Omayyad mosque in Damascus

Afghan-American writer, lecturer, and teacher Tamim Ansary is man ideally placed to help Westerners see the history of our world through another set of eyes.  Growing up in Afghanistan as a young history buff, Ansary had an opportunity to read and learn about the world from dual perspectives.  A decade ago, when he was working as a textbook editor, a publisher in Texas hired him to develop a new world history textbook for high school students.

“What that meant was that I had to select and arrange the most consequential events to reveal the arc of history, not a chronological list of every damn thing that ever happened,” Ansary said.   What emerged was a narrative of civilization that included both “the West” and “Islam.”  From his textbook, Ansary went on to write another book, this time for adults – Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World through Islamic Eyes.  That book is about to be re-published in paperback edition.

Ancient Times – Mesopotamia and Persia

Ansary begins with two lists of the pivotal periods in human history – as seen both through Western eyes and through Islamic eyes.  For both, it is the year 3500 BC (before Christ in the Western calendar) – or 3500 BCE (before the Common Era, as it’s known in both Muslim and Jewish traditions).   “The first traces of what you might call ‘civilization’ emerged along the Tigris and Euphrates River and a little later in Egypt,” Ansary said.  “Writing is part of it; cities are part of it; irrigation systems and inventions like the wheel.”

In the Middle East, a pattern recurred again and again, Ansary explains.  “A city would be built up; the nomads would take over that city and become the civilized people.  They would expand the empire the city had once ruled; then, new nomads would come and expand the empire again.  That process came to a climax with the Persian Empire, which ruled a realm stretching from the Indus River to Egypt.”  In the Mediterranean region, Ansary notes, this period roughly overlaps the Western civilization of Greece and Rome.

Birth of Islam

In terms of cultural identity, the most critical historical period for Muslims is the birth of Islam – specifically the Hijra, the flight of the Prophet Mohammed from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE.  “About 610,” Ansary recounts, “the Prophet went to a cave and meditated.  And he felt he had been visited by the angel Gabriel, who told him he was the messenger of Allah. That message was that there is only one God.  You shouldn’t worship idols.  This one God has given humanity freedom of choice, but will hold them responsible for their choices.  Time will end and there will be a day of judgment, and people will be sorted into those who have done good, who will go to heaven, and those who have done evil, who will go to hell – for eternity.” (more…)