RayKalm
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Iran
Turkey
The Islamic conquest of Persia (637-651) led to the end of the Sassanid Empire and the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion in Persia. However, the achievements of the previous Persian civilizations were not lost, but were to a great extent absorbed by the new Islamic polity. Islam has been the official religion of Iran since then, except short duration after Mongol raid and establishment of Ilkhanate. Iran became an Islamic republic after the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
Before the Islamic conquest, the Persians had been mainly Zoroastrian, however, there were also large and thriving Christian and Jewish communities. Eastern Iran (what is now Afghanistan) was predominantly Buddhist. There was a slow but steady movement of the population toward Islam. When Islam was introduced to Iranians, the nobility and city-dwellers were the first to convert, Islam spread more slowly among the peasantry and the dihqans, or landed gentry. By the late 11th century, the majority of Persians had become Muslim, at least nominally.
Though Iran is known today as a stronghold of the Shi'a Muslim faith, it did not become so until much later, around the 15th century. The Safavid dynasty made Shi'a Islam the official state religion in the early sixteenth century and aggressively proselytized on its behalf. It is also believed that by the mid-seventeenth century most people in Iran had become Shi'as, an affiliation that has continued. Over the following centuries, with the state-fostered rise of a Persian-based Shi'ite clergy, a synthesis was formed between Persian culture and Shi'ite Islam that marked each indelibly with the tincture of the other.
Nowadays Islam is the religion of 98% of Iranians, approximately 90% of Iranians are Shi'a and 8% are Sunni, mostly Turkomen, a minority of Arabs (mainly in Hormozgan Province), Baluchs, and Kurds living in the south, southeast, northeast and northwest. Almost all of Iranian Shi'as are Twelvers.
The Seljuk Empire (Turkish controlled Persian empire)
The Sassanid Empire (Last Iranian/Persian Empire before Islam reached them)
The Persian Empire (Before Islam reached the Iranians)
The Ottoman Empire (Turkish controlled Caliphate, last Caliphate of Islam)
Turkey
The Islamic conquest of Persia (637-651) led to the end of the Sassanid Empire and the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion in Persia. However, the achievements of the previous Persian civilizations were not lost, but were to a great extent absorbed by the new Islamic polity. Islam has been the official religion of Iran since then, except short duration after Mongol raid and establishment of Ilkhanate. Iran became an Islamic republic after the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
Before the Islamic conquest, the Persians had been mainly Zoroastrian, however, there were also large and thriving Christian and Jewish communities. Eastern Iran (what is now Afghanistan) was predominantly Buddhist. There was a slow but steady movement of the population toward Islam. When Islam was introduced to Iranians, the nobility and city-dwellers were the first to convert, Islam spread more slowly among the peasantry and the dihqans, or landed gentry. By the late 11th century, the majority of Persians had become Muslim, at least nominally.
Though Iran is known today as a stronghold of the Shi'a Muslim faith, it did not become so until much later, around the 15th century. The Safavid dynasty made Shi'a Islam the official state religion in the early sixteenth century and aggressively proselytized on its behalf. It is also believed that by the mid-seventeenth century most people in Iran had become Shi'as, an affiliation that has continued. Over the following centuries, with the state-fostered rise of a Persian-based Shi'ite clergy, a synthesis was formed between Persian culture and Shi'ite Islam that marked each indelibly with the tincture of the other.
Nowadays Islam is the religion of 98% of Iranians, approximately 90% of Iranians are Shi'a and 8% are Sunni, mostly Turkomen, a minority of Arabs (mainly in Hormozgan Province), Baluchs, and Kurds living in the south, southeast, northeast and northwest. Almost all of Iranian Shi'as are Twelvers.
Arab Muslims conquests have been variously seen in Iran: by some as a blessing, the advent of the true faith, the end of the age of ignorance and heathenism; by others as a humiliating national defeat, the conquest and subjugation of the country by foreign invaders. Both perceptions are of course valid, depending on one's angle of vision… Iran was indeed Islamized, but it was not Arabized. Persians remained Persians. And after an interval of silence, Iran reemerged as a separate, different and distinctive element within Islam, eventually adding a new element even to Islam itself. Culturally, politically, and most remarkable of all even religiously, the Iranian contribution to this new Islamic civilization is of immense importance. The work of Iranians can be seen in every field of cultural endeavor, including Arabic poetry, to which poets of Iranian origin composing their poems in Arabic made a very significant contribution. In a sense, Iranian Islam is a second advent of Islam itself, a new Islam sometimes referred to as Islam-i Ajam. It was this Persian Islam, rather than the original Arab Islam, that was brought to new areas and new peoples: to the Turks, first in Central Asia and then in the Middle East in the country which came to be called Turkey, and of course to India. The Ottoman Turks brought a form of Iranian civilization to the walls of Vienna."
The Seljuk Empire (Turkish controlled Persian empire)
![420px-Seljuk_Empire_locator_map.svg.png](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2Fc%2Fc3%2FSeljuk_Empire_locator_map.svg%2F420px-Seljuk_Empire_locator_map.svg.png&hash=f86532d89f41a5eb99b476b1172015fb)
The Sassanid Empire (Last Iranian/Persian Empire before Islam reached them)
![Sassanid_empire_map.png](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2F5%2F58%2FSassanid_empire_map.png&hash=aa338f24fbfd278fbd0c8212cbc26e02)
The Persian Empire (Before Islam reached the Iranians)
![799px-Achaemenid_Empire.png](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2Fd%2Fdc%2FAchaemenid_Empire.png%2F799px-Achaemenid_Empire.png&hash=e76fb2c5dfbf5edf9d8de5e4ac6e8d62)
The Ottoman Empire (Turkish controlled Caliphate, last Caliphate of Islam)
![250px-OttomanEmpireIn1683.png](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2F0%2F06%2FOttomanEmpireIn1683.png%2F250px-OttomanEmpireIn1683.png&hash=f4f765c93083baa07fcca47799d13dad)