Why didn't the Balkans become muslim?

[Targon]

This is not quite true. The Bosnians decided to become Muslims voluntarily.

That doesnt contradicts what I said. Yes they decided voluntarily but not because suddenly they all had divine dreams telling them to become Muslims or something. Many of them converted for practical reasons. Being Muslim was more beneficial in a Muslim ruled empire.

 

[Kambojaric]

This is not quite true. The Bosnians decided to become Muslims voluntarily.

That doesnt contradicts what I said. Yes they decided voluntarily but not because suddenly they all had divine dreams telling them to become Muslims or something. Many of them converted for practical reasons. Being Muslim was more beneficial in a Muslim ruled empire.

Bosniaks are an interesting people. For example prior to the advent of the Ottomans this region had already been a bit of a rebel as far as mainstream religion was concerned. Bogomilism and the Bosnian Church were heretics as per the Catholics and Orthodox. This rebel nature may have aided the popularity of Islam in Bosnia.

 

[SALMAN F]

Because Ottoman Empire had no policy of forced conversion in mass scale. Which was good, otherwise it would backfire and possibly cause massive rebellions. Plus Christian minority means extra taxes, more Christians more extra taxes.

Those people who converted to Islam, like Bosnians, Albanians, Pomaks etc. did so because economically and socially being Muslim was an advantage in Ottoman Empire.

I know that the muslims didn't force their religion on others only some rate cases bu I think the ottomans didn't do much preaching like other Muslims did in Malaysia and indonisia for example they both became muslim by the arab and other muslims traders

 

[Fenasi Kerim]

I want to give you another example from Turkish history. Talas war. Great Turkish cities to the east of the Caspian were raided by Arab armies and thousands of Turks were massacred. Conclusion? The entrance Islam of the Turks in a collective way was almost 200 years late.

Entrance of Turks to Islam had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with the Talas battle or Arabs, yes Turks sided with the Arabs due to war with the Chinese however they kept to their shamanist beliefs.

Turkish cities? as? Those massacres Arabs committed were mainly of Persian peoples, they were very oppressive. However Turks were mainly nomadic and lived well beyond the Transoxiana, the places you will mention had mainly Iranian populations.

Turks, Mongols and Persians were actually very lenient compared to Arabs when it came to ruling, Arabs till this day continue there assimilation policies no differently.

Another factor could be that in the Balkans, the rulers were mainly locals who were appointed and had accepted Ottoman rule where as Arab empires it was almost always someone appointed of Arabian origin from the peninsula, that is why Arab empires did not last long or recover like the Turkic ones. Ottomans governed the way the Romans did, conquer and appoint locals, so long as they pay taxes no problem.

I know that the muslims didn't force their religion on others only some rate cases bu I think the ottomans didn't do much preaching like other Muslims did in Malaysia and indonisia for example they both became muslim by the arab and other muslims traders

Mainly through Sufi's and such preachers, same in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh IMO the difference is these people's followed Buddhism, Hinduism, local religions etc which was far easier to convert then those following a well establish religion & theological traditions like Christianity or Judaism.

 

[xenon54 out]

I know that the muslims didn't force their religion on others only some rate cases bu I think the ottomans didn't do much preaching like other Muslims did in Malaysia and indonisia for example they both became muslim by the arab and other muslims traders

I think it depends on the different Islamic schools that Arabs and Turks generally have apart from some exceptions.
This is even visible today, the countries following Hanafi School are more on the liberal side and adapted better to the geography and native traditions compared to other schools so i can imagine the spreading of religion was also less ''agressive''.

 

[SouI]

Plus Christian minority means extra taxes, more Christians more extra taxes.

That is also what led to the dissolution of the empire.

 

[Mucahit]

I don't care about being Muslim or Christian but we should've definitely used a better Turkification system, we could've at least kept Western Thrace and large parts of Bulgaria today. The same goes for the Middle East as well.

A shame Ottomans didn't care about Turkification back then and not only that they also kicked out & exiled Shia and Alevite Turks out of Eastern Anatolia instead invited Kurdish clans thus today Eastern Turkey today is majority Kurdish and we have a separatist problem.

 

[Fenasi Kerim]

I don't care about being Muslim or Christian but we should've definitely used a better Turkification system, we could've at least kept Western Thrace and large parts of Bulgaria today. The same goes for the Middle East as well.

A shame Ottomans didn't care about Turkification back then and not only that they also kicked out & exiled Shia and Alevite Turks out of Eastern Anatolia instead invited Kurdish clans thus today Eastern Turkey today is majority Kurdish and we have a separatist problem.

Agree with the Turkification part, however if they didn’t “kick” out the kizilbash, south eastern Turkey today could have belonged to Iran....

I don’t mean to discriminate against those belonging to a different faith however they were open to manipulation then.

 

[Targon]

Agree with the Turkification part, however if they didn’t “kick” out the kizilbash, south eastern Turkey today could have belonged to Iran....

I don’t mean to discriminate against those belonging to a different faith however they were open to manipulation then.

Another scenario is, they could simply embrace a Bektashi stance in their religious affairs, nulling the need for Iran among Qizilbash.

 

[SALMAN F]

Agree with the Turkification part, however if they didn’t “kick” out the kizilbash, south eastern Turkey today could have belonged to Iran....

I don’t mean to discriminate against those belonging to a different faith however they were open to manipulation then.

I don't really think so because southern Iraq is majority Shia yet it didn't become part of Iran

Maybe the ottomans should have used preaching to Sunnism instead of kicking them out

 

[Yatağanlı]

Around 30-40% of the Balkans population was muslim. But then this happened:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Muslims_during_Ottoman_contraction

But this is not a genocide of course. It's only a genocide when you kill christians.

 

[UkroTurk]

Bosnia had converted İslam before Trabzon and Rize cities aka Pontus State.

 

[Saho]

From what I've read:

- The Balkan wars resulted into a huge population exchange, national expansion and expulsion of Slavic Muslims by Orthodox Christian insurgents (Serb, Greece and Bulgaria) in the late 18th century.

- Many of them also had to flee previously because of the Russo-Turkish wars in which led to huge population movements. The majority of the Muslim population was also expelled during the wars.

 

[A.A. Khan]

Hi every one I decided to open this thread in the turkish section to ask this question since it involved the Ottoman Empire and other Turkic folks about why didn't the Balkan and other parts of Europe didn't become muslim like Spain, Portugal and Sicily

Present day Bulgaria, Macedonia, Crimea[Ukraine] had a near muslim majority in the late 19th century. Skopje, capital of macedonia was a muslim majority city in Ottoman times. Wars, serbianization, persecutional policies led to huge exodus [muhajirism] and deaths. Bulgarian Muslims [indigenous] were killed or deported in mass no.s. Place which is still Muslim majority like Western Bosnia's area of Slavonia had a big muslim presence till 1989. To this day most Bosnias of that region have never been able to go back as that area is operated by Srpska republic that does'nt allow Muslims to be resettled. The Muslims from Slav region had always been lax about religion, they were never religious more traditional or tengri in nature. Drink alcohol, eat pork don't attend mosque. Still the local christians can't stand there Turkish names and culture.

There is a reason why Afghanistan or Dagestan [East Caucasus;Chechnya, ingushetia] survived the onslaught of Russians who were more ruthless towards Muslims than Serbians, in ethnic cleansing, mass killings and displacement. They were/are very religious. Whenever Russia captured territory, it resorted to mass displacement campaigns targeted towards Muslims and fill in Russians in that area. Serbians followed it in Yugoslavia and India also trying this policy in Kashmir, There are more Tatars displaced around Russia than living in Tatarstan. But Dagestan region and Afghanistan is where Russia failed to settle any Russians and broke up their Soviet republic.

 

[fitpOsitive]

Hi every one I decided to open this thread in the turkish section to ask this question since it involved the Ottoman Empire and other Turkic folks about why didn't the Balkan and other parts of Europe didn't become muslim like Spain, Portugal and Sicily

Even Spain and whole of India didn't become muslim. Because there is no compulsion in Islam.
@Zuraib Qasit Khan Deccani