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Muhammad was born in the town of Mecca, and his dad died before he was born. His mother raised him from the beginning. At age of six, Muhammad was taken to visit relatives in Yathrib. His mother and all of his relatives except his uncle, Abu Talib, died. Muhammad grew and had several jobs such as being a shepherder. In his early twenties he became a very successful merchant. In 595, at the age of 25, Muhammad married his wife Khadija, who was 15 years older than he.
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When Muhammad got tired of the way things were run in Mecca, he and a couple hundred of his followers left and went to Muhammads home town, Yathrib. Muhammad soon helped solve many problems such as the civil war between tribes. He also began to build the Muslim faith. When Muhammad was at the peak of his new religion, he wanted to take the religion a step further, so he marched into Mecca, and soon all the people of Mecca followed him as their spiritual leader.
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The death of Muhammad caused a void in leadership because he had no sons to pass his authority onto. The question was who was going to lead the Muslim faith.
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A group of Muhammad's closest followers selected Muhammad's father-in-law, Abu Bakr, to be the temporal leader of the Islamic community. The caliph was also recognized as a religious leader, or imam. Bakr's leadership unified the factions among the Bedouin tribes.
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No longer at war with each other, the unified Muslims began to conquer neighboring peoples. The Byzantine armies were defeated near the Yarmuk River, and north of the Red Sea. Four years later Muslims took possession of Syria and also conqured the entire empire of the Sasanids. Egypt and parts of North Africa also became Arab territories.
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The first crusade armie marched in to Jerusalem and succeded in the conquering of this Muslim territory.
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The materialism of Mecca soon pushed Muhammad out of the town and into the hills where he found a cave where he could fast and meditate. One day in the cave, Muhammad was aproached by the angel, Gabriel and was told to recite words so beautiful that he knew they could only be the words of God. After a few other encounters such as this, Muhammad began to tell his tribe of these experiences.
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Muhammad dictated his revelations to scribes and these became the wholy scriptures of Islam or the Qur'an. The basic message of the Qur'an is that there is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his Prophet.
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In some of the tribes now controlled by Muslims, there were revolts that sprang out because of this new religion in which the people did not want to be a part of. For example Ali's second son, Hussein, argued that he did not believe in Umayyad rule. So Hussein decided to rise up against Umayyad rule and revolt, but his armies were defeated, and Hussein was killed in the battle.
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Therem was a time of splended rule that went well into the ninth century. The best known caliphs during this time were Harun al-Rashid, whose reign was considered to be the golden age of Abbasid, and his son al-Ma'mum established a foundadtion to translate classical greek writings.
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During this time the lack of spiritual authority was weakening the caliphate angainst other rivals. When Harun died in 809, his two sons Amin and Ma'mum were in a rivalry in which led to a civil war that destroyed Baghdad.
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