The 'Believers' movement: an open monotheist community?
c. c. 610 – c. 690
Place: medina
24.468, 39.611 · On the map
This is an influential but debated hypothesis. Critics were not checked this turn, so scholars_against is left empty.
Donner argues that Muhammad's early movement saw itself as a community of 'Believers' (mu'minun) that pious Jews and Christians could join. In this view a separate Islamic identity hardened only around the 690s under 'Abd al-Malik, which ties the chain's end directly to the Dome of the Rock.
People named here
- Muhammad
- 'Abd al-Malik
Where scholars disagree
For
- Fred M. Donner — Muhammad and the Believers (2010)
Against
No names on this side.
Links
Sequence
Out
Dome of the Rock inscriptions (691/2)
Donner: the Dome marks the hardening of a distinct Islamic identity.
culminates_in
scholarly hypothesis
Conflict and authority
In
Donner's model of the early community as 'Believers'.
founded
scholarly hypothesis
Sources
- Fred M. Donner, Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins of Islam (2010)
Harvard University Press. Accessed 2026-11-11.
- Wikipedia: Fred Donner
Wikipedia contributors (CC BY-SA 4.0). Accessed 2026-11-11.