As we have seen in a previous article there is no Dar al Islam in the world today. The conditions for an abode to be Dar al Islam (which you can read in the same article) are not met by any country at this moment. In fact, these conditions weren’t met by any place for a very, very long time. Neither the so-called “Ottoman Empire” was Dar al Islam (about whom you can read here), nor were their predecessor, the Mamluk State.
So the question is, at which point in history did Dar al Islam cease to exist?
We can track back to the first time when Kufr spread and prevailed in the lands where the Muslims used to live and therefore the abode changed from Dar al Islam to Dar al Kufr.
Let’s have a look through history. We will only take into account the states/dynasties that governed all or major parts of the Islamic world and what is/was considered as Islamic world. We won’t discuss small regional states/dynasties that only governed for short periods of time and/or smaller territories, lands or regions.
Khulafa-i Rashidin 12-41 (632-661)
Needless to say that during the time of the rightly guided Khulafa the entire land which was under the control of the Muslims was Dar al Islam. No further explanation is needed here.
Umayyad Dynasty 41-132 (661-750)
Although the Umayyads turned the Khilafah into a kingdom Sultanate and there was a lot of injustice, fisq and haram during their reign the only law and rule was the Shariah of Allah. No kufr and shirk spread or prevailed in the territory they reigned, therefore the lands under their control was Dar al Islam.
Abbasid Dynasty 132-656 (750-1258)
The Abbasids ruled for a very long period of time. There were many different phases during their reign and therefore we can’t claim “the Abbasid State was Dar al Islam (all the time)” or “the Abbasid State was Dar al Kufr (all the time)”. But we can definitely say that at some point during the reign of the Abbasids, the Dar al Islam turned into Dar al Kufr.
In the first period of the Abbasid reign various kufr, like the discussion of Khalq al Qur’an (the “creation” of the Qur’an), al Qadr, ‘Uluw amongst many others began. And while some of them spread, others didn’t spread so much, and none of them prevailed. Also some of these Kufr were more prevalent in some regions than they were in other regions and therefore they never took an important place in the society as a whole.
It was in the middle of the reign of the Abbasids when Kufr spread through the whole land of the Muslims and started to dominate. According to al-Maqrizi, who lived between 764 AH and 845 AH, the dominance of the Ash’aris began to be visible for well over 400 years. That is from 380 AH onwards it moved from Iraq to Syria and then to other Muslim lands. (see al-Khitat from al-Maqrizi). This state of dominance continued throughout history and is still the case in our time. Major “Islamic” education institutes like al-Azhar, an Nizamiyya etc. played a major role in spreading the creed of the Ash’aris and in the case of al-Azhar are still doing this today.
We will cover the Ash’aris, their Aqidah, and their many kufr in a separate article in shaa Allah.
The Seljuk Empire 429-590 (1037-1194)
In 429 AH, the Seljuks took over the reign from the Abbasids. Tughril Beg relegated the Abbasid Khalifa to a state figurehead but took the command of the army and thus was de facto the leader of the state. While Tughril Beg, the founder and first Sultan of the Seljuk Empire, was opposing the Ash’aris (according to some reports he even persuaded them; according to other reports the Ash'aris were exiled from Khurasan and cursed at Friday sermons in Seljuq mosques) his successor Alp Arslan was in full support of the Ash’aris. Nizam al Mulk, the vizier of Sultan Alp Arslan founded the Madrasa al Nizamiyya in Baghdad in 459 (1066) in defense of the Ash’ari creed. During his time as vizier and under his patronage people like Abu al Ma’ali `Abd al Malik al Juwaini had the opportunity to preach the Ash’arite creed freely.
The Ash’ari creed gained popularity and obtained widespread acceptance due to the preaching, lecturing and propagating from al Juwaini and al Ghazzali.
Al Juwaini (born 419/1028 and died at Nishapur in 478/1085) received his early education from his father, Abu Muhammad `Abd Allah. After the death of his father, he got further education from his teacher, Abu Ishaq al Isfarayani, a Ash’ari scholar. Al Juwaini, in course of time, was recognized by the so-called scholars of the time to be Shaikh al Islam and Imam al Haramain. For thirty years, he continued teaching and preaching the Ash’ari creed and thus made it popular. Having titles like Shaikh al Islam and Imam al Haramain, al Juwaini’s Fatawa used to be respected by people in general throughout the Muslim world; and for this reason, his writings got the widest circulation and, through these writings, the Ash’ari creed became known everywhere and started to become the dominating creed. All this under the protection of the Seljuq leaders, especially Nizam al Mulk.
Al Juwaini also was the teacher of al Ghazali. In 484/1091, Nizam al-Mulk appointed the then 33-year-old al-Ghazali as a professor of the Nizamiyya in Baghdad. al Ghazali believed that the Ash’ari mode of thought was excellent for the masses and he said that, “the secret of faith could not be revealed to the masses.” For this reason he encouraged the spread of the Ash`ari creed. He made the Ash’ari theology so popular that it became the theology of the community in general and has continued to remain so up to the present time.
In the West another absolvent of the Nizamiyya, Ibn Tumart, founder of the Berber Almohad dynasty and student of al Ghazzali spread the Ash’ari creed by force. This kafir who died 542 AH killed tens of thousands of Muslims because he considered them Mujassimah for not subscribing to the Ash’ari creed.
Another famous graduate of the Nizamiyya of Baghdad was Baha' ad-Din ibn Shaddad, who was the military Qadi and biographer of Salahuddin al Ayyubi. He worked for four years as a repetiteur (muʿid) at the Nizamiyya.
The very frequency with which Ibn al-Jawzi mentions clashes between Ash’aris and their opponents in Baghdad throughout the Seljuq age also indicates the spread of Ash’arism.
Ayyubid dynasty 566-658 (1171-1260)
The Ayyubid dynasty was a dynasty of Kurdish origin, founded by Salahuddin al Ayyubi and was centered in Egypt. The dynasty ruled much of the Middle East including Egypt, Syria, northern Mesopotamia, Hejaz, Yemen, and the North African coast up to the borders of modern-day Tunisia during the 6th and 7th centuries AH. The Ayyubid family, under the brothers Ayyub and Shirkuh, originally served as soldiers for the Zengids until they supplanted them under Salahuddin, the son of Ayyub. In 569/1174, following the death of Nur al-Din Zengi, Salahuddin proclaimed himself Sultan.
But even before the reign of the Ayyubis, Salah ad Din propagated Ash’arism. According to al Maqrizi, Salah al-Din al Ayyubi propagated an Ash’ari creed as the official doctrine of orthodoxy at the time of the restoration of Sunnism in Egypt in the late Seljuq age. Since that time, anyone differing from al-Ash’ari in Egypt would be accused of Kufr. (see al-Maqrizi, al-Khitat, 2, 273, 358)
Mamluk Sultanate 656-922 (1250–1517)
The dominance of the Ash’aris remained the same during the reign of the Mamluks. While there was nominally still an Abbasid Khalifa during the Mamluk Sultanate he virtually held no power.
In Damascus, Ash’arism was broadly established at least since the time of Ibn Asakir (d. 571 AH). Those who opposed Ash’arism had to be very cautious in their criticism in order to avoid trouble with the Mamluk government generally favoring Ash’arism.
The spread of Sufism fell also during the time of the Mamluks' reign. The Shadhiliyya, Rifa’iyyah, and Badawiyyah were the Sufi orders with the largest number of adherents - all of them having many kufr, such as visiting tombs, etc in their creeds. The Mamluks patronized the Sufis by funding zawiyas (Sufi lodges).
During the reign of the Mamluks many Christian - especially Coptic Christians in Egypt, but also other Christians - held privileged positions in the Mamluk bureaucracy. This took such an enormous extent that there were several instances of protests of the general people against the employment of Coptic Christians with the state. As a result of this pressure, Coptic Christians had their employment in the bureaucracy of the Mamluks terminated at least nine times between the late 7th and mid-9th centuries AH.
Ottoman Empire 922-1341 (1517–1923)
We have discussed the kafir Ottoman Empire in a separate article which you can read here.
Conclusion
From these historical facts, we can say without any doubt that there has not been a Dar al Islam for at least 9 centuries. And although we can’t determine an exact date when the Dar ul Islam ceased to exist, we can say with certainty that this happened at some point between the end of the 4th century AH and the middle of the 5th century AH. We also can say with certainty that with the building of the Nizamiyya Madrasas in Baghdad and other places and linked to this the spread of the heretic Ash’ari theology and doctrine the land had become Dar ul Kufr.
Never since has a Dar ul Islam existed as the kufr creed of the Ash’ari sect remained dominant among the people and the ruling classes throughout the “Islamic” history. At later points other kufr - like grave worshiping, became an addition to the already existing kufr.
