rulers did collect the jizya. Thus, these two border communities embraced different relationships between the state and religion. In part, this was due to different relationships to the governed forged by local rulers versus foreign conquerors. In Baghdad and Cairo, centers of the Islamic state, the political systems began to fragment as different factions of the religions sought dominance. Shiites, Sunnis, Sufis, and so on all struggled for control. By the fourteenth century, the Islamic heartland had fractured into three regions. In the east, the remnants of the old Abbasid state survived, if only in name. In the center, military men of non-Arab origin held the reins of power. In the west, Arab rulers prevailed, but there was also the influence of Berbers and other groups.

Compare the Muslim Societies That Emerged in Mali and India

Definitions: