Nigeria was first exposed to Islam in the eleventh century via two different geographic routes: the Senegalese Basin and North Africa. Islam’s beginnings in the nation are connected to its growth throughout the greater West African region. Islam was mostly introduced into Nigeria through trade. Islamic historians and geographers from the Middle Ages, such Al-Bakri, Yaqut al-Hamawi, and Al-Maqrizi, wrote the first accounts of Islam in Central Sudan. Later writings by Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun provided additional information about Islam in West Africa. Due to trade between the Kanem kingdom and the Northern African provinces of Fezzan, Egypt, and Cyrenaica in the eleventh century, Islam spread throughout North-East Nigeria, and especially inside the Kanem empire.
Northern Muslim traders would occasionally settle in towns along trade routes, where they would subsequently spread Islam to the local populace. When Mai Ume Jilmi of Kanem was converted in the eleventh century by a Muslim teacher whose successors thereafter held the hereditary title of Chief Imam of Kanem, it was the first known conversion of a traditional king. Written works by Imam Ahmad Fartua, who lived during the Idris Alooma period, gave readers a peek of Bornu’s bustling Islamic community. While religious records revealed that, under Mai (king) Idris Alooma’s reign (1571–1603), the majority of the prominent persons in the Borno Empire had converted to Islam, even if a sizable portion of the nation continued to practice traditional religions. By creating mosques, Islamic courts, and a dormitory for Kanuris in Makkah, the Islamic pilgrimage site, Alooma promoted Islam throughout the nation.
Islam is said to have entered Hausaland, especially Kano, in the fourteenth century by Muslim traders from the Mali Empire and West African traders who were converted by Tukulor Muslims from the Senegalese basin. In Hausaland, Muhammad Rumfa (1463–1499) was the first king to convert to Islam.
Sheik Jamiu Bulala
By the 16th century, it had reached the nation’s principal cities in the north before making its way into the countryside and the MiddleBelt uplands. There are, nevertheless, some assertions of an earlier arrival. Sheikh Dr. Abu-Abdullah Abdul-Fattah Adelabu, a Muslim scholar who was born in Nigeria, has maintained that Islam has spread throughout Sub-Saharan Africa, including Nigeria, during the rule of the Arab conqueror Uqba ibn al Nafia (622–683), whose Islamic conquests under the Umayyad dynasty, during the times of Muawiyah and Yazid, spread throughout all of Northern Africa, or the Maghrib Al-Arabi, which includes modern-day Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Morocco, as early as the first century of Hijrah.
ISLAM IN SOUTHWESTERN NIGERIA,
During the Mali Empire, Islam also made its way to the southwestern Yoruba-speaking regions. Sheikh Dr. Abu-Abdullah Adelabu cited Arab anthropologist Abduhu Badawi in his book Movements of Islam in face of the Empires and Kingdoms in Yorubaland to bolster his claims about the early arrival of Islam in southwest Nigeria. Badawi contended that the fall of Koush southern Egypt and the prosperity of the politically multicultural Abbasid period in the continent had created several streams of migration that moved west in the mid-9th century Sub-Sahara. Adelabu claims that the Abbasid Dynasty’s fame and impact, the second great dynasty, whose rulers held the title of “Caliph,” encouraged intercultural Muslims to search peacefully and prosperously for pastures from the Nile to Niger and Arab traders from the Desert to Benue. This echoes the conventional historical view that the Islamic Umayyad Caliphate’s conquest of North Africa between AD 647 and AD 709 effectively ended Catholicism in Africa for several centuries.
Islam is known as Esin Imale in Ancient Yoruba, and according to folk etymology, the word derives from the word “Mali.” It was during the fourteenth century that the religion was first brought to that area by wandering Malian traders known as Wangara Traders. Islam was widely adopted during the 18th and 19th centuries. During the rule of Mansa Kankan Musa of the Mali Empire in the 14th century, Yorubas had their first encounter with Islam. Although there were no Yoruba Muslims in Ọyọ-Ile when the first mosque was constructed in AD 1550, according to Al-Aluri, the mosque’s sole purpose was to meet the spiritual demands of the foreign Muslims residing in Ọyo.
As Islam spread throughout Yoruba territory, Muslims began erecting mosques. Iwo Town was the first to do so, with a structure completed in 1655. Iṣẹyin followed in 1760, Lagos in 1774, Ṣaki in 1790, and Oṣogbo in 1889. Before the Sokoto jihad in the 19th century, Islam eventually extended to other places, including Oyo (where Solagberu was the first convert), Ibadan, Abokuta, Ijẹbu-Ode, Ikirun, and Ẹdẹ. In Yoruba territory, Islam gained popularity around the middle of the 19th century due to a number of circumstances.
Prior to the decline of Oyo, there were sizable Muslim populations in a number of the nearby towns. Regrettably, when Oyo was destroyed, these Muslims—Yoruba and immigrants—moved to newly established towns and villages and rose to prominence in Islam. Second, a large number of immigrants—many of whom were Muslims—introduced Islam to their host during this period of widespread migration into Yoruba country. Eades claims that because the religion allowed polygamy, it “differed in attraction” and “better adapted to Yoruba social structure.” More powerful Yorubas, such as Seriki Kuku of Ijebu territory, converted to Islam quickly, having a beneficial effect on the locals.
Islam arrived in Lagos about the same time as other Yoruba towns, but after returning from exile in Ẹpẹ, Ọba Kosọkọ, a member of the Ologun Kutere royal house, gave it royal support. Islam quickly expanded to other Yoruba communities, particularly during the intra-tribal conflicts. During these times, there was a great need for Islamic instructors, who were known for teaching the Quran and crafting amulets for Yoruba soldiers fighting among themselves. While there were some differences, Islam and Christianity both shared a belief in a Supreme Being with the locals. Islamic scholars emphasized to their listeners the importance of abandoning idolatry and turning to Allah. Islamic experts and native Imams quickly began setting up Quranic centers to teach Arabic and Islamic subjects; conventional schools were founded much later to educate newly converted Muslims and to spread Islam.
In the major Yoruba towns and cities, Central Mosques have taken the role of traditional shrines and ritual locations.
