Before and After Muhammad

Islam emerged amid flourishing Christian and Jewish cultures, yet students of antiquity and the Middle Ages mostly ignore it. Despite intensive study of late antiquity over the last fifty years, even generous definitions of this period have reached only the eighth century, whereas Islam did not mature sufficiently to compare with Christianity or rabbinic Judaism until the tenth century. This book suggests a new way of thinking about the historical relationship between the scriptural monotheisms, integrating Islam into European and West Asian history. The book identifies the whole of the First Millennium—from Augustus and Christ to the formation of a recognizably Islamic worldview by the time of the philosopher Avicenna—as the proper chronological unit of analysis for understanding the emergence and maturation of the three monotheistic faiths across Eurasia. It proposes not just a chronological expansion of late Antiquity but also an eastward shift in the geographical frame to embrace Iran. The book looks at Judaism, Christianity, and Islam alongside other important developments in Greek philosophy and Roman law, to reveal how the first millennium was bound together by diverse exegetical traditions that nurtured communities and often stimulated each other

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Archaeology · Christianity · Early Christianity · Flourishing · Islam · Judaism · Late Antiquity · Middle Ages · Period (music) · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Classics · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Islamic Studies and History · Philosophy · Religious studies · Ancient Civilization · Frühmittelalter · Islamic civilization · Medieval Civilization · Middle east · Monotheism · Periodisierung · Religion · Religion and civilization · Spätantike

• The Roman Context of Early Islam

  Mischa Meier•Millennium•2020

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• Introduction

  Nils H Korsvoll•Trends in Classics•2021

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• The exploration of collective identity in Byzantium compared to Western Europe and the Islamic world

  Open Access•Maria Mavroudi•Zbornik radova Vizantoloskog…•2023

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• The aesthetics of hope in late Greek Imperial literature Methodius of Olympus' Symposium and the Crisis of the third century

  Open Access•Dawn Lavalle Norman•Aesthetics of Hope in Late Greek…•2019

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