At the start of the period, the Abbasids ruled Bactria (northern Afghanistan), where they allowed the local Buddhists, Hindus, and Zoroastrians to keep their religions if they paid a poll tax. Many, however, voluntarily accepted Islam, especially among the landowners and the educated upper urban classes. Its high culture was more accessible than their own and they could avoid paying the heavy tax. The Turki Shahis, allied with the Tibetans, ruled Kabul, where Buddhism and Hinduism were flourishing. The Buddhist rulers and spiritual leaders might easily have worried that a similar phenomenon, conversion out of convenience, would happen there.

The Turki Shahis ruled the region until 870 CE, losing control of it only between 815 and 819. During those four years, the Abbasid Caliph al-Ma'mun invaded Kabul and forcedthe ruling shah to submit to him and accept Islam. To represent his submission, the Kabul Shah presented the Caliph, as a gift, a gold Buddha statue from Subahar Monastery. As a sign of the triumph of Islam, Caliph al-Ma'mun sent the enormous statue, with its silver throne and jeweled crown, to Mecca and displayed it there at the Kaaba for two years. In doing so, the caliph was demonstrating his authority to rule the entire Islamic world after vanquishing his brother in a civil war. He did not force all the Buddhists of Kabul to convert, however, nor did he destroy the monasteries. He did not even smash, as an idol, the Buddha statue that the Kabul Shah had presented him, but sent it instead to Mecca