“The tap of the white ablution fount weeps in despair, like a passionate lover weeping at the departure of the beloved. Over dwellings emptied of Islam, vacated, whose inhabitants now live in unbelief, where the mosques have become churches in which only bells and crosses are found....O who will redress the humiliation of a people who were once powerful, a people whose condition injustice and tyrants have changed? Yesterday they were kings in their own homes, but today they are slaves in the land of the infidel…. And were you to behold their weeping when they are sold, it would strike fear into your heart, and sorrow would seize you….The heart melts with sorrow at such sights, if there is any Islam or faith in that heart!”
To this day Andalus evokes among Muslims nostalgia for a golden age when the resonated with the sound of prayer every morning and the name of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was honored every day. No other country was contested between Muslims and Christians as bitterly as was Spain. The struggle went on for 500 years. When the battles had ended and the last adhan (call to prayer) was said from the ramparts of Granada in 1492, Muslims had lost the crown jewel of the Maghrib. Soon, they would be tortured and expelled, along with the Jews; from a land they considered the garden of the west. Their monuments were razed, their mosques destroyed, their libraries burned and their women were sent as slaves to the courts of Europe. It was a turning point, a milestone and an event that profoundly and fundamentally changed the flow of global events.
When the Muslims followed the Qur’an and Sunnah, they made spectacular progress in all the fields of life. They got returns and rewards far above their own expectations. Even the non-Muslims and those living beyond the Spanish frontiers availed of the fruits of Muslim creativity and contributions. But as soon as they turned their backs to the Qur’an and Sunnah, they got set on a perilous path. Muslims of Spain deviated from the right path. They violated the principles of unity and brotherhood of Islam. They gave up labor and hard work and went into the laps of lavishness and luxuries. They got caught up in the quagmire of intrigues and insurgencies, revolts and rebellions. In fact they went too far away from the principles and practices of Islam. Consequently, they lost all grace and glory. They were eventually buried deep under the dust and debris of miseries and misfortunes.
“Throughout the period of Islamic rule, Al-Andalus was a remarkable example and outstanding model of tolerance.” We fail to remember that the tolerance the Muslims, in accordance to their faith, displayed towards the Jews and Christians enabled them all to live together in relative peace and harmony, an indication of the Greatness of Islam, without question. Nowhere else has there been so long and so close of a relationship between the 3 Great faiths. All Jews and Christians were allowed to maintain their beliefs and live their lives as they desired as long as they respected their Muslim rulers.
After driving the Muslims out of Spain the Christian victors wrought havoc with the remaining Muslim population. The savageries they committed have no match in the history of brutality. An all-out massacre was started. Thousands of innocent Muslim civilians were murdered mercilessly. Those who escaped the inferno were forcibly converted to Christianity. Only a handful of Muslims could manage to flee to North Africa. During their rule, the Muslims had filled Spain with scholarly books. The Christian victors reduced all those books to ashes, and desecration of the mosques became the order of the day. A number of the magnificent Muslim monuments were demolished. Indeed the wave of victors’ vengeance touched the peaks of savagery. The Muslims of Spain got an exemplary punishment for their negligence towards the Holy Qur’an and the Prophet’s Sunnah.
In 1492, we also learn of the mass exodus from Spain, due to the inquisition ordered by Queen Isabella. Many Muslims and Jews left Andalusia because their rights were taken from them. However, they were very fortunate if they were able to escape with their lives from their own land. Muslims were ordered to convert or be killed. Many stayed behind and secretly remained Muslim, while others who resisted were burned at the stake. An estimated 3 million were expelled from Spain, along with all of Spain’s skilled workers and masterminds. Undoubtedly, Spain soon found herself victim to her own cruelty.
Until the inquisition, Muslims were free to practice their religion freely. However, during the inquisition led by Isabella, the rights of Muslims and Jews were taken away. The final expulsion occurred in early 17th century when all the remaining ‘Moriscos,’ those who were forcibly baptized, were forced from Spain in 1605. The inquisition was finally completed, and naturally, Spain fell into depression and was reduced to nothingness.
Spanish government officials placed strict restrictions on the Moriscos to try to make sure they were not still secretly practicing Islam, which many were of course doing. Moriscos had to leave the doors to their homes open on Thursday nights and Friday mornings, so soldiers can pass by and look in to make sure they were not bathing, as Muslims are supposed to do before the congregational prayer of Friday. Any Muslim caught reading the Qur’an or making ablution could be immediately killed. For this reason, they were forced to find ways to practice their religion in secret, constantly in fear of being found.
One of the most important reasons for the fragmentation of the Maghrib – and the loss of Andalus – was the loss of legitimacy of rule. A ruler and a system of government that is accepted as legitimate, elicits its support from the people. Such support is essential to building a civilization. Conversely, rule that is considered illegitimate is constantly challenged and can only be sustained by force.