Clergy in the Umayyad Era

Abstract

The study reveals the positive role enjoyed by the clerics and the positive role they played, the vast majority of whom were the Companions of the Messenger of God, in the field of jurisprudence and Sharia, and solving problems and new developments affecting Muslims in the affairs of their religion, especially in the countries of conquest, where new elements entered for the first time in Islam. Arabic and non-Arabic, as well as in the affairs of their dealings, what made it easy for the clerics to solve what was problematic for Muslims was their capabilities, their knowledge of religious sciences, and people’s acceptance of them. The Islamic military leaders also played an important role in managing the areas that the Muslims entered as conquerors and sought to stabilize them and spread security in them, whether in their good management, application of the principles of Islamic law, and overcoming all difficulties through dialogue despite some intellectual differences, and the followers continued this in the policy approach of the Companions of Prophet Mohammad peace be upon him. Several schools of thought and jurisprudence appeared in Muslim countries, especially in the Levant, and spread in and outside the Levant. The Umayyad Caliphate made peaceful efforts to try to reconcile ideas and doctrines. Such as the doctrine of Qadariyah or Al-Awza’i, the purpose of which is to preserve the unity of the Islamic state and prevent it from slipping into internal disputes or conflicts. The Umayyad state was sometimes forced to use cruelty and weakness with some of the opponents, and the matter sometimes reached the point of imprisonment or killing because some of the opponents did not hesitate to oppose the Umayyads publicly. The Umayyad state succeeded in doing this temporarily, but it did not succeed until the end, as evidenced by the fact that the opposition’s ideology persisted until it weakened it and facilitated its downfall.