In return for the right to practise their religion, the ahl al-dhimma paid a poll-tax, jizya. The payment of the jizya by the ahl al-kitab is based on Sura At-Tawba:29 in the Quran, which stipulates that these people should be fought "until they pay the jizya out of hand, while being humiliated ."[3]

It is true that the ahl al-kitab were given rights, but these were hardly rights equal to those held by Muslims. In the first place, they did not have equal political rights. The Islamic state was a theocratic polity, ruled according to God's revelation. Unbelievers, by definition, could not hold the highest office in the land or contribute to policy.

The ahl al-kitab who paid jizya were also clear as to the position they held in Muslim society: the jizya, and other stipulations, were there to show that while they were a protected people, they were also a subject people. Some of these conditions may be seen in another early Muslim document, the Pact of Umar, which is regarded as the standard agreement imposed by the Islamic state on the subject ahl al-kitab.

According to the pact, the ahl al-kitab could not proselytise, and had no right to prevent members of their community from being converted to Islam. They had to wear clothes that distinguished them from Muslims and marked them out as inferior members of the polity. They had to give up their seats to Muslims. They could not ride horses, or bear arms in public the way Muslims could. They had to clip the hair on the fronts of their heads.

There were also limits to the religious freedom given to the ahl al-kitab. Christians could neither display crosses in public nor ring bells in their churches. The houses of the ahl al-kitab had to be lower than those of Muslims. They could neither build new churches or synagogues, nor repair any existing ones if they were to fall into disrepair. In full from The Nutgraph