Islam never arose, instead full Roman Catholicism or a variant spread through the Middle East and other areas?

CarlManvers2019

Writers Blocked Douchebag
As the title says, how would things go? Would there still be future crusades to take Jerusalem? Would there be more than three popes?

Would Christianity and its variants be more aggressive due to increased numbers when it comes to converting others?
 
D

Deleted member

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Sol’s right, the first big observation is that most Christian heresies lost out due to Islam, and the Popes would be much more likely to lose control of eastern civilisation’s Christianity, not less, because it would be much harder to control.

The next biggest observation though would be that North Africa would likely end up culturally indistinguishable from southern Europe.
 
D

Deleted member 88

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I've always figured Arabia would sooner or later enter the greater Mediterranean cultural and political orbit anyway. And that Arab population increases meant there'd likely be some migrations. Given that the Romans and Sassanids used Arab mercenaries, proxies and foederati-I expect you may have seen some sort of repeat of the Germanic migrations. Though perhaps-the Byzantines would have held onto Egypt and Syria-I could see large Arab migration to these regions anyway, either through peaceful or unpeaceful means. The byzantines might hold political sway still-but there'd be a degree of Arabization, even if the Arabs were Romanized/Christianized/Hellenized/Persianized?

The Visigoths were perennially unstable-and sooner or later would have collapsed. And I could see the Franks, and yes Berber mercenaries and adventurers gaining clout or outright territory in Spain.

Geopolitically-the Sassanids were exhausted, and fought a civil war or two IIRC, before the Arab invasions came hard. I expect either that dynasty would have been overthrown or it would have reconstituted itself.

And thus the cycle of Roman-Persian wars would continue in some way-simply to the competing geopolitics and geographic location, it makes conflict inevitable. We see that with the Ottoman-Safavid conflicts as well.

Though an 8th round between the Romans and Sassanids specifically is questionable, if possible.

The Byzantines are going to lose control of Italy sooner or later. They might hold on longer due to not constantly defending Anatolia, and I could see a lasting Byzantine control in southern Italy-but everything north of Rome is simply untenable in the long run.

Other effects are harder to predict-Central Asia remains a meeting ground between different religions longer, and Christianity continues to grow in Persia, India was divided at this time, and would likely remain so.

Tang China probably reaches the limits of what it can control in Central Asia-internal rebellions will mark its end. Though without an Arab victory at Talas-the Chinese likely have the nominal allegiance of any polities in that region(the Tarim basin being that) for quite a while.

The Turks and other nomads never convert to Islam-this doesn't stop periodic nomad invasions into Europe, India, and the Middle East.

Beyond that-its impossible to say. Islam is just so important to world history, it was a sort of reset in some ways-changing just about everything, even beyond where it conquered. After a while-an alternate history writer dealing with this scenario can just plausibly make things up.
 
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WolfBear

Well-known member
I wonder if cousin marriage will become much less widespread in a scenario where there is no Islam. The spread of Islam was also accompanied by the spread of Arabian Peninsula FBD (father's brother's daughter) cousin marriage patterns, after all:


No Islam and this doesn't happen unless some other religion begins in the Arabian Peninsula and subsequently goes on an extremely massive conquering spree.
 

Buba

A total creep
No Islam = Roman Patriarch remains one of the Big Five, alongside his peers - yes, PEERS - from Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Jerusalem (alphabetical order).
No Catholicism vs. Orthodox split as we know it evah.
 

stevep

Well-known member
No Islam = Roman Patriarch remains one of the Big Five, alongside his peers - yes, PEERS - from Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Jerusalem (alphabetical order).
No Catholicism vs. Orthodox split as we know it evah.

Not as we know it but bound to be some divisions, especially as the faith maintains control of its territories OTL lost to Islam and also spreads into other areas. Its simply too big an area plus too many political advantages for clerics to squabble over doctrine as a way of seeking to extend their power or undermine rivals.

At some point, especially since the Byzantine empire could well last longer as a great power the rivalry between the empire and the Papacies desire for dominance is going to cause conflict which for political as well as religious reasons is probably going to become a permanent division. Plus your going to have the eastern faiths lasting much longer without Islam as a less oppressive [in the earlier centuries anyway] alternative to Orthodox so likely continued unrest in Egypt and Syria with the former probably likely to gain independence at some point.

Whether Christianity can decisively defeat Zoroastrianism would be a big issues as its the one faith, other than Judaism which is largely eclipsed as a power by this stage, with the centralised faith system to potentially resist Christian encroachment. However Zoroastrianism didn't seem to travel well itself so even if it remained dominant in its heartlands then either by the northern steppes or the Indian Ocean merchants can bring assorted forms of Christianity to areas further east. How they interact with Buddhism, Hinduism and Confucianism would be the big issues.

While I agree with comments above about the posted video one point I would agree on is that the identity of a 'Europe' would be much weaker without Islam isolating it and by largely confining Orthodox and absorbing other sects enabling Catholicism to become so overwhelmingly dominant.
 

WolfBear

Well-known member
Not as we know it but bound to be some divisions, especially as the faith maintains control of its territories OTL lost to Islam and also spreads into other areas. Its simply too big an area plus too many political advantages for clerics to squabble over doctrine as a way of seeking to extend their power or undermine rivals.

At some point, especially since the Byzantine empire could well last longer as a great power the rivalry between the empire and the Papacies desire for dominance is going to cause conflict which for political as well as religious reasons is probably going to become a permanent division. Plus your going to have the eastern faiths lasting much longer without Islam as a less oppressive [in the earlier centuries anyway] alternative to Orthodox so likely continued unrest in Egypt and Syria with the former probably likely to gain independence at some point.

Whether Christianity can decisively defeat Zoroastrianism would be a big issues as its the one faith, other than Judaism which is largely eclipsed as a power by this stage, with the centralised faith system to potentially resist Christian encroachment. However Zoroastrianism didn't seem to travel well itself so even if it remained dominant in its heartlands then either by the northern steppes or the Indian Ocean merchants can bring assorted forms of Christianity to areas further east. How they interact with Buddhism, Hinduism and Confucianism would be the big issues.

While I agree with comments above about the posted video one point I would agree on is that the identity of a 'Europe' would be much weaker without Islam isolating it and by largely confining Orthodox and absorbing other sects enabling Catholicism to become so overwhelmingly dominant.

Confining Orthodox to Eastern Europe? And Protestantism subsequently became a huge rival to Catholicism after the start of the Reformation.

In regards to India specifically, it's worth noting that the parts of India (or more accurately, South Asia) that became the most Islamized were the parts of the Indian periphery--so, east Bengal, west Punjab, most of Sindh, and Kashmir. In some of these areas, Islam was the religion of the plough and since agriculture was introduced into these areas by Muslim dynasties, a lot of people there subsequently converted to Islam:


In Sindh, it was primarily the Buddhists who converted to Islam while the Hindus largely maintained their traditional faith, which is why Sindh continued to have a huge Hindu population until 1947.

Here, Hinduism is going to be competing with Buddhism and possibly later Christianity on the Indian periphery while the Indian heartland will probably remain solidly Hindu due to Hindu influence being more widespread there. Though you could potentially see, say, Hindu and Christian traditions being combined in some areas even there eventually depending on just how deeply into the Indian core Christianity will eventually penetrate in this TL.
 

Buba

A total creep
Papacy's desire for dominance
The Roman Patriarch ending up with a state of his own is IMO a fluke. It was opportunity coming together with papal personalities.
IMO it as the whittling down of the Big Five to defacto two that enabled the Catholic vs Orthodox split. Had Antioch and Alexandria been in Christian polities, then Constantinople and Rome excommunicating one another would not have had such impact.
 
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stevep

Well-known member
The Roman Patriarch ending up with a state of his own is IMO a fluke. It was opportunity coming together with papal personalities.
IMO it as the whittling down of the Big Five to defacto two that enabled the Catholic vs Orthodox split. Had Antioch and Alexandria been in Christian polities, then Constantinople and Rome excommunicating one another would not have had such impact.

I wasn't referring to the existence of a Papal state as a territorial fact but more that as I understand it from very early times the Papacy claimed religious primacy over the other Patriarchs and all Christians wherever they lived.
 

Buba

A total creep
I wasn't referring to the existence of a Papal state as a territorial fact but more that as I understand it from very early times the Papacy claimed religious primacy over the other Patriarchs and all Christians wherever they lived.
Oh, if they did then nobody took it seriously :)
The Big Five supervised their "fiefs" - and often did not have much control over them anyway.
For 2-3 centuries the Roman Popes* were Good Greeks or Syrians appointed by the Emperor ... and if a Bishop of Rome misbehaved then it was - the horror! the horror! - off to the Crimea with him!

* there is a Pope in Alexandria too
 
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