Spread Of Islam Dbq Essay

The Islamic empire was situated directly between two powerhouses: Europe and China. They had managed to fend off conquest by the Arabs, who were taking over land from Spain to India, but they were struggling. Both were infested with plagues that killed off hundreds of thousand of citizens. Europe was stuck in the Middle Ages, where trade was nonexistent and medicine primarily consisted of guesswork and foolish ideas. China’s merchants were on the bottom of society, and so trade suffered there, on top of an eventual Mongol threat. If these two once-great forces were crumbling, how did the Arab empire manage to thrive? Islam owed its great accomplishments to their strong devotion to their religion, the size of both their empire and trading network,

Mecca's significance in Islam is due to the Prophet Muhammad first receiving revelations from Allah at the Kabba, located in Mecca. Islamic mathematicians and astronomers were particularly important because they calculated the direction of Mecca, as well as proper times of prayer. This is mentioned in Document 1, a history textbook excerpt that defines the reasons for Muslim pursuit of knowledge as well as emphasizing their acheivements. If Muslims had not been such devout followers of their religion, the need for the development of mathematical principles would have been undoubtedly lessened. For example, Muslims took the Indian numerical system and transferred it to Arabic, thereby globalizing and progressing mathematics. Al-Khwatizmi conducted an extensive study of Indian numerals, making him a certifiable expert on the subject, after which he wrote a well known algebra textbook. The basic math featured in Document 4 demonstrate the significance of this, as these principles are used by students from kindergarten to high school today. Another important aspect of Islam is the Quran, or the Islamic scripture. Because the Quran is the direct word of Allah, everything in Islamic society, including the law

It also affirms the Muslims’ aspiration towards better lives for themselves, describing how the Arab leaders wanted their illnesses treated by competent doctors, not by random citizens. This prompted the establishment of a medical examination for potential doctors, which definitely had a positive effect on the Muslim medical field, based on the incredible medical advances made during this time. All of these advances also resulted in the creation of many new medical books. Document 3 describes a multi-volume medical encyclopedia, The Canon of Medicine, that was particularly influential. These books, once translated into European languages and passed onto the doctors of Europe, was the standard for medical knowledge in schools until the 18th century, proving how advanced the Arab’s medical discoveries were for their time. Before Islamic knowledge about everything from medicine to literature reached Europe, however, many scholars visited universities in Baghdad. The Abbasid capital city was a critical center of learning, as it was Baghdad's schools that first allowed students to study fields other than religion. Cordova, the Islamic capital of Spain, was also a significant location for scholars. Document 2 compares Cordova to London, Paris, and other areas of Europe, insisting that the Islamic city was the place to