Saqifah and the Ridda wars
When the Prophet (PBUH) died in June 632, the Ansar of Madinah met at the Saqifah of Banu Sa'ida to discuss who should lead. Umar and Abu Ubayda joined them, and the gathering pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr, the Prophet's closest companion and father-in-law. Ali and members of the Prophet's family delayed their pledge for months, and Sunni and Shia Muslims still remember those days differently.
Many tribes stopped paying zakat or followed new prophets such as Musaylima. Abu Bakr's Ridda wars, led above all by Khalid ibn al-Walid, reunited Arabia within a year. The bloodiest clash, Yamama, killed so many men who knew the Quran by heart that Abu Bakr ordered it collected into a single written copy.
Umar and the two empires
Abu Bakr named Umar ibn al-Khattab as his successor before he died in 634. In ten years Umar's armies beat both superpowers of the time. In Syria, Khalid and Abu Ubayda broke the Byzantine army at Yarmouk in 636. In Iraq, Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas defeated the Persians at Qadisiyyah and took their capital, Ctesiphon. Nahavand in 642 finished the Sasanian army, and Amr ibn al-As took Egypt.
Umar built the state that held it all together: the diwan, a register of soldiers and their pay; new garrison cities at Basra, Kufa and Fustat; and the Hijri calendar. He accepted Jerusalem's surrender in person in 637. In November 644 he was stabbed at dawn prayer by Abu Lu'lu'a, a Persian slave, and before he died he named a council of six to choose the next caliph.
How the new lands were ruled
The conquerors did not force their new subjects to convert or take their farms. Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians kept their faith and paid the jizya in return for protection and freedom from military service. Arab soldiers lived apart in the new garrison cities and drew pay from the diwan, while the old Byzantine and Persian clerks kept the tax system running, writing in Greek and Persian for decades.
Umar also removed Khalid ibn al-Walid from top command, so that people would not think victories came from one man rather than from God. Khalid accepted the decision and kept serving under Abu Ubayda.
Uthman: growth and grievance
The council chose Uthman ibn Affan. Under him the frontier reached Khurasan and North Africa, and a new navy won the Battle of the Masts in 654. His most lasting act was the standard copy of the Quran, sent to every province so that all Muslims would read from the same text.
But many of his governors were his Umayyad relatives, and complaints from Egypt, Kufa and Basra grew louder. In 656 rebels besieged his house in Madinah and killed him while he was reading the Quran.
Ali and the first civil war
Ali ibn Abi Talib, the Prophet's cousin and son-in-law, was chosen in Madinah but faced two challenges at once. Aisha, Talha and Zubayr demanded justice for Uthman and were defeated at the Battle of the Camel near Basra. Muawiya, Uthman's cousin and the powerful governor of Syria, refused to pledge allegiance. Their armies met at Siffin in 657, and the fight ended in arbitration.
Some of Ali's soldiers rejected the arbitration and turned against him. Ali crushed these Kharijites at Nahrawan, but in January 661 one of them, Ibn Muljam, struck him in the mosque of Kufa. His son Hasan made peace with Muawiya a few months later.
Why the Rashidun era ended
The community never settled how to choose its leader or hold him to account. Conquest brought wealth and new provinces faster than institutions could absorb them, and three of the four caliphs were killed. When Hasan stepped aside in 661, the caliphate passed to Muawiya and, from then on, to dynasties.
Spotted a mistake in this chapter? Tell us