Streszczenie
The Islamic commentators on the Damascus mosque from the eighth to the twelfth
centuries demonstrated superiority of Islam to Christianity to reduce the influence of the
earlier owners of the sanctuary, giving this holy place the exclusively Muslim meaning.
The tradition recorded by Ibn ‘Asākir in his Tārīh madīnat Dimašq confirms this tendency.
Although one can speak about some kind of tolerance in medieval Islam according to
the researches of Yohannan Friedmann Muslims faced other religions from the position
of a ruling power and were, therefore, able to determine the nature of that relationship
in accordance with their world-views and beliefs. This phenomenon explains why from
among 15 churches in the first part of the 7th century in Damascus in the 12th century
there were only three churches used in the Christian cult, one was partially destroyed,
seven were ruined and four were changed into mosques.