To: jbe who wrote (75864 ) 3/21/2000 5:06:00 PM From: Neocon Read Replies (2) | Respond to
For example, this is prominent in the article on Bosnia- Herzegovina (after conquest) in the Britannica:britannica.com In one crucial way, however, Bosnia differed from the other Balkan lands (except, later, Albania) : a large part of the native population converted to Islam. This was a gradual development; it took more than a hundred years for Muslims to become an absolute majority. There was no mass conversion at the outset, and no mass emigration of Muslims from Turkey. The fundamental reason for the growth of such a large Muslim population in Bosnia may lie in the earlier religious history of the Bosnian state. Whereas neighbouring Serbia had benefited from a strong, territorially organized national church, Bosnia had seen competition in most areas between the Bosnian church and the Roman Catholic church, both of which operated only out of monastic houses. In Herzegovina a third church, the Serbian Orthodox, had also competed. Christianity was thus structurally weaker in Bosnia than in almost any other part of the Balkans. The motives that inclined Bosnians to adopt Islam were partly economic: the prosperous cities of Sarajevo and Mostar were mainly Muslim, and it was not possible to lead a full civic life there without converting to Islam. Other motives included the privileged legal status enjoyed by Muslims and, possibly, a desire to avoid the harac, though Muslims were subject, unlike Christians, both to the alms tax and to the duties of general military service. But the traditional belief that Bosnian noblemen converted en masse to Islam in order to keep their estates has been largely disproved by modern historians.
