History of Jerusalem during the Early Muslim period

Throughout the Early Muslim and Crusader periods, up until Saladin's conquest of 1187, Jerusalem retained a sizable Christian majority, which only ceased to exist once Saladin removed the Frankish population in 1187.[1][2][3]

During the early centuries of Muslim rule, especially under the Umayyad (661–750) and Abbasid (750–969) dynasties, the city prospered; the 10th-century geographers Ibn Hawqal and al-Istakhri describe it as "the most fertile province of Palestine", while its native son, geographer al-Muqaddasi (born 946) devoted many pages to its praises in his most famous work, The Best Divisions in the Knowledge of the Climes. Jerusalem under Muslim rule, however, did not achieve the political or cultural status enjoyed by the capitals Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo etc.

With the decline of the Carolingian Empire, which split up in 888, a period of anti-Christian persecution by the Muslims began. However, the recovered Byzantines filled this void and as the Empire expanded under the Byzantine Crusades, Christians were again allowed to make pilgrimages to Jerusalem.

It is recorded in the medieval chronicles of William of Tyre (30–1186) that Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab personally came to receive the key to the city by the Greek Orthodox patriarch, Sophronius, and invited to offer Muslim prayers at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Umar chose to pray[4] some distance from the church, so as not to endanger its status as a Christian temple. Fifty-five years later, the Mosque of Omar was built on the site where he prayed, east of the church (distinct from the later, Ayyubid Mosque of Omar, which stands south of the church). After the fall of Jerusalem, Umar permitted Jews to practice their religion freely and live in Jerusalem. (See: Covenant of Umar I).[5]

Although the Qur'an does not mention the name "Jerusalem", the hadith specify that it was from Jerusalem that Muhammad ascended to heaven in the Night Journey, or Isra and Miraj. Sixty years after the Muslim conquest of the city, the Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik commissioned and completed the construction of the Dome of the Rock over the Foundation Stone on Jerusalem's Temple Mount,[5] the location from which Muhammad was believed to have ascended into heaven. The Al-Aqsa Mosque (named for the "farthest mosque") was also built nearby, again in honor of the story of the Night Journey.

Caliph Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan (r. 661–680), the founder of the Umayyad Caliphate, originally served as the governor of Syria under the caliphs Umar and Uthman.[6] He opposed Uthman's successor Ali during the First Muslim Civi War and forged a pact against him with the former governor of Egypt, Amr ibn al-As, in Jerusalem in 658.[7] According to the near-contemporary Maronite Chronicle and Islamic traditional accounts, Mu'awiya obtained oaths of allegiance in Jerusalem on at least two different occasions between 660 and July 661.[8] Although the precise dating is inconsistent, the Muslim and non-Muslim accounts generally agree that the oaths to Mu'awiya took place at a mosque on the Temple Mount.[9] The mosque may have been erected by Umar and expanded by Mu'awiya, though there are no apparent traces of the structure today.[9] The Maronite Chronicle notes that "many emirs and Tayyaye [Arab nomads] gathered [at Jerusalem] and proferred their right hand[s] to Mu'awiya".[10] Afterward, he sat and prayed at Golgotha and then prayed at Mary's Tomb in Gethsemane.[11] The "Arab nomads" were likely the indigenous Arab tribes of Syria, most of whom had converted to Christianity under the Byzantines and many of whom had retained their Christian faith during the early decades of Islamic rule. Mu'awiya's prayer at Christian sites was out of respect for the Syrian Arabs, who were the foundation of his power. His advisers Sarjun ibn Mansur and Ubayd Allah ibn Aws the Ghassanid may have helped organize the Jerusalem accession ceremonies.[12]

The fifth Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705), who had served as the governor of Jund Filastin (military district of Palestine) under his father Caliph Marwan I, was recognized as caliph in Jerusalem.[13] From the beginning of his caliphate, Abd al-Malik began plans for the construction of the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque.[13] The Dome of the Rock was completed in 691/2, constituting the first great work of Islamic architecture.[14][15] The Dome of the Rock's construction was supervised by the Caliph's theological adviser Raja ibn Haywa of Beisan and one of his local mawali (non-Arab converts to Islam) Yazid ibn Salam.[16] The construction of the Dome of the Chain on the Temple Mount is credited to Abd al-Malik.[17] The Caliph and one of his generals, al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, who became his practical viceroy over Iraq, are credited by the Islamic tradition for constructing two gates of the Temple Mount, which the modern historian Amikam Elad proposes may be the Prophet's Gate and the Mercy Gate; both gates are attributed to the Umayyads by modern scholars.[18] The caliph also repaired the roads to Jerusalem as attested by several milestones.[19]

Extensive building works took place on the Temple Mount and outside of its walls under Abd al-Malik's son and successor al-Walid I (r. 705–715).[19] Modern historians generally credit al-Walid with the construction of the al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount, though the mosque may have been originally built by his Umayyad predecessors; according to the latter view, al-Walid was nonetheless responsible for part of the mosque's construction.[20] The Aphrodito Papyri indicate that laborers from Egypt were sent to Jerusalem for terms ranging between six months and one year to work on the al-Aqsa Mosque, al-Walid's caliphal palace, and a third, undefined building for the Caliph.[21] Amikam Elad holds that six Umayyad buildings excavated south and west of the Temple Mount may include the palace and undefined building mentioned in the papyri.[19] Al-Walid's brother and successor Sulayman (r. 715–717), who had served as the governor of Jund Filastin under al-Walid and Abd al-Malik, was initially recognized as caliph in Jerusalem by the Arab tribes and dignitaries. He resided in Jerusalem for an unspecified period of time during his caliphate and constructed a bathhouse there, but he may not have shared the same adoration of Jerusalem as his predecessors.[22]

Under the Umayyads the focus of Muslim ritual ceremonies and pilgrimage in Jerusalem was the Temple Mount and to a lesser extent the Prayer Niche of David (possibly the Tower of David), the Spring of Silwan, the Garden of Gethsemane and Mary's Tomb, and the Mount of Olives.[23] The Umayyads encouraged Muslim pilgrimage and prayer in Jerusalem and traditions originated during the Umayyad period celebrated the city. During this period, Muslim pilgrims came to Jerusalem to sanctify themselves before making the Umra or Hajj pilgrimages to Mecca. Muslims who could not make the pilgrimage, and possibly Christians and Jews, donated olive oil for the illumination of the al-Aqsa Mosque.[24] The bulk of the Muslim pilgrims to Jerusalem were presumably from Palestine and Syria in general, though several came from distant parts of the Caliphate.[25]

The Umayyads were swept away by the Abbasid Revolution, and from 750 on the Abbasid dynasty ruled the caliphate including Jerusalem, with intermissions, for the next two centuries. After the First Abbasid period (750–878), the Tulunids, a mamluk dynasty of Turkic origin, managed to independently rule over Egypt and much of Greater Syria, including Palestine, for almost three decades (878–905). Abbasid rule returned between 905–969, of which 30 years of direct rule from Baghdad (905–935), and the rest with the help of the Ikhshidid governors of Egypt (935–969).[26] The period of Ikhshidid rule was characterised by acts of persecution against the Christians, including an attack by the Muslims on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 937, with the church set on fire and its treasure robbed. The tensions were connected with the renewed threat posed by the encroaching Byzantines, and on this background the Jews joined forces with the Muslims. In 966 the Muslim and Jewish mob, instigated by the Ikhshidid governor, attacked again the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the resulting fire causing the collapse of the dome standing over the Tomb of Jesus and causing the death of Patriarch John VII.[27]

Ahmad ibn Tulun, the founder of a dynasty based in Egypt, consolidated his rule over Palestine between 778 and 880 and passed it on to his son at his death in 884. According to Patriarch Elias the Third of Jerusalem, Tulun finished a period of persecution against Christians by naming a Christian governor in Ramla (or perhaps Jerusalem), the governor initiating the renovation of churches in the city. Tulun had a Jewish physician and generally showed a very relaxed attitude towards dhimmis, and when he lay on his deathbed, both Jews and Christians prayed for him.[28] Tulun was the first in a row of Egypt-based rulers of Palestine, which ended with the Ikhshidids. While the Tulunids managed to preserve a high degree of autonomy, the Abbasids retook control over Jerusalem in 905, and between 935 and 969 it was administered by their Egyptian governors, the Ikhshidids. During this entire period, Jerusalem's religious importance grew, several of the Egyptian rulers choosing to be buried there.[29]

The first Fatimid period (969–1171) saw a predominantly Berber army conquer the region. After six decades of war and another four of relative stability, Turkish tribes invade the region, starting off a period of permanent upheaval, fighting against each other and the Fatimids and, in less than thirty years of warfare and vandalism, destroyed much of Palestine, bringing terrible hardships, particularly on the Jewish population. However, the Jewish communities stayed in their places, only to be uprooted after 1099 by the Crusaders.[30] Between 1071 and 1073, Palestine was captured by Turkoman tribes answering to the Seljuq sultan.[31] Jerusalem was in the hands of the Seljuk emir Atsiz ibn Uvaq from 1073 on. In 1077, after Atsiz's defeat in Egypt in a battle against the Fatimids, local Muslims rose up against Atsiz, capturing the families and property of the Turkomans. Atsiz besieged Jerusalem and promised the defenders the aman, safety, at which they surrendered. Atsiz broke his promise and slaughtered 3000 inhabitants. After Atsiz other Seljuk commanders ruled over Jerusalem and used it as a power base in their unceasing wars. Turkish rule totalled about a quarter of a century of hardship.[32] In 1098 the Fatimids retook Jerusalem and ruled it for a less than a year,[33] until the onslaught of the First Crusade.

In 1073, the Turkic emir Atsiz ibn Uvaq al-Khwarizmi besieged and captured the city, placing it under the nominal control of the 'Abbasid caliphate. In 1077, on his return from a disastrous attempt to capture Cairo, the capital of the Fatimid caliphate, he found that in his absence the inhabitants of Jerusalem had rebelled and forced his garrison to shelter in the citadel. He therefore besieged the city again, and on recapturing it, slaughtered an estimated 3,000 of the rebel inhabitants, including those who had taken shelter in the Al-Aqsa Mosque and only sparing those inside the Dome of the Rock.[34][35][36] In 1079, Atsiz was murdered by his nominal ally Tutush, who subsequently established firmer 'Abbasid authority in the area. A new period of turbulence began in 1091 with the death of Tutush's governor in Jerusalem, Artuq and the succession of his two sons, who were bitter rivals. The city changed hands between them several times, until in 1098 the Fatimids, seizing the opportunity presented by the approach of the First Crusade, regained control.[36]