Short answer
No. There were conquests, but conquest is not conversion. The Qur'an says plainly that there is no compulsion in religion. It even asks the Prophet (ﷺ) himself whether he would force people to believe. History agrees. Muslims ruled Spain for nearly eight hundred years, and for most of that time Christians and Jews there stayed Christians and Jews. The Ottomans ruled Greece and Serbia for nearly four centuries, and both are still Christian. Muslim kings ruled from Delhi for six hundred years, yet most of the subcontinent's people were still Hindu. Indonesia, the largest Muslim country, was never conquered by a foreign Muslim army. Traders brought Islam there. In the Americas, whole peoples were made Christian after conquest, and Muslims did not do it. Islam's answer is the Qur'an's own rule: no compulsion in religion.
Full explanation
The Qur'an forbids forcing anyone to believe
The rule is stated in so many words. It is stated to the Prophet (ﷺ) himself. Faith that is forced is not faith. Belief lives in the heart, and a sword cannot make the heart believe.
“Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.”
“If it had been thy Lord's will, they would all have believed,- all who are on earth! wilt thou then compel mankind, against their will, to believe!”
Where Muslims ruled for centuries
To test the charge, look at what happened to the conquered peoples afterwards. The Ottomans, the Muslim dynasty that ruled from Istanbul, held Greece and Serbia for nearly four hundred years. Yet the Orthodox Patriarch, the senior bishop of the Orthodox Church, still has his seat in Istanbul. The Ottoman sultan Mehmed II put a new Patriarch in place in 1454, the year after he took the city. Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria are Orthodox today. Muslim sultans and emperors ruled from Delhi for six hundred years. Even so, the census of 1941 counted about two-thirds of India's people as Hindu, and under a quarter as Muslim. Pakistan and Bangladesh were still part of India then. The 2011 census counted today's India as 79.8 per cent Hindu. Akbar, a Mughal emperor of the sixteenth century, ended the tax on non-Muslims. He gave Hindus the highest posts. He had the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, the two great Hindu epics, translated into Persian. In Egypt and Syria, people took centuries to become Muslim, and Christians still live there today.
A history of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople under Ottoman rule: Mehmed II installed Gennadios as Patriarch after taking the city in 1453, and the Church kept charge of its own people's religious and family law through the Ottoman centuries.
Of the roughly 389 million people counted in undivided India in 1941, including the lands that became Pakistan and Bangladesh, about two-thirds were recorded as Hindu and just under a quarter as Muslim.
Of India's 1.21 billion people in 2011, 79.8 per cent were recorded as Hindu and 14.2 per cent as Muslim.
A history of the Mughal Empire. It describes how Akbar abolished the jizya on non-Muslims in 1564, brought Hindu Rajput rulers and officials into the highest ranks of his service, and had Sanskrit works including the Mahabharata and the Ramayana translated into Persian.
A quantitative study of conversion in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, North Africa and Spain. It finds that conversion to Islam in the conquered lands was slow and gradual, taking place over two to three centuries and more after the conquests.
What this page does not claim
This is not a claim that Muslim empires were gentle. The Ottomans taxed heavily and put down rebellions hard. In the devshirme, a levy of boys, they took Christian boys for the Sultan's service and raised them as Muslims. This site does not defend that practice. It broke the Qur'an's rule of no compulsion in religion (2:256). Muslim scholars of the time themselves questioned it. In India temples were destroyed in war, and Aurangzeb, a Mughal emperor of the seventeenth century, reimposed the tax on non-Muslims. But the charge is that Islam converts by force. After centuries of Ottoman rule, Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria are still Christian. After six centuries of Muslim kings in Delhi, most of India is still Hindu.
A history of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople under Ottoman rule: Mehmed II installed Gennadios as Patriarch after taking the city in 1453, and the Church kept charge of its own people's religious and family law through the Ottoman centuries.
A history of the Mughal Empire. It describes how Akbar abolished the jizya on non-Muslims in 1564, brought Hindu Rajput rulers and officials into the highest ranks of his service, and had Sanskrit works including the Mahabharata and the Ramayana translated into Persian.
“Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.”
Where Islam came without an army
Indonesia has more Muslims than any other country. Islam reached it through merchants and local rulers, not through a foreign Muslim army. The Mongols went the other way. They swept in from the steppes of Mongolia in the thirteenth century and conquered the Muslim lands. Then their rulers became Muslims themselves. No one can force the winner to take the faith of the loser.
Traces the coming of Islam to the Indonesian islands from about the thirteenth century through trade and the conversion of local rulers and peoples, not through conquest by a foreign Muslim army.
A history of the Mongol conquest of the Muslim lands in the thirteenth century and of the later conversion of the Mongol rulers of Iran and of the Golden Horde to Islam.
| Where | Muslim rule | The other faiths |
|---|---|---|
| Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria | Nearly four centuries of Ottoman rule | All three are Orthodox Christian today, and the Orthodox Patriarch still sits in Istanbul. |
| India | Six centuries of Muslim kings ruling from Delhi | In 1941, when Pakistan and Bangladesh were still part of India, about two-thirds of its people were Hindu. |
| Egypt and Syria | Centuries of Muslim rule | Conversion took centuries, and Christians remain there to this day. |
These faiths lived on under Muslim rule for centuries. And Indonesia, the country with the most Muslims on earth, received Islam through merchants and local rulers, not a foreign Muslim army.
Spain before and after 1492
Al-Andalus is the name for Muslim Spain. For most of the centuries of Muslim rule there, from 711, Christians and Jews kept their churches, synagogues, bishops, courts and language. After Granada fell in 1492, the Jews were expelled that same year. In 1499 Archbishop Cisneros had the Arabic books of Granada gathered and burned in a public square. He spared only books of medicine. The Muslims of Castile were given baptism or exile in 1501-1502, and those of Aragon in the 1520s. Arabic dress, names and books were banned in 1567. From 1609 to 1614 some three hundred thousand baptised Moriscos, Muslims made Christian by force, and their descendants, were expelled. Eight centuries of Muslim rule left Christians and Jews in Spain. A little over a century of Catholic Spain left neither Muslims nor Jews. Many of the Jews expelled in 1492 found refuge in the Ottoman Empire, where the Sultan took them in.
A history of the Muslims of Spain up to 1500. It describes how, after the surrender of Granada in 1492, Archbishop Francisco Jimenez de Cisneros pressed mass baptisms on the Muslims there, and in 1499 had Arabic books gathered and burned in a public square of the city, sparing only works of medicine.
A history of the Muslims of Spain after the fall of Granada in 1492: the forced baptisms of 1501-1502 in Castile and of the 1520s in Aragon, the laws against Arabic language and custom, and the expulsion of the Moriscos from 1609 to 1614.
A history of the Sephardic Jews: their life in Muslim and Christian Spain, the expulsion of 1492, and the refuge many of them found in the Ottoman Empire, where Spanish-speaking Jewish communities lived on for centuries.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1492 | Granada falls. The Jews are expelled the same year. |
| 1499 | Archbishop Cisneros has the Arabic books of Granada gathered and set on fire in a public square, sparing only books of medicine. |
| 1501–1502 | The Muslims of Castile are given baptism or exile. |
| 1520s | The Muslims of Aragon are given the same choice. |
| 1567 | Arabic dress, names and books are banned. |
| 1609–1614 | Some three hundred thousand baptised Moriscos, Muslims forced into baptism and their descendants, are expelled. |
Many of the Jews expelled in 1492 found refuge in the Ottoman Empire, where the Sultan took them in.
What was done in the Americas
When Spain took the Americas, its commanders read out the Requerimiento, a Spanish legal paper. They read it in Spanish, to peoples who could not understand a word of it. It told them to accept the Church as ruler of the world and the Spanish Crown as their lords. If they did not, war would be made on them, and they would be enslaved with their wives and children. After the conquest, friars baptised whole peoples by the hundred thousand. Friars are members of Catholic religious orders. They pulled down the temples of the native peoples and built churches in their place. At Mani in Yucatan in July 1562, the friar Diego de Landa, later Bishop of Yucatan, burned the Maya books he had gathered. He wrote himself that they burned them all. In Canada, more than 150,000 native children were taken into government-funded residential schools. The churches ran these schools until 1969. The children were punished for speaking their own languages.
The demand Spanish commanders were ordered to read out before making war on a native people. It told them to acknowledge the Church as ruler of the world, the Pope, and the King and Queen of Spain as their lords, and to let the faith be preached to them. If they delayed, the Spaniards would make war on them, and take them, their wives and their children as slaves, and seize their goods.
A history of the debates over the conquest of the Americas. It shows that the Requerimiento was read in Spanish to peoples who could not understand it, sometimes out of their hearing altogether, before war was made on them, and that Spaniards of the time, Las Casas among them, mocked it for this.
A history of the friars' conversion of Mexico after the conquest, from 1523 to 1572: baptisms counted in the hundreds of thousands, the pulling down of temples and the burning of idols, and churches built in their place.
Landa writes that the friars found a great number of books in the Maya script, and because they held nothing but superstition and the devil's lies, burned them all, which the Maya grieved over bitterly.
A history of the Spanish conquest of Yucatan and the Franciscan mission there. It describes the inquisition Diego de Landa ran in 1562, when Maya were tortured to confess to idolatry, and the auto-da-fe at Mani in July 1562, where their books and images were burned.
More than 150,000 First Nations, Metis and Inuit children were sent to residential schools funded by the Canadian government and run until 1969 by the Catholic, Anglican, Methodist, United and Presbyterian churches. The last closed in 1996. Children were taken from their families, punished for speaking their own languages, and taught to reject their peoples' beliefs; thousands died at the schools.
"Compel them to come in"
In a parable in Luke, the master tells his servant to compel people to come in to his feast. Augustine, a North African bishop of the fourth and fifth centuries, read this as a warrant to force the Donatists back into the Church. The Donatists were a rival North African church. The verse was quoted for centuries afterwards to justify coercion. Many of the Africans carried to the Americas in the Atlantic slave trade were Muslims from West Africa. In the French colonies the law required every slave to be baptised. Within a few generations their descendants were Christians. The Qur'an sets the opposite rule: no compulsion.
“And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.”
Augustine defends the use of imperial force to bring the Donatists back into the Catholic Church, and reads the words "compel them to come in" from the parable in Luke 14 as a warrant for it.
Every slave in the French islands must be baptised and instructed in the Catholic religion, and anyone who buys newly arrived Africans must report them to the governor and the intendant within eight days so that it is done.
A history of the African Muslims enslaved in the Americas: where in West Africa they came from, how many of them were literate in Arabic, and how slavery and forced Christianisation ended the practice of Islam among their descendants.
The saying critics quote
Sahih al-Bukhari 25 — Kitab al-Iman (Book of Belief), hadith 25
Ibn Umar reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said he had been ordered to fight the people until they testify that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is His Messenger, pray and give zakat; if they do, their lives and property are safe, and their reckoning is with Allah.
Cited for
Critics read it as an order to fight everyone until they become Muslim.
The response
Another authentic report of the same saying, in al-Nasa'i, a collection of hadith, says who it means: the idolaters. These were the idol-worshippers of Arabia in the Prophet's (ﷺ) own time. Many of them had broken their treaties and attacked first. Even to them, the Qur'an commands protection and a safe escort for anyone who asks for it. The saying does not speak of Jews or Christians. They kept their faith under Muslim rule for fourteen centuries. That could not have happened if it meant everyone. The saying gives no one today any right to fight anyone: war is for a lawful state alone.
Where it lands — The saying concerns the treaty-breaking idolaters of Arabia in the Prophet's (ﷺ) time, not all mankind. Jews and Christians kept their faith under Muslim rule for fourteen centuries.
Perspectives
The common objection: the conquests spread it
Many critics say Islam spread by conquest. Within a hundred years of the Prophet's (ﷺ) death, Muslim armies ruled from Spain to Central Asia and Sind.
Critics say the early conquests carried Islam from Spain to Central Asia within a hundred years. So, they say, it was spread by the sword.
Rebuttal
Conquering a land and converting its people are different things. In the conquered lands, people became Muslim slowly, over centuries. That is not what forced conversion looks like. And the older religions lived on under Muslim rule. The largest Muslim country today, Indonesia, was reached by traders. And the Qur'an forbids forcing anyone in religion.
What the historical record shows
Conquering a land and converting its people are different things. Under Muslim rule, the older religions lived on for centuries, and people became Muslim slowly. The largest Muslim country was reached by trade, not by armies.
The Orthodox Church kept its Patriarch in Constantinople under Ottoman rule, with a Patriarch put in place by Mehmed II after 1453. And the Greeks, Serbs and Bulgarians stayed Orthodox.
In the lands conquered in the first Muslim centuries, conversion to Islam was gradual and took centuries.
After six hundred years of Muslim kings in Delhi, the 1941 census counted about two-thirds of the people of undivided India as Hindu. That India included today's Pakistan and Bangladesh.
In 1947, Partition moved most of the Muslim-majority areas into Pakistan, part of which later became Bangladesh. The 2011 census recorded the India that remained as 79.8 per cent Hindu.
Islam reached the Indonesian islands through trade and local conversion, not foreign conquest.
The Mongols conquered the Muslim heartlands and their rulers later converted to Islam.
After 1492 Catholic Spain expelled its Jews, forced baptism on its Muslims, and expelled the baptised Moriscos from 1609.
In 1499 Archbishop Cisneros had the Arabic books of Granada burned in a public square. Only books on medicine were spared.
A non-Muslim historian of the early twentieth century looked at the story that Islam was forced on conquered peoples by the sword. He called it an absurd myth.
The Christian record of compulsion
The charge fits Christian history better. A parable in the Gospel of Luke was read for centuries as a licence to compel. The native peoples of the Americas were made Christians after conquest. Enslaved African Muslims were baptised by law.
Augustine used "compel them to come in" from Luke 14:23 to defend forcing the Donatists back into the Church.
The French Code Noir of 1685 required every slave to be baptised a Catholic.
Many of the Africans enslaved in the Americas were Muslims, and their faith did not survive among their descendants.
Spanish commanders read the Requerimiento, in Spanish, to peoples who could not understand it. It demanded submission to the Church and the Crown on pain of war and slavery.
After the conquest of Mexico, friars baptised native peoples in their hundreds of thousands and pulled down their temples.
Diego de Landa burned the Maya books at Mani in 1562. In his own account, he wrote that the friars burned them all.
Canada's residential schools were run by the churches for the government until 1969. They took more than 150,000 native children from their families and punished them for speaking their own languages. The last closed in 1996.
The Islamic perspective
Islam forbids forcing anyone into the faith. The Prophet (ﷺ) was told that he could not compel people to believe. In the lands Muslims ruled, the older religions lived on for centuries. People converted slowly, over generations, not at the point of a sword.
The Qur'an states that there is no compulsion in religion.
The Qur'an asks the Prophet (ﷺ) whether he would compel mankind to believe. Belief is by God's (﷾) will alone.
Faith held under force is not accepted by God (﷾), so a forced conversion achieves nothing in Islam.
Conversion in the conquered lands was slow, spread over generations, which is not the pattern of forced conversion.