Also important for understanding Maimonides' view of Islam is a well known letter than he wrote around the year 1165, when he was still a resident of Fez, having not yet travelled to Erez Yisrael and Egypt. It was addressed to the inhabitants of Morocco, who had been threatened by the Almohads with conversion, exile, or death. It so happened that an anonymous scholar who had been living outside of the Almohads' reach had issued a ruling that Islam was idolatry and that, therefore, one must give up his life rather than convert to Islam. If one did not, he was to be treated as no different than a true apostate. This ruling created somewhat of a storm among the crypto-Jews of Morocco, and it was in response to this confusion that Maimonides wrote his letter, which was a marvelous defense of a Jewish community that was forced to hide its religion because of persecution.<ref>Regarding the debate as to whether Maimonides himself was a crypto-Jew while be lived in Fez, see the recent discussion by Jay Harris, "Maimonides in 19th Century Historiography," Proceedings of the American Academy of Jewish Research 54 (1987), pp. 133ff.</ref>
Rabbi Haym [[Rav Hayyim Soloveitchik]]'s discussed at length the issues involved.<ref>Maimonides' Iggeret Ha-Shemad: Law and Rhetoric," in Leo Landman, ed., Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein Memorial Volume (New York, 1980), pp. 284ff.</ref> However, one thing which appears to be sure, is that it was the Maimonidean acceptance of Islam's monotheistic character that enabled him to come to the defense of the crypto-Jews, even if he does not argue this point explicitly. Either he felt that this notion was so obvious, he did not feel the need to defend it. Alternatively, one could say that his refusal to argue the case that Islam is not idolatry was because he regarded the crypto-Jews as never having truly accepted the religion in the first place and, therefore, his argument was able to proceed along a different line, one which argues that, even assuming that Islam is idolatry, the Jews still have not violated the idolatry prohibition.<ref>See Soloveitchik, Op. cit., pp. 286-287.</ref> However, had the Jews truly accepted Islam, one could probably have expected Maimonides to argue that, whereas the Jews may have been heretics, they were not idolaters. By assuming that the Jews never adopted Islam, Maimonides can argue the way that he does.
However, Rabbi Soloveitchik argues that, since Maimonides identifies the denial of prophecy with idolatry, "why should the Shahadah, with its assertion of the primacy of Mohammed's prophecy, not be on a similar footing? The contemporary nature of Judaism changes little whether one asserts that there never was a revelation or whether one claims that it occurred but is now outmoded. Both statements would seem to be equally treasonable" (pp. 285-286). The Magen Avraham, <ref>Orah Hayyim 128:37</ref>, who argues that, at least in one respect, Maimonides equates conversion to Islam with idolatry.
