The division of the Arabian Empire into rival caliphates
did not check the spread of Islam. The Turks and Mongols during the Middle Ages
carried it to the uttermost regions of Asia and throughout southeastern Europe.
Some parts of the territory thus gained by it have since been lost. Spain and
the Balkan peninsula are once more Christian lands. In other parts of the
world, and notably in Africa and India, the religion of Mohammed is spreading
faster than any other creed. Islam to-day claims about two hundred million
adherents.
THE BENEFITS OF ISLAM
The growth of Islam is evidence that it meets the needs of
Asiatic and African peoples. Its simple creed—the unity of God, man's immortal
soul, and material rewards and penalties in a future life—adapt it to the
understanding of half-civilized peoples. As a religion it is immeasurably
superior to the rude nature worship and idolatry which it has supplanted. The
same is true of Islam as a system of morality. The practice of the virtues
recommended by the Koran and the avoidance of the vices which that book
condemns tend to raise its adherents in the moral scale.
