“There is also the superstition of the Ishmaelites which to this day prevails and keeps people in error, being a forerunner of the Antichrist…. From that time to the present a false prophet named Mohammed has appeared in their midst. This man, after having chanced upon the Old and New Testaments and likewise, it seems, having conversed with an Arian monk, devised his own heresy. Then, having insinuated himself into the good graces of the people by a show of seeming piety, he gave out that a certain book had been sent down to him from heaven. He had set down some ridiculous compositions in this book of his and he gave it to them as an object of veneration.”
St. John Damascene (d. 749), Syrian Arab Catholic monk and scholar. Quoted from his book On Heresies under the section On the Heresy of the Ishmaelites (in The Fathers of the Church. Vol. 37.
A very accurate description from someone who was practically there to see it!
I think the thing to remember is that in a sense the political or conquest aspect came first, and the “religion” was then added on as a way to give Mohammed and the Arabs total control of the conquered people and to cement this by making the political state into a religion. That’s why it has killed over 250 million people so far in its ceaseless campaign for world domination.
Islamic society is actually the only truly theocratic society, that is, where the state and the religion are one and the same and the state is ruled by religious law. If Hitler had been smart, he would have founded a religion (actually, like Napoleon, he was trying to do so, but he didn’t get it going soon enough).