Islamic History: from the birth of the Prophet in 570 CE to 1.8 billion Muslims today.

To understand Islam, it helps to understand the world into which it came. The Arabian Peninsula in the sixth century was not a backwater of civilization. It was a crossroads: between the Byzantine and Persian empires, between the trade routes of the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, between the monotheistic traditions of Judaism and Christianity to the north and the polytheism of the desert tribes. Into this world, in the Year of the Elephant (approximately 570 CE), a child was born in the city of Mecca who would, by the will of Allah, change the trajectory of human civilization.

Pre-Islamic Arabia: the Jahiliyyah

The period before Islam in Arabia is called the Jahiliyyah, usually translated as "the Age of Ignorance." This term does not mean that the Arabs of this era were intellectually primitive. The pre-Islamic Arabs produced remarkable poetry, sophisticated oral tradition, and complex tribal governance systems. What the term "Jahiliyyah" refers to is moral and spiritual ignorance: a society organized around tribal loyalty above all else, where infanticide of girls was practiced, slavery was unrestricted, social hierarchy was absolute, and the worship of hundreds of idols had replaced whatever remnant of the Abrahamic tradition Ibrahim had established in Mecca.

Mecca itself was the religious center of Arabia. The Kaaba, built by Ibrahim (Abraham) and his son Ismail (Ishmael) as the first house of worship for Allah alone, had by the sixth century become surrounded by 360 idols representing the gods of every tribe in Arabia. The Quraysh tribe, which controlled Mecca and the trade routes through it, had turned the pilgrimage to the Kaaba into a commercial and political institution. The Hajj still occurred every year, but mixed with idolatry and its associated practices.

There were individuals in this society, called the hanifiyyun, who had preserved a trace of pure monotheism and refused idol worship. The Prophet's great-grandfather Abd al-Muttalib was known for certain practices consistent with Abrahamic tradition. Waraqah ibn Nawfal, the cousin of the Prophet's first wife Khadijah, was a Christian scholar who read the scriptures in Arabic. These figures represent the thin thread of monotheistic awareness that survived in Arabia before the final and complete revelation.

Birth and early life of the Prophet

Muhammad ibn Abdullah (peace be upon him) was born in Mecca in approximately 570 CE, in the clan of Banu Hashim of the tribe of Quraysh. His father Abdullah had died before his birth, and his mother Aminah died when he was six years old. He was raised first by his grandfather Abd al-Muttalib, and then, after his grandfather's death, by his uncle Abu Talib.

His early life was marked by periods of poverty, manual labor, and a reputation for exceptional honesty that earned him the titles al-Amin (the Trustworthy) and al-Sadiq (the Truthful) among the Meccans long before he received prophethood. He worked as a shepherd and then as a merchant, traveling the trade routes of Arabia and Syria. When he was 25, he married Khadijah bint Khuwaylid, a wealthy businesswoman fifteen years his senior who had employed him to lead her trade expeditions. Their marriage was one of the great love stories of Islamic history: they had six children together, and she was the first person to believe in his prophethood.

As he grew older, the Prophet (peace be upon him) would withdraw periodically to the Cave of Hira in the mountains above Mecca, spending days and nights in reflection and worship. This practice of tahannuth, of seeking solitude for contemplation, continued for years before the first revelation came.

The first revelation: 610 CE

In the month of Ramadan in 610 CE, when the Prophet (peace be upon him) was approximately 40 years old, he was in the Cave of Hira when the angel Jibreel (Gabriel) came to him and commanded:

"Read in the name of your Lord who created. Created man from a clinging substance. Read, and your Lord is the most Generous. Who taught by the pen. Taught man that which he knew not." (Qur'an 96:1-5)

These five verses, the opening of Surah Al-Alaq, were the first words of the Qur'an ever revealed. They commanded reading, learning, and the acknowledgment of the Lord who creates and teaches. The first word of the divine revelation to the final prophet was an instruction toward knowledge.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) returned home trembling and told Khadijah what had happened. She took him to her cousin Waraqah ibn Nawfal, the Christian scholar, who identified what had come to him as the same Namus (revelation) that had come to Musa (Moses). Waraqah told him: "This is the Namus that Allah sent down to Musa. I wish I were young and could live long enough to see when your people will drive you out." The Prophet asked: "Will they drive me out?" Waraqah replied: "Yes; never has a man come with what you have brought except that he was opposed" (Sahih al-Bukhari 3).

The revelation continued over twenty-three years: thirteen years in Mecca and ten years in Medina, until the completion of the Qur'an shortly before the Prophet's death.

The Meccan period: persecution and patience

The early years of Islam in Mecca (610-622 CE) were years of quiet preaching followed by escalating persecution. The Prophet (peace be upon him) began by calling his family and close friends. The first to believe were Khadijah (RA), Ali ibn Abi Talib (RA) who was living in his household, Zayd ibn Harithah (RA) his freed slave, and Abu Bakr al-Siddiq (RA) his closest friend. Through Abu Bakr, several other prominent early converts joined Islam.

When the Prophet (peace be upon him) began publicly declaring his message, the Quraysh reacted with hostility. Their objections were both theological (rejecting monotheism and the abandonment of their idols) and economic (the pilgrimage to the Kaaba and the commerce it generated depended on the polytheistic religious system). They began persecuting the early Muslims, particularly those who were slaves or poor and lacked tribal protection.

Among the most severe cases of persecution: Bilal ibn Rabah (RA), an Abyssinian slave, was tortured by his master Umayyah ibn Khalaf, laid on the burning sand with a heavy rock on his chest, and told to renounce Islam. He repeated "Ahad, Ahad" (One, One), referring to the oneness of Allah. Abu Bakr (RA) eventually purchased his freedom. Ammar ibn Yasir (RA), his parents Yasir and Sumayyah became the first martyrs of Islam when they were tortured to death for refusing to renounce their faith.

In 615 CE, the Prophet (peace be upon him) advised some of his followers to migrate to Abyssinia (modern Ethiopia), where the Christian king Ashama ibn Abjar, known as the Negus, provided them protection after hearing their testimony about Isa (Jesus). This was the first hijra of the Muslims. Two migrations to Abyssinia took place, with over eighty male companions making the second migration.

The Hijra to Medina: 622 CE

The turning point in Islamic history came in 622 CE with the Hijra, the migration of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and his companions from Mecca to Medina (then called Yathrib). This event was so significant that it became the starting point of the Islamic Hijri calendar. Year 1 AH (After Hijra) corresponds to 622 CE.

The migration followed several years of diplomatic groundwork. At the annual trade fair of Mecca, the Prophet (peace be upon him) had met men from Medina who became early converts. Two pledges of allegiance, known as the First and Second Pledges of Aqabah (620 and 621 CE), established a covenant of support between the Medinan converts and the Prophet (peace be upon him). The second pledge involved 73 men and 2 women who promised to protect the Prophet (peace be upon him) as they would protect their own families.

The Quraysh, learning of the migration plans, plotted to assassinate the Prophet (peace be upon him) by having men from every tribe strike simultaneously so that Banu Hashim could not seek blood retaliation from any single tribe. He escaped with Abu Bakr (RA), hiding in the Cave of Thawr for three days while the Quraysh searched for them, then making the journey to Medina. Ali ibn Abi Talib (RA) stayed behind in Mecca to return valuables that people had entrusted to the Prophet (peace be upon him), a measure of how much even the enemies of Islam trusted him personally.

In Medina, the Prophet (peace be upon him) established the first organized Muslim community. Among his first acts was the drafting of the Constitution of Medina, a written agreement between the Muhajiroon (immigrants from Mecca), the Ansar (helpers of Medina who welcomed them), and the Jewish tribes of Medina. This document is one of the earliest known constitutions in history, establishing mutual defense, freedom of religion, and the resolution of disputes under the Prophet's (peace be upon him) arbitration.

Major battles of the Medinan period

The Medinan period (622-632 CE) included several major military confrontations that shaped the survival and growth of the Muslim community.

Battle of Badr (624 CE / 2 AH). The first major military engagement of Islamic history. A Muslim force of approximately 313 men faced a Qurayshi army of around 1,000. The Muslims won decisively. The Qur'an references this battle extensively, particularly in Surah Al-Anfal, noting that Allah sent 1,000 angels to assist the believers (Qur'an 8:9). Seventy of the Quraysh's leaders were killed, and seventy were taken prisoner. This battle fundamentally altered the balance of power in Arabia.

Battle of Uhud (625 CE / 3 AH). The Quraysh returned with a larger army seeking revenge for Badr. The Muslims initially had the advantage but suffered a setback when a contingent of archers abandoned their assigned position to collect spoils, allowing the Qurayshi cavalry to circle around. The Prophet (peace be upon him) was wounded, and the Muslims suffered approximately 70 martyrs including Hamza ibn Abd al-Muttalib (RA), the Prophet's uncle. The battle and its lessons are extensively analyzed in the Qur'an (Surah Al-Imran 3:121-175) as a lesson in obedience and trust in Allah.

Battle of Khandaq (The Trench, 627 CE / 5 AH). The Quraysh formed a confederacy of Arab tribes and marched on Medina with an army of approximately 10,000. On the advice of Salman al-Farisi (RA), the Prophet (peace be upon him) had a trench dug around the exposed northern side of Medina. The strategy succeeded: the confederate army besieged Medina for approximately a month but could not cross the trench, and eventually withdrew after facing hardship and internal disagreements. The Qur'an refers to this battle in Surah Al-Ahzab (33:9-27).

Treaty of Hudaybiyyah (628 CE / 6 AH). The Prophet (peace be upon him) set out with approximately 1,400 companions to perform Umrah. The Quraysh blocked their entry to Mecca, and negotiations resulted in the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah: a ten-year truce, with the Muslims agreeing to return that year without performing Umrah, and to send back any Qurayshi who came to the Muslims without their guardian's permission, while the Quraysh would not return Muslims who reverted to Mecca. Outwardly it seemed like a defeat; the Qur'an called it "a clear victory" (Qur'an 48:1). The truce enabled peaceful propagation of Islam, and more people entered Islam in the two years following the treaty than in the preceding years of conflict.

The conquest of Mecca: 630 CE

When the Quraysh violated the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah by attacking a tribe allied with the Muslims, the Prophet (peace be upon him) mobilized an army. Accounts put its size at between 10,000 and 10,000 soldiers, compared to the initial force at Badr of 313. The Quraysh, unable to resist, offered no significant military opposition.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) entered Mecca peacefully. His general amnesty for the Meccans who had persecuted Muslims for over a decade is among the most studied moments of Islamic history. He asked the gathered Meccans: "What do you think I will do with you?" They replied: "A generous brother and the son of a generous brother." He said: "Go, for you are free." This amnesty was extended even to some of those who had committed the most severe crimes against Muslims.

He then entered the Kaaba, cleared it of the 360 idols, and restored it to its purpose as the house of pure worship of Allah alone. Bilal (RA), the former slave who had been tortured for his faith, was called to give the adhan from atop the Kaaba: a moment of extraordinary symbolic power.

The Farewell Sermon and death of the Prophet

In the tenth year after the Hijra (632 CE), the Prophet (peace be upon him) performed his only Hajj, accompanied by an estimated 100,000 to 140,000 companions. At the plain of Arafat, he delivered the Farewell Sermon, one of the most important speeches in human history. Its themes included: the sanctity of life and property, the equality of all people regardless of race or tribe, the rights of women, the prohibition of usury, and the importance of holding fast to the Qur'an and the Sunnah.

It was during this Hajj that the following verse was revealed, signaling the completion of the Islamic revelation:

"This day I have perfected for you your religion and completed My favor upon you and have approved for you Islam as religion." (Qur'an 5:3)

When Abu Bakr (RA) heard this verse, he wept, understanding it to mean that the completion of the religion also signaled that the Prophet's (peace be upon him) time on earth was nearing its end. The Prophet (peace be upon him) died in Medina in the month of Rabi al-Awwal, 11 AH (632 CE), at approximately 63 years of age, with his head in the lap of Aisha (RA). He was buried in the room where he died, which is now within the Prophet's Mosque in Medina.

The Khulafa al-Rashidun: 632-661 CE

The four Rightly-Guided Caliphs who succeeded the Prophet (peace be upon him) are among the most significant figures in Islamic history. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: "You must follow my Sunnah and the Sunnah of the Rightly-Guided Caliphs after me. Hold fast to it" (Abu Dawud 4607).

Abu Bakr al-Siddiq (632-634 CE, 2 years). The first caliph faced the Riddah wars: the apostasy and rebellion of tribes who had pledged Islam to the Prophet (peace be upon him) personally and considered themselves no longer bound after his death. Abu Bakr's firm decision to fight those who refused to pay zakah, treating it as apostasy from the obligations of Islam, preserved the unity of the Muslim community. He also initiated the compilation of the Qur'an into a single written manuscript after the deaths of many huffaz (memorizers) in the Battle of Yamama. Zayd ibn Thabit (RA) was appointed to lead this collection, narrated in Sahih al-Bukhari 4986. Abu Bakr died naturally in 634 CE after approximately two years of caliphate.

Umar ibn al-Khattab (634-644 CE, 10 years). The caliphate of Umar (RA) saw the most dramatic territorial expansion of early Islam. Under his leadership, the Muslim armies conquered Iraq, Persia (defeating the Sasanian Empire at the Battle of al-Qadisiyyah in 636 CE), the Levant (Syria, Palestine, and Jordan, defeating the Byzantine Empire at the Battle of Yarmouk in 636 CE), and Egypt. Jerusalem was taken without bloodshed; Umar (RA) personally traveled to receive the city's surrender and famously declined to pray inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre so that it would not become a precedent for converting it to a mosque. He established many of the administrative and governmental institutions of the Islamic state. He was assassinated in 644 CE by a Persian slave named Abu Lu'lu'ah.

Uthman ibn Affan (644-656 CE, 12 years). Uthman (RA) continued the territorial expansion and is most famous for commissioning the standardization of the Qur'anic manuscript. Copies of the official mushaf were sent to the major cities of the Islamic world, and variant copies were burned to prevent any divergence from the authorized text. He was assassinated in 656 CE by rebels who stormed his house while he was reading the Qur'an; his blood fell on the page he was reading. The assassination sparked the first major political crisis in Islamic history.

Ali ibn Abi Talib (656-661 CE, approximately 5 years). Ali (RA) was the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet (peace be upon him), married to the Prophet's daughter Fatimah (RA). His caliphate was dominated by civil conflict. The Battle of the Camel (656 CE) pitted him against Aisha (RA) and others who demanded investigation of Uthman's murder before pledging allegiance. The Battle of Siffin (657 CE) was fought against Muawiyah ibn Abi Sufyan (RA), the governor of Syria, who also demanded justice for Uthman. Ali (RA) was assassinated in 661 CE by a Kharijite extremist while praying Fajr in the masjid of Kufa.

The Umayyad Caliphate: 661-750 CE

After Ali's (RA) assassination, Muawiyah ibn Abi Sufyan established the Umayyad Caliphate with its capital in Damascus, inaugurating the first hereditary Muslim dynasty. The Umayyad period (661-750 CE) saw further enormous territorial expansion: Islamic rule reached Spain and Portugal (al-Andalus) in 711 CE under Tariq ibn Ziyad, extended across North Africa, and pushed east into Central Asia and the borders of India and China.

The Umayyad period is complex in Islamic historical memory. On one hand, the territorial expansion of Islam during this era was remarkable. On the other hand, the shift to dynastic hereditary succession and some of the political practices of Umayyad rulers are viewed critically by many Muslim historians. The tragedy of Karbala in 680 CE, in which Husayn ibn Ali (RA), the grandson of the Prophet (peace be upon him), was killed along with most of his family by the forces of the Umayyad governor Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad, remains one of the most painful events in Islamic history and is the origin of the Sunni-Shia split over questions of political succession.

The Abbasid Golden Age: 750-1258 CE

The Abbasid revolution of 750 CE overthrew the Umayyads (who survived only in al-Andalus, where they established an independent emirate) and transferred the caliphate to Baghdad, a newly built capital on the Tigris River. The Abbasid period, particularly from the reign of Harun al-Rashid (786-809 CE) through al-Ma'mun (813-833 CE), is known as the Islamic Golden Age.

Baghdad became the intellectual center of the world. The Bayt al-Hikmah (House of Wisdom), established under al-Ma'mun, was a major center of translation, scholarship, and research. Greek philosophical and scientific texts were translated into Arabic, studied, and then advanced far beyond their original state. Muslim scholars in this period made foundational contributions to virtually every field of human knowledge:

Mathematics: Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi (780-850 CE) developed algebra (the word itself comes from his book Al-Jabr) and introduced Hindu-Arabic numerals to the wider world. His name is the origin of the word "algorithm."

Medicine: Ibn Sina (Avicenna, 980-1037 CE) wrote the Canon of Medicine, which remained a standard medical textbook in European universities until the 17th century. Ibn al-Nafis (1213-1288 CE) described pulmonary circulation of the blood three centuries before William Harvey.

Optics: Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen, 965-1040 CE) wrote the Book of Optics, laying the foundations of modern optics and the scientific method. He was the first to accurately explain how vision works.

Astronomy: Al-Battani (858-929 CE) made precise measurements of astronomical constants. Muslim astronomers preserved and advanced Greek astronomy and gave many stars their Arabic names still used today.

Chemistry: Jabir ibn Hayyan (721-815 CE) is considered the father of chemistry, developing systematic experimental methods and discovering many basic chemical processes.

The great Islamic scholars

The Abbasid period also produced the four founders of the major schools of Islamic jurisprudence, whose legal reasoning continues to guide over a billion Muslims today.

Imam Abu Hanifa (699-767 CE) founded the Hanafi school, the most widely followed school of jurisprudence globally, predominant in Turkey, the Indian subcontinent, Central Asia, and much of the Arab world. He was known for his extensive use of reasoning (ra'y) and analogy (qiyas) in deriving legal rulings.

Imam Malik ibn Anas (711-795 CE) founded the Maliki school, predominant in North Africa, West Africa, and parts of the Arab world. His collection of hadith, the Muwatta, is one of the earliest surviving hadith collections. He gave significant weight to the practice of the people of Medina as a source of law.

Imam al-Shafi'i (767-820 CE) founded the Shafi'i school, predominant in East Africa, Southeast Asia, and parts of the Arab world. He was the first scholar to systematically articulate the theory of Islamic legal methodology (usul al-fiqh) in his work Al-Risala.

Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal (780-855 CE) founded the Hanbali school, predominant in Saudi Arabia and Qatar. He is also famous for his monumental hadith collection, the Musnad, containing over 27,000 hadith. He famously withstood imprisonment and flogging during the Mihna (the Abbasid inquisition on the createdness of the Qur'an) rather than compromise his theological position.

Alongside these four imams, the period produced hadith scholars of the highest rank: Imam al-Bukhari (810-870 CE), whose Sahih al-Bukhari is considered the most authentic book after the Qur'an; Imam Muslim (815-875 CE); Imam al-Tirmidhi (824-892 CE); Imam Abu Dawud (817-889 CE); and others whose work forms the foundation of Islamic hadith sciences.

The Mongol destruction: 1258 CE

The Abbasid Golden Age came to a devastating end in 1258 CE when the Mongol forces under Hulagu Khan sacked Baghdad. The caliph al-Musta'sim was executed. Contemporary accounts describe the destruction as catastrophic: the libraries of Baghdad, containing centuries of accumulated scholarship, were thrown into the Tigris River until the water reportedly ran black with ink. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed in the city.

The Mongol invasion is often cited as one of the greatest tragedies in Islamic history. It ended the Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad (a remnant Abbasid caliphate continued in Cairo under Mamluk protection until 1517). However, the story did not end in defeat: within a generation, the Mongol rulers of the Middle East and Central Asia had themselves converted to Islam. The religion they came to destroy became their own faith.

The Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt stopped the Mongol advance at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260 CE, the first major defeat of the Mongol army and a turning point that halted Mongol expansion into Africa and possibly into Western Europe.

The Ottoman Empire: 1299-1922 CE

The Ottoman Empire, founded by Osman I around 1299 CE, became the longest-lasting and most powerful Islamic empire in history. At its height in the 16th and 17th centuries, it controlled Anatolia, southeastern Europe (including the Balkans and Hungary), the Arab world (including Mecca and Medina after 1517), North Africa, and much of the Middle East.

The conquest of Constantinople in 1453 CE by Sultan Mehmed II ("the Conqueror") fulfilled a prophecy attributed to the Prophet (peace be upon him) and ended the Byzantine Empire after a thousand years. The conversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque became a symbol of Islamic civilization's triumph. The city was renamed Istanbul and became the new capital of the Ottoman Empire.

The Ottoman sultans also held the title of Caliph from 1517 onwards, after the last Abbasid caliph in Cairo transferred the title to the Ottoman sultan Selim I following the Ottoman conquest of Egypt. The Ottoman Caliphate remained the symbolic center of Sunni Muslim political unity until its abolition by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in 1924 CE, two years after the formal end of the Ottoman Empire in 1922.

Ottoman contributions to Islamic civilization include architectural masterpieces (the Suleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul, the Blue Mosque), legal codification (the Mecelle), preservation of the Haramayn (the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina), and centuries of relative stability across a vast multicultural empire.

The modern Muslim world

The 19th and 20th centuries brought European colonialism to most of the Muslim world: the British controlled India, Egypt, Sudan, and Malaysia; the French controlled North and West Africa; the Dutch controlled Indonesia; the Ottoman heartland was carved up after World War I. The dismantling of the Ottoman Caliphate in 1924 CE left the Muslim world without a recognized political center for the first time in over a millennium.

The 20th century saw the independence movements and the emergence of modern Muslim-majority nation-states across Asia and Africa. The founding of Saudi Arabia in 1932 CE brought the holy cities under a unified Arab state. Pakistan was created in 1947 CE as a Muslim-majority homeland in South Asia. Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim-majority country, gained independence in 1945 CE.

Islamic revival movements of the 19th and 20th centuries, from the scholarly reformism of Shah Waliullah in India, to the Salafi movement originating with Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab in Arabia, to the Muslim Brotherhood founded by Hassan al-Banna in Egypt in 1928 CE, shaped the intellectual and political landscape of contemporary Islam.

Today, there are approximately 1.8 billion Muslims in the world, roughly 24% of the global population, making Islam the second-largest religion after Christianity and the fastest-growing major religion by population. Muslims form majorities in over 50 countries. Indonesia has the largest Muslim population of any single country, followed by Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India. In Europe and North America, Muslim minority communities have grown significantly through immigration and conversion over the past century.

The story of Islamic history is not finished. It is a living tradition carried by 1.8 billion people who read the same Qur'an that was revealed in 610 CE, pray the same prayers that the Prophet (peace be upon him) performed, and hold fast to a chain of scholarship and practice that stretches unbroken across fourteen centuries.

FAQ

When did Islam begin?

The first revelation of the Qur'an came to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) in 610 CE, in the Cave of Hira near Mecca, when he was 40 years old. The first revealed verse was "Read in the name of your Lord who created" (Qur'an 96:1). The Islamic calendar, however, begins with the Hijra (migration to Medina) in 622 CE, which marks the founding of the first organized Muslim community.

Who were the Khulafa al-Rashidun?

The Khulafa al-Rashidun (the Rightly-Guided Caliphs) were the four successors of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him): Abu Bakr al-Siddiq (632-634 CE), Umar ibn al-Khattab (634-644 CE), Uthman ibn Affan (644-656 CE), and Ali ibn Abi Talib (656-661 CE). The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: "Hold fast to my Sunnah and the Sunnah of the Rightly-Guided Caliphs after me" (Abu Dawud 4607).

What was the Islamic Golden Age?

The Islamic Golden Age refers primarily to the Abbasid period (roughly 8th to 13th centuries CE, centered in Baghdad), during which Muslim scholars made foundational contributions to mathematics, astronomy, medicine, philosophy, chemistry, and literature. Key figures include Ibn Sina (Avicenna) in medicine, al-Khwarizmi in algebra, Ibn al-Haytham in optics, and al-Biruni in anthropology. The translation movement made Greek classical knowledge available and then advanced it significantly.

When was the Quran compiled?

The Qur'an was collected into a single written manuscript (mushaf) during the caliphate of Abu Bakr (632-634 CE), after many of the huffaz (memorizers of the Qur'an) were killed at the Battle of Yamama. Zayd ibn Thabit (RA) was appointed to lead the compilation. Under Caliph Uthman (644-656 CE), a standardized master copy was produced and distributed to the major cities, with variant copies ordered to be destroyed. This is narrated in Sahih al-Bukhari 4986.

How many Muslims are there today?

There are approximately 1.8 billion Muslims in the world today, making Islam the second-largest religion after Christianity and the fastest-growing major religion. Muslims constitute majorities in over 50 countries and significant minorities in many others. Indonesia has the world's largest Muslim population by country, followed by Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India.