Ibn Yasin has meanwhile found a more…
1054 CE
Ibn Yasin has meanwhile found a more favorable reception among the neighboring Lamtuna people.
Probably sensing the useful organizing power of Ibn Yasin's pious fervor, the Lamtuna chieftain Yahya ibn Umar al-Lamtuni had invited the man to preach to his people.
The Lamtuna leaders, however, keep Ibn Yasin on a careful leash, forging a more productive partnership between them.
Invoking stories of the early life of the Prophet Muhammad, Ibn Yasin preaches that conquest is a necessary addendum to Islamicization, that it is not enough to merely adhere to God's law, but necessary to also destroy opposition to it.
In Ibn Yasin's ideology, anything and everything outside of Islamic law can be characterized as "opposition".
He identifies tribalism, in particular, as an obstacle.
He believes it is not enough to urge his audiences to put aside their blood loyalties and ethnic differences, and embrace the equality of all Muslims under the Sacred Law, it is necessary to make them do so.
For the Lamtuna leadership, this new ideology dovetails with their long desire to refound the Sanhaja union and recover their lost dominions.
In the early 1050s, the Lamtuna, under the joint leadership of Yahya ibn Umar and Abdallah ibn Yasin—soon calling themselves the al-Murabitin (Almoravids)—set out on a campaign to bring their neighbors over to their cause.
After a revolt of the Gudala, Ibn Yasin had been forced to withdraw with his followers, but in alliance with Yahya ibn Umar, he had managed to quell the rebellion.
Ibn Yasin now forms the Almoravid alliance from the tribes of the Lamtuna, the Masufa and the Gudala, with himself as spiritual leader and Yahya ibn Umar taking the military command.
In 1054, the Maghrawa-ruled Sijilmasa is conquered.
Ibn Yasin introduces his orthodox rule—among other things wine and music are forbidden, non-Islamic taxes are abolished and one fifth of the spoils of war are allocated to the religious experts.