3. Arabization and islamization

Introduction
The main Arab conquests - from the Maghreb to Iran - were followed by conversions to Islam and by the adoption of the Arabic language by the defeated. But Arabization and Islamization are processes that have transformed these societies at different rhythms, and the “itinerary” of these deep changes cannot be summarized or reduced to a single model. However we can highlight some important trends. Arabization doesn’t necessarily mean conversion to Islam, and conversion to Islam doesn’t necessarily mean giving up local customs. Despite their conversion to Islam, some populations of the Arab-Muslim world were able to retain their languages while, outside the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern area, original languages were more resilient. There was even a "rebirth" for the 10th-century Persian, with the merging of the official language of the Sassanid Empire (both religious and literary) with some Arab inputs. Some religious communities have resisted the conversion movement, like the Copts of Egypt, who now represent the first Christian community of the Arab-Muslim world.
Source 1a

Comments of bishop Athanasius of Qus

If some of them [its readers] learn Coptic with great difficulty by spending much time on it, they come to nothing but read the phrases, not without deficiency, and without understanding what they say; they talk to themselves in an unintelligible language and become barbarians to themselves.

Bishop Athanasius of Qūs. Quoted by J.C. Garcin, “L’arabisation de l’Égypte”, Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée, 1987, No. 43, p. 131. Trans. Marie Lebert.

When Egypt, a Byzantine province, was conquered in 641, two languages were then in use, Greek (for administrative matters) and Coptic, the latest “version” of the ancient Egyptian language. The Arabization of Christians using the Coptic language was slower than that of the Near Eastern populations. In the centuries following the conquest of Egypt, Arabic was not only the language of the State but also the language of culture, the everyday language, and even the language of Christian theology. Coptic was probably abandoned for good between the 10th and the middle of the 11th century. But the 12th century was a cultural "Golden Age" for the Copts with the "rebirth" of the Coptic-Arabic literature written in Arabic. This led Athanasius, a 14th-century scholar living in Qūs, in Upper Egypt, to write in Arabic a comprehensive grammar of Coptic dialects used in Upper and Lower Egypt, for a dedicated audience of scholars and monks.

Source 1b

A Coptic Church in Old Cairo

Wikimedia Commons. Usable under the conditions of the GNU Free Documentation License:
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html
Public domain.
Image under URL : http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Coptic%26Arabic.jpg? (05/01/2015)

The inscription on the Coptic Church in Old Cairo (dated 1899) quoted the Gospel of John (John, 4:13-14) both in Coptic, a liturgical language of the Christian Egyptians, and in Arabic:
“In the name of God, the benevolent all who drink from this water, will also be thirsty but whoever drinks the water that I give will never, ever be thirsty”.

Source 2

Excerpt from the chapter 16 of 'The Rehla' of Ibn Battuta: The stay of Ibn Battuta in the Maldives

When I became qazi [qādī], I strove with all my might to establish the rule of law (shariat). Litigations are not there as in Morocco. The first of the bad customs which I abolished was that requiring the divorced wives to stay in the houses of their erstwhile husbands. The divorced wife had to stay in the house of the man who had divorced her until she had married another man. I cut it at the very root. Some twenty-five men were brought before me for acting in that way and I had them whipped and paraded round the bazaars, and I caused the women to be removed from their houses. Then I pressed for the saying of congregational prayers and ordered that men should hurry through the streets and bazaars after the Friday prayer; those who were found not having attended the prayer were whipped and publicly disgraced. […] Finally I endeavoured to compel women to wear clothes, but I was not able to get this done.

Excerpt from the chapter 16 of The Rehla of Ibn Battuta - India, Maldive Islands and Ceylon - translation and commentary by Dr. Mahdi Husain, Oriental Institute, Baroda (India), 1976.

Ibn Battūta, the most famous Arab traveller of the Middle Ages, travelled thousands of miles for 28 years, especially in newly Islamized territories. His autobiographical story was dictated to an Andalusian secretary of the Royal Court of Fez (Morocco), who transcribed it in literary Arabic. The journey of the "traveller of Islam" from Morocco to China had different motivations: studies, pilgrimage, seeking prestige, etc. Ibn Battūta started his journey at the age of twenty, and considered himself as a religious scholar, but nothing is known about its scholarly background. He stayed for eighteen months in the Maldives, spanning on 800 kilometers as a double garland of islands in southern India, with a sultanate from the middle of the 12th century. With his knowledge of scholarly Arabic and of law, Ibn Battūta imposed himself as the qādī. In this high position in a recently Islamized society that was not fluent in Arabic, Ibn Battūta sought to enforce Islamic norms, especially against women, but didn’t always succeed in his task.

Source 3

Constitution of Morocco, 2011.

Preamble
A sovereign Muslim State, attached to its national unity and to its territorial integrity, the Kingdom of Morocco intends to preserve, in its plenitude and its diversity, its one and indivisible national identity. Its unity, forged by the convergence of its Arab-Islamist, Tamazight [or Amazigh] and Saharan-Hassanic* components, is nourished and enriched by its African, Andalusian, Hebraic and Mediterranean influences. The pre-eminence accorded to the Muslim religion in the national reference is consistent with the attachment of the Moroccan people to the values of openness, of moderation, of tolerance and of dialog for mutual understanding between all the cultures and the civilizations of the world.
Article 5
Arabic is the official language of the State. The State works for the protection and for the development of the Arabic language, as well as the promotion of its use. Likewise, Tamazight [or Amazigh*] constitutes an official language of the State, being common patrimony of all Moroccans without exception.

*Saharan-Hassanic: term applying to the Saharan population of southern Morocco speaking Hassanic.
*Amazigh (or Tamazight): Berber language spoken by about 50% of the Moroccan population.

The Berbers of Morocco represent about half of the Moroccan population. To meet the demands of the Berber movement, increasingly politicized since the 1990s, King Mohammed VI announced in his 2001 Throne Speech the creation of a Royal Institute of the Amazigh Culture. Ten years later, the revised Constitution dated 2011 legitimated the Amazigh identity in an inclusive move. But the identity discourses now claim either a better integration of the Amazigh identity in both the cultural life and the governance, or a better recognition of the Berber community versus the Arab identity. The Amazigh issue goes beyond Morocco, and also includes Algeria, Libya, Mali and Niger. It has also reached an international dimension because of its claims in the context of human rights.