The Prophet Muhammad ibn Abdullah sallalahu alaihi wassalam (peace be upon him) (s.a.w.) lived between the years 570 CE and 632 CE in the region known today as Saudi Arabia. The Prophet s.a.w. was born in Makkah (Mecca), a member of the Quraysh tribe. The holy temple of the Kabbah at Makkah had for some time been the focal point of idol worship for the whole of Arabia and the various warring Arab tribes, regarding Makkah as a holy city, would not fight there. This peaceful environment established Makkah as a centre for trade during religious festivals.

Before the Prophet s.a.w. was born, his father died. The Prophet s.a.w.'s mother passed away when he was six years of age and his grandfather, Abd al Muttalib, a member of the clan of Banu Hashim and Lord of the Quraysh tribe, subsequently cared for him. After al Muttalib's death at the age of eighty, the clan of Banu Ummayyah took over leadership of the Quraysh and the Prophet s.a.w.'s uncle, Abu Talib, assumed responsibility for the Prophet s.a.w., then eight years old. As a young man the Prophet s.a.w. was known as Al Amin (the trustworthy) and Assadiq (the honest). His first employment was as a herdsman but he later worked for the wealthy widow Khadijah, as a trader, on the caravans between Makkah and Syria.

At the age of 25 the Prophet s.a.w. married Khadijah, then aged 40. They remained married for 28 years until Khadijah's death. They adopted the Prophet s.a.w.'s cousin, Ali, who converted to Islam as a youth. Of four sons and two daughters with Khadijah, only Fatima outlived the Prophet s.a.w.. After Khadijah's death, the Prophet s.a.w. married Sawdah. Further concurrent marriages followed, to Zaynab who died two years after their marriage, Umm Salamah the widow of Abu Salamah, Aishah (the daughter of Abu Bakr), Hafsah, Safiyyah (a member of the Jewish tribe of Banu al Nadir who converted to Islam after the siege of Khaybar), and the slave girl Mariyah (a gift from the Archbishop of Alexandria). The various marriages consolidated the ties of relationship throughout the factions of the new Islamic community.

The Prophet s.a.w. received his first revelation in approximately 610 CE, at the age of 40. His followers believe that he was an ordinary man, chosen by God to convey to mankind the message of Islam, literally 'to submit'. In Arabic, the word for God is Allah. Followers of Islam are known as Muslims, literally 'ones who submit'. The Prophet s.a.w.'s mission to spread Islam was derided and opposed by the Quraysh of Makkah through political, and ultimately physical, means. Under persecution, a small group of 11 Muslims emigrated to Abyssinia where the Christian King Negus ruled. The Negus accepted this group under his protection having decided that there was little difference between Christianity and the new religion of Islam. In the meantime the two Arab tribes of Al Aws and Al Khazraj in the town of Yathrib, later known as Medina, converted to Islam. Eventually, the Prophet s.a.w. learned of a plot by the Quraysh to kill him in Makkah and fled with his closest friend and convert, Abu Bakr, to Medina in 622 CE. This departure became known as the Hijra, literally 'emigration'. The year count in the Muslim world starts at this time. Soon after the arrival at Medina, a peace treaty was signed with the indigenous Jews and Christians. Islam quickly became the dominant force in Medina.

Through a series of battles and campaigns during the remainder of the Prophet's s.a.w. lifetime, not all of which were successful, Islam was established as the main military and political force in the Arabian peninsula. In the Prophet s.a.w.'s later days, delegations were sent to Chosroes, the King of Persia, and to Heraclius of the Byzantine empire at Constantinople, inviting them to convert to Islam. Persia, weakened by defeat and the loss of Jerusalem at the hands of Byzantium, accepted Islam, and following the repulsion of its forces at Mutah, the Byzantine Empire acquiesced to Islamic rule.

The book containing the message of Islam is called the Qur'an or Koran, which can be translated as 'Recitation' or 'Collection (of verses)'. Muslims believe that the Qur'an is the word of God as conveyed to the Prophet s.a.w.. As the Prophet s.a.w. himself was unlettered, the companions of the Prophet s.a.w., the sahaba, memorised the verses recited by him and committed some of them to writing during his lifetime. All of the Qur'anic verses were subsequently gathered together in approximately 634 CE by Zeid ibn Thabit, a citizen of Medina and companion of the Prophet s.a.w., under the direction of Abu Bakr. The compilation was made with the aid of several witnesses who had learnt the Qur'an by heart. However, in the following years, other versions of the Qur'an appeared in various parts of the Muslim Empire. Thus, in 651 CE, Caliph Uthman ordered that ibn Thabit's original version be copied and distributed throughout the empire, and that all other versions be destroyed.

The Uthmanic copy, which was rendered in the Quraysh dialect, was letter for letter the same as those Qur'ans printed today except for a few diacritical marks and vowel points. These were often omitted in early copies because it was taken for granted that readers of the text were sufficiently familiar with the Arabic language not to require them. The Topkapi manuscript in Istanbul is believed to be one of the earliest surviving written copies of the Qur'an, as is the Samarkand manuscript located at the Soviet State Library in Tashkent. An early copy of the Qur'an from the eighth century CE is available in the British Library written in Ma'il (slanting) script. Later copies (late eighth and ninth century CE) in Kufic script (sometimes referred to as al-Khatt al-Kufi script) are more widely found.

The period between 632 CE - 661 CE (11 AH - 41 AH) that followed the death of the Prophet s.a.w. became known as the time of the 'Four Right-Guided Caliphs', caliph meaning successor as ruler. During this time surviving companions of the Prophet s.a.w. led the new community, these being, Abu-Bakr 632 CE - 634 CE, Umar ibn al Khattab from 634 CE - 644 CE, Utman ibn Affan from 644 CE - 656 CE, and finally Ali ibn Abu Talib 656 CE - 661 CE. (Aishah, a surviving wife of the Prophet s.a.w., had opposed Ali who argued that the leadership succession should fall to him and his descendants through his wife Fatimah, the daughter of the Prophet s.a.w.). As a result of the murder of Utman, discord arose between supporters of Ali and Mu'awiyah ibn Abi Sufyan, which culminated in the Battle of Siffin at the Euphrates (657 CE) between the two men. After Ali's assassination in 661 CE at the hands of Mu'awiyah's supporters, some of Ali's followers founded the Rafidi sect, later to become the Shia sect, under the leadership of one Abdullah ibn Sabah. The remaining body of Muslims comprise the majority Sunni sect. The Shia sect bestows upon Ali, and his son Hussein a special status.

From its humble beginnings in the Arabian peninsula, the Islamic state spread rapidly outwards. In 634 CE the Byzantine army, and in 655 CE its fleet, was defeated by the Muslims. With the end of the period of the Four Right-Guided Caliphs, came the beginning of the Ummayyid dynasty, founded under Ummayyah and based first in Damascus (661 CE - 750 CE). In 668 CE Constantinople was attacked for the first time. In 711 CE the Muslims arrived for the first time in Spain. By 715 CE, under the Ummayid Caliph, Walid I, the Moslem empire stretched from its base in Damascus as far as Spain, China and southern Africa. In 732 CE the advance in Europe was halted by Charles Martel at Poitiers in France but the Ummayids succeeded in establishing themselves in Cordoba (756 CE - 1031 CE). Meanwhile, in the lands that fringed the Arabian peninsula, it was the Abbassid dynasty that came to prominence. Ruling first under Al Abbas himself between 750 CE - 766 CE from Kufah, and subsequently from its base in Baghdad between 766 CE and 1258 CE, the period is seen as one in which there was a gradual weakening of political principles.

A revival came under the Seljuk Turks who routed the Byzantine army at Melasgird in 1071 CE and provided resistance to subsequent Christian crusades. After the fall of Baghdad to the Mongols in the 1258 CE the focus of Islamic power shifted to Egypt under the Mamluk sultans. The founder of the Mamluk state, Baybar defeated the Mongol advance at Ayn Jalut in 1260 CE. There followed a period that is often viewed as being one of relative laxity in political principle, even of some decadence, though one in which Egypt was established as an important centre of learning and culture in the Islamic world.

With the final defeat of the Muslims in Spain in 1492 CE and the weakening of the Mamluk regime in Egypt, the focus of Islamic power shifted to Constantinople which had fallen to Ottoman forces in 1453 CE. Under the Ottomans a new empire was established, Suleiman the Magnificent reigning as Sultan from 1520 CE to 1566 CE over territory that stretched from Baghdad to Hungary. The last Ottoman advance was repelled in 1683 CE under John II of Poland at Vienna, but the empire perpetuated, operating under Islamic law until its formal dissolution in November 1921 CE. Meanwhile, the Moghul dynasty established in the wake of Babur's victory over the Lodis at the Battle of Panipat, Delhi, in approximately 1525 CE, survived until the death of Moghul Aurungzeb in 1707 CE.

The main countries with a Muslim majority population today are Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Iran, Egypt, Turkey, Iraq, Sudan, Morocco, Algeria, Uzbekistan, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Kazakstan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgystan. India, China, Russia, Phillipines, USA, Myanmar, and Bosnia have significant Muslim minority populations.

The Muslim calendar follows the lunar month. There are twelve months in the year, having 29 or 30 days each, depending upon moon-phases. The months from beginning to end of the Muslim year are: Muharram, Safar, Rabia 1, Rabia 2, Jumada 1, Jumada 2, Rajab, Shaaban, Ramadan, Shawwal, Dhul Qada, and Dhul Hijja.

Two major Muslim festivals are the Id ul Fitr and the Id ul Adha. Id ul Fitr falls on the first day after the end of Ramadan. It lasts for one day and celebrates the completion of the fast. Id ul Adha falls between the 10th and 13th day of the month of Dhul hijjah, the month of the Hajj pilgrimage. It commemorates the day on which Abraham prepared to sacrifice his son at the behest of God and was traditionally accompanied by the ritual slaughter of animals to provide food for family, friends and the poor. Other events in Muslim history that are sometimes commemorated include Hijra (on the first day of the Muslim year) and Ashura on the tenth of Muharram (on this day Muslims fast to commemorate the success of Moses and the Jews over the Pharoah of Egypt).

Some important modern-day organisations in the Muslim world with actvities related to the Islamic finance sector are: The Organisation of the Islamic Conference (the OIC is an organisation of Muslim states that co-ordinates international political and economic policy); The Islamic Development Bank (established by the OIC in 1975 as a supra-national development bank funded by various Muslim states with the purpose of fostering economic development and social progress of member countries and Muslim communities in accordance with the Shariah); The Accounting and Auditing Organisation for Islamic Financial Institutions (AAOIFI formulates standards for accounting, auditing and shariah interpretation in the Islamic financial sector); the Council of the Fiqh Academy (a Jeddah based organisation that co-ordinates and standardises international theory on Islamic jurisprudence); the Islamic Financial Services Board (a Kuala Lumpur based organisation that sets prudential, supervisory and governance standards for Islamic financial institutions), and King abdul Aziz Aziz University in Jeddah and Makkah (which established the International Centre for Research in Islamic Economics in 1977).