Islamic leadership

Islamic leadership

Muhammad entered Mecca victoriously in 630, prompting the rest of Quraysh to embrace Islam. Muhammad sought to consolidate the unity of his expanding Muslim community by "winning over this powerful group [the Quraysh]", according to Donner; to that end he guaranteed Qurayshi participation and influence in the nascent Islamic state. Thus, despite their long enmity with Muhammad, the Quraysh were brought in as political and economic partners and became a key component in the Muslim elite. Many leading Qurayshi tribesmen were installed in key government positions and in Muhammad's policy-making circle. According to Donner, the inclusion of Quraysh "in the ruling elite of the Islamic state was very probably responsible for what appears to be the more carefully organized and systematic approach to statesmanship practiced by Muhammad in the closing years of his life, as the organizational skills of the Quraysh were put to use in the service of Islam".

With Muhammad's death in 632, rivalry emerged between the Quraysh and the two other components of the Muslim elite, the Ansar and the Thaqif, over influence in state matters.The Ansar wanted one of their own to succeed the prophet as caliph, but were persuaded by Umar to agree to Abu Bakr. During the reigns of Abu Bakr (632–634) and Umar (r. 634–644), some of the Ansar were concerned about their political stake. The Quraysh apparently held real power during this period marked by the early Muslim conquests. During the First Muslim Civil War, the Ansar, who backed Caliph Ali of the Banu Hashim against two factions representing rival Qurayshi clans, were defeated. They were subsequently left out of the political elite, while the Thaqif maintained a measure of influence by dint of their long relationship with the Qurays.

A hadith holding that the caliph must be from Quraysh became almost universally accepted by the Muslims, with the exception of the Kharijites.Indeed, control of the Islamic state essentially devolved into a struggle between various factions of the Quraysh. In the first civil war, these factions included the Banu Umayya represented by Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan, the Banu Hashim represented by Ali, and other Qurayshi leaders such as al-Zubayr ibn al-Awwam of the Banu Asad and Talha ibn Ubayd Allah of the Banu Taym. Later, during the Second Muslim Civil War, these same factions again fought for control of the caliphate, with the Umayyads victorious at the war's conclusion in 692/93. In 750, the issue of which Qurayshi clan would hold the reins of power was again raised but this time, the Abbasids, a branch of the Banu Hashim, were victorious and slew much of the Banu Umayya. Afterward, Islamic leadership was contested between different branches of the Banu Hashim.

Quraysh tree

Quraysh tribe (detailed tree)

Waqida bint Amr

Abd Manaf ibn Qusai

Ātikah bint Murrah

Nawfal ibn Abd Manaf

‘Abd Shams

Barra

Hala

Muṭṭalib ibn Abd Manaf

Hashim

Salma bint Amr

Umayya ibn Abd Shams

ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib

Harb

Abū al-ʿĀs

ʿĀminah

ʿAbdallāh

Hamza

Abī Ṭālib

Az-Zubayr

al-ʿAbbās

Abū Lahab

ʾAbī Sufyān ibn Harb

al-Ḥakam

ʿUthmān

ʿAffān

MUHAMMAD (Family tree)

Khadija bint Khuwaylid

ʿAlī (Family tree)

Khawlah bint Ja'far

ʿAbd Allāh

Muʿāwiyah I

Marwān I

ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān

Ruqayyah

Fatimah

Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyyah

ʿAli ibn ʿAbdallāh

Sufyanids

Marwanids

al-Ḥasan

al-Ḥusayn (Family tree)

Abu Hashim (Imām of al-Mukhtār and Hashimiyya)

Muhammad "al-Imām" (Abbasids)

Ibrāhim "al-Imām"

al-Saffāḥ

al-Mansur