A study reveals that Muslims in Mongol-ruled China did not just survive – they flourished by creatively blending Islamic, Persian, Chinese, and Mongol traditions into something entirely new.
In 1271, a Persian-speaking Muslim scholar named Jamāl al-Dīn stood before Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor who had just proclaimed the Yuan Dynasty. He carried not weapons but instruments – an astrolabe, a celestial globe, and what may have been the first terrestrial globe ever seen in China. The emperor was so impressed that he established a special bureau for Islamic astronomy, placing Jamāl al-Dīn in charge.
This moment captures something profound about Islam in Yuan China. It was not a story of defeat, marginalization, or forced conversion. It was a story of creation through integration – of Muslims becoming Chinese while remaining Muslim, of Persian knowledge transforming Chinese science, and of Confucian scholars learning to see Islam not as a foreign threat but as a tradition aligned with their own values.
A new study published in the journal Religions offers the most comprehensive analysis of this remarkable period. Written by Wei Wang of Minzu University of China, the research examines how Muslim communities under Mongol rule (1271–1368) engaged in what she calls “transcultural praxis” – a dynamic process of strategic adaptation and negotiation that preserved Islamic identity while enabling meaningful engagement with Chinese cultural norms.
The Mongol Cataclysm That Built Bridges
The story begins not in China but in Central Asia. Between 1219 and 1221, Genghis Khan’s Mongol armies devastated major Islamic cities – Bukhara, Samarkand, Urgench. They destroyed libraries, killed scholars, and displaced countless Muslims. But they also did something unprecedented: they systematically relocated skilled populations across their expanding empire.
As the Persian historian Juvaini wrote in the 13th century: “Whereas today so many believers in the one God have bent their steps thitherwards and reached the farthest countries of the East, and settled, and made their homes there, that their numbers are beyond calculation or computation.”
These Muslims – collectively called Huihui (回回) by the Chinese – came as soldiers, artisans, merchants, scholars, and religious leaders. They were conscripted into specialized military units, established agricultural colonies (tuntian), and spread across the entire country. Unlike earlier Muslim enclaves in Tang-Song China (618–1279), which were confined to “foreign quarters” in port cities, Yuan Muslims permeated every stratum of society.
A Yuan-era stele inscription from Dingzhou Mosque records: “Now, from the capital in the center to distant provinces everywhere, there are over ten thousand mosques, all facing west to perform their prayers.” Another contemporary observer noted: “Nowadays, the Huihui all regard the Central Plains as their home, with particularly large concentrations in Jiangnan.”
Table 1: Muslim Population Distribution in Yuan China
| Region | Concentration | Primary Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Dadu (Beijing) | High (imperial capital) | Bureaucrats, scholars, imperial guards |
| Jiangnan (Yangtze Delta) | Very high | Merchants, maritime trade, artisans |
| Yunnan | Moderate | Military garrisons, administrators |
| Xinjiang & Gansu | Moderate to High | Agricultural colonies, religious scholars |
| Quanzhou (Zaytun) | Very high | Maritime merchants, Sufi lodges |
Persian: The Forgotten Language of Yuan China
One of the study’s most striking findings is the centrality of Persian in Yuan China. The Mongol Empire’s unification of Eurasia meant that Persian – not Arabic – became the lingua franca of Islamic civilization in China. Persian script is what Chinese documents of the era called “Huihui writing” or “Huihui characters.”
The Yuan dynasty was the first in Chinese history to formally use more than two written languages for administrative affairs, with Chinese, Mongolian, and Persian serving as official government languages. The government established a Huihui Imperial Academy (回回國子監) to train translators, with a curriculum that included both foreign languages and Confucian classics.
Three foundational Persian-language religious primers composed during this period profoundly influenced Chinese Islamic tradition: ‘Umdat al-Islām (The Pillars of Islam), Muhimmāt al-Muslimīn (The Essentials for Muslims), and Chahār Fasl (Four Chapters). These texts were written in Persian with Arabic quotations followed by Persian translations – clearly intended for ordinary Persian-speaking Muslims, the Huihui masses of the Yuan era.
Significantly, these texts established the Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence as the mainstream tradition of Chinese Islam – a legacy that continues to this day. The authors explicitly identified as Hanafis and frequently cited the opinions of Abū Ḥanīfa. The “Eight Roots of Religion” (八項教門原根) widely circulated among traditional Chinese Muslims can be traced to the Muhimmāt al-Muslimīn.
The Qadi System: Islamic Law Under Mongol Rule
How did Muslims maintain their legal and religious institutions under non-Muslim rule? The Yuan government established special administrative organs for Muslims, with setups from the central government down to localities.
The general term for these organs was “Huihui Qāḍī Department” (回回合的司) or “Office of Huihui Zhangjiao Qāḍī” (回回掌教哈的所). The Qāḍī (judge) adjudicated all types of litigation among Muslims – civil, commercial, and criminal – according to Islamic law. In practice, the Qāḍī was often also the Imam of the mosque and a Dānishmand (religious scholar), simultaneously serving as judicial arbiter, religious leader, and government-appointed official.
The Moroccan traveler Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, who visited China in 1346, observed: “In every city of China there is a Sheikh al-Islam, who is in charge of the Muslims’ affairs, and a Qadi who adjudicates their lawsuits.” A Yuan-era inscription from Quanzhou’s Qingjing Mosque confirms this, mentioning a Shaykh al-Islām named Burhān al-Dīn, aged 120, who was “erudite and virtuous” and served as the regional religious leader.
However, the study notes that the Qāḍī system was not stable throughout the Yuan period. It was repeatedly established and abolished in response to political struggles between Muslim officials and Han Chinese bureaucrats. In 1311, Emperor Renzong abolished independent religious administrative organs, limiting Qāḍī duties to “only managing religious affairs and reciting scriptures.” All litigation was turned over to government offices. This tension between Islamic legal autonomy and state control would continue for centuries.
Conflict and Negotiation: The Sheep Slaughter Incident
One fascinating episode illustrates the friction between Islamic law and Mongol-Chinese governance. According to Islamic law, permissible animals like sheep must be slaughtered by a Muslim who invokes God’s name, cutting the throat to drain the blood. The Mongols, however, used a method of slaughter that involved cutting open the animal’s chest and abdomen.
In 1280, Kublai Khan bestowed food upon Huihui envoys. They refused to eat “sheep slaughtered by others.” The emperor was furious: “They are my servants. How dare their eating and drinking not follow our court?” He issued an edict prohibiting Muslims from their method of slaughtering sheep.
The prohibition lasted seven years. Many Muslim merchants departed, disrupting commerce. In 1287, prominent Huihui officials presented a large sum of gifts to the powerful Chancellor Sangge, who persuaded Kublai Khan to rescind the prohibition. The incident reveals a pattern of pragmatic compromise – Islamic law yielded to state authority, but through negotiation and political influence, Muslims regained their religious practice.
From Outsiders to Chinese Residents: The Process of Integration
Throughout the Yuan period, Muslims who had spread across China gradually transformed from foreign migrants into Chinese residents. The household registration system established by Kublai Khan in 1271 formally conferred Chinese identity upon Muslims of all ethnicities, categorizing them into occupation-based types like Dānishmand household (Muslim scholars) and Darwīsh household (Sufis), as well as ethnicity-based types like Huihui household.
Muslims actively studied Chinese culture. By the mid-Yuan period, many adopted Chinese surnames and courtesy names, named their residences and halls, and even followed the Confucian mourning system of a three-year mourning period. For the majority of Muslims, although funerals were conducted according to Islamic rites, they also incorporated Chinese customs such as wearing mourning attire and holding memorial ceremonies on the seventh day, the hundredth day, and the anniversary of a death.
The restoration of the imperial examination system in 1314 accelerated this process. Zhu Xi’s Neo-Confucianism became the official state orthodoxy, dominating the examination system. Muslim officials actively studied Confucianism while conducting administrative activities according to Confucian principles.
One of the most renowned examples is al-Sayyid Shams al-Dīn ‘Umar (賽典赤·赡思丁, 1211–1279), a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad. As governor of Yunnan Province, he constructed Confucian temples, purchased classical texts, endowed school lands, and actively promoted Confucianism. The renowned scholar Chen Yuan praised him, saying: “This is something that Confucian followers could never have anticipated” – a descendant of Muhammad promoting the teachings of Confucius.
Table 2: Dimensions of Transcultural Adaptation in Yuan China
| Dimension | Islamic Tradition | Chinese Adaptation | Hybrid Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Religious Institutions | Qāḍī (judge) system | State-appointed religious officials | Qāḍī as government bureaucrat |
| Legal Practice | Islamic law (shari’a) | State court jurisdiction | Qāḍī limited to religious affairs |
| Funerary Customs | Islamic burial rites | Confucian mourning periods | Islamic burial + 7th/100th-day memorials |
| Naming Conventions | Arabic/Persian names | Chinese surnames + courtesy names | Dual identity markers |
| Education | Persian religious primers | Confucian classics + examinations | Muslim literati-officials |
| Philosophy | Hanafi-Māturīdī theology | Neo-Confucian concepts | “Interpreting Islam in Confucian terms” |
The Forerunners of Confucian-Islamic Synthesis
Perhaps the most significant development of the Yuan period was the beginning of systematic Confucian-Islamic dialog. Two extant mosque inscriptions from 1348 and 1350 represent the earliest known direct engagements between Confucian scholars and Islam.
The Inscription of Rebuilding the Prayer Hall (1348) was written by Yang Shouyi, the magistrate of Anxi County, for the Dingzhou Mosque. The Inscription of Qingjing Mosque (1350) was written by Wu Jian, a literatus from Fuzhou, for the Qingjing Mosque in Quanzhou.
Both inscriptions interpret Islam through Confucian concepts. They describe the Islamic Creator as Tian (Heaven) or Li (Principle). Wu Jian writes: “Their teaching holds that all things originate from Heaven, and Heaven is one Principle, without any image.” Yang Shouyi argues that Islam, unlike Buddhism and Daoism, “possesses the Five Relationships in full” – the Confucian core of ruler-minister righteousness, father-son affection, husband-wife distinction, elder-younger order, and friend-friend faithfulness.
Yang Shouyi explicitly writes: “They follow the legitimate calendar, perform corvée duties and pay taxes, so there is no difference in the righteousness between ruler and minister; the elder is compassionate, the younger is filial, so there is no difference in the affection between father and son… there is no difference whatsoever.”
These inscriptions initiated the tradition of “interpreting Islam in Confucian terms” (以儒詮經) – a hermeneutic approach that would later be developed into the sophisticated philosophical syntheses of the Ming-Qing Han Kitab movement. The scholars of that movement – such as Liu Zhi (ca. 1660–1730) – would write entire treatises comparing Islamic and Confucian concepts of the soul, cosmology, and ethics. But the seeds were planted in the Yuan.
The Legacy of a Transcultural Epoch
The Yuan period was not merely a time of survival for Chinese Muslims. It was an era of remarkable cultural production that reshaped Chinese civilization.
- Astronomy: Jamāl al-Dīn introduced seven advanced instruments, including an astrolabe and a terrestrial globe. His Perpetual Calendar (Huihui Calendar) influenced Guo Shoujing’s revolutionary Calendar for Granting the Seasons (1280). The Huihui Calendar remained in official use alongside Chinese calendars throughout the Ming dynasty until the late 17th century.
- Medicine: The Broad Grace Bureau (廣惠司), a rank 3a institution, prepared imperial medicines and treated the poor. The Huihui Medicinal Formulas (回回藥方), a vast compendium drawing heavily from Ibn Sīnā’s Canon of Medicine, contained an estimated 6000–7000 prescriptions. The dietitian Khusraw Hūy produced Essential Principles of Dietetic Hygiene (飲膳正要), China’s first systematic treatise on dietetics.
- Geography: Jamāl al-Dīn and the Chinese scholar Yu Yinglong compiled the Grand Unified Gazetteer of the Great Yuan (大元一統志), spanning 1300 volumes. It integrated data from the Central Plains with detailed information from Mongolia, the Western Regions, and even included maps of the Mongol khanates in the west – unprecedented in Chinese geographical records.
- Architecture: The Muslim architect Ikhtiyār al-Dīn (也黑迭兒丁) was appointed by Kublai Khan to head the imperial construction department. He played a leading role in designing Dadu (modern Beijing), with its rigorous rectangular plan, clear north–south central axis, and grid-pattern street layout – a scheme that honored Chinese urban planning principles while incorporating Islamic emphases on symmetry and geometric order.
- Literature and Arts: A remarkable cohort of Muslim literati emerged – poets like Sa Dula (薩都剌), painters like Gao Kegong (高克恭), and scholars like Ding Henian. Sa Dula, a close associate of eminent Chinese scholars Yu Ji and Yang Zai, wrote poetry that blended recollections of Western Regions landscapes with Chinese literary tropes. Gao Kegong synthesized the misty ink-wash style of Song masters with the texture and luminosity of Persian painting traditions.
Conclusions: A Model for Transcultural Engagement
This study fundamentally revises our understanding of Islam in Chinese history. It challenges teleological narratives that portray Chinese Muslims as either assimilated into oblivion or perpetually foreign. Instead, it reveals a dynamic process of selective adaptation in which Muslims actively shaped their own identity while contributing to Chinese civilization.
The Yuan period was not a prelude to decline but a critical incubator of Sino-Islamic civilization. The concept of “Yi-Ru Huitong” (伊儒會通) – the confluence of Islamic and Confucian traditions – finds its roots not in abstract philosophical speculation but in the concrete historical processes of institutional accommodation, legal mediation, and social integration that unfolded under Mongol rule.
For contemporary readers, the Yuan example offers a model of pluralistic coexistence. It demonstrates how a religious community can maintain its doctrinal and ritual coherence while actively participating in – and contributing to – a host society’s political, cultural, and intellectual life. The Muslims of Yuan China were not caught between two worlds. They created a new one.
As the author concludes: “Civilizations do not merely clash or merge – they engage, adapt, and mutually transform.” In an era of renewed interest in global history and cross-cultural dialog, the story of Islam in Yuan China reminds us that integration is not the same as assimilation. It is creation through encounter.
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