Nineteenth-century Anglo-American observers feared a globally unified Islam centered on the Ottoman caliph

Evidence

Wheeler reflected yet another Islamophobic concern among many Britons and Americans: a global surge of Islamism meant to bring the world under singular Muslim domination. Much of this centered on Istanbul (or Constantinople, the name many commentators preferred), “the capital of Mohammedanism” as an American missionary there put it in 1835. In his overview of religions that went through at least five reprintings in the first half of the nineteenth century, John Haywood explained that Muslims’ “spiritual head” lived in Turkey, a man equivalent to the “Roman Pontiff, or the Grecian Patriarch.” He was referring to the khalifa (caliph), an office of leadership of the entire Muslim community dating back to the successors of Muhammad. The Ottoman sultans had claimed it for themselves since 1517. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 67

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the caliph/khalifa as an office of leadership of the entire Muslim community dating from Muhammad’s successors, claimed by Ottoman sultans since 1517.
• QUESTION: What is the genealogy of the ‘global unified Muslim menace’ trope from the caliphate panic here to modern fears of a global caliphate?
• XREF: connects to: The fear of Islam intensified amid Ottoman decline and colonial expansion — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 166; Anglo-American observers explained Muslim expansion as caused by inherent religious fanaticism. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear:…, 85; The US needed Islam as a foil to define itself as Western — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 154 (+13 more)

Broader Connections

• Anglo-American observers explained Muslim expansion as caused by inherent religious fanaticism. #expands (0.60) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 85
• Nineteenth-century Americans and Britons attributed Islam’s spread to coercion rather than persuasion. #expands (0.60)
• Anti-Islamic fear imagined Muslims colonizing America into apostasy from afar. #expands (0.60) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 81
• British colonial ideology consolidated the essentialized idea of Islam as a homogeneous threat #expands (0.60)
• The essay critically assesses the contemporary scholarship on Christian Islamophobia, arguing that it often overlooks the internal Christian divisions and portrays Christianity as a monolithic… #qualifies (0.60)
• Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that… #expands (0.60)
• The US needed Islam as a foil to define itself as Western #expands (0.50) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 154
• British census data on Muslim numbers amplified Anglo-American fears. #expands (0.50) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 90
• Americans derived much of their Islamophobia from British colonial sources. #expands (0.50) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 40
• American commentators read the 1857 uprising as a religious awakening of Islam against Britain #expands (0.50) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 66
• Elites mobilized Islamophobia to advance their political agendas across centuries #expands (0.50) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 98
• Ottomans were seen as a political threat rather than a religious one #contradicts (0.40) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 76
• Ottoman proximity shifted Muslim-monster stories toward miscegenation fear #expands (0.25)