ABSTRACT
The seventh century is a touchstone for the assertion of behavior by contemporary Muslims. Whether in the orthodox prescriptions of the sunna or in efforts to reimagine Muhammad and his companions as proponents of feminism or pluralism, the events of this period remain central to the Muslim imaginary. One part of this seventh century context was the futuh, the divinely approved conquest of the Middle East. Aside from providing much of the raw material for the biographies of early Muslim leaders, especially the Rashidun caliphs, the futuh also a history to a shared Muslim identity as an umma, an identity that has become especially significant in a modern global context. The futuh provides a moment of struggle that brings about Muslim triumph, which shows the personal characteristics of ideal Muslim leaders and demonstrates God's endorsement of Muhammad's mission through military victory. For the English-speaking Muslim diaspora, accounts of the futuh offer a strangely Janus-faced image. On one hand, public accounts often downplay the military aspects of the sources: a narrative of the “spread of Islam” fits into a discourse of Islam as the religion of peace, occasionally contrasted to Christian violence in the Crusades. In this chapter, I seek to survey the representation of the futuh in English-language school textbooks in the United Kingdom and on English-language Internet sites to inquire into the role this period plays in Muslim self-fashioning in a contemporary context.
