Non-Muslims in the Early Islamic Empire

I am delighted to learn of the recent publication of a new book chronicling the treatment of non-Muslims in the early Islamic empire, a problem that has either been shamefully ignored by too many scholars for ideological and political purposes or otherwise misunderstood, and sometimes tendentiously manipulated, by the few people who have paid recent attention. The new book is Milka Levy-Rubin, Non-Muslims in the Early Islamic Empire: From Surrender to Coexistence (Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization, 2011)

About this book the publisher tells us:

The Muslim conquest of the East in the seventh century entailed the subjugation of Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, and others. Although much has been written about the status of non-Muslims in the Islamic empire, no previous works have examined how the rules applying to minorities were formulated. Milka Levy-Rubin's remarkable book traces the emergence of these regulations from the first surrender agreements in the immediate aftermath of conquest to the formation of the canonic document called the Pact of 'Umar, which was formalized under the early 'Abbasids, in the first half of the ninth century. What the study reveals is that the conquered peoples themselves played a major role in the creation of these policies, and that these were based on long-standing traditions, customs, and institutions from earlier pre-Islamic cultures that originated in the worlds of both the conquerors and the conquered. In its connections to Roman, Byzantine, and Sasanian traditions, the book will appeal to historians of Europe as well as Arabia and Persia.

I hope to feature an interview with the author on here in the coming weeks.