Muhammad ibn Abdullah

Early life and childhood

Muhammad was born to villagers of the Banu Hashim clan, a branch of the Qurayshi tribe, and one of Mecca's prominent families. He was reported to have been born in "the year of the Elephant." Although some schollars disagree by one or two years.^[10] Muhammad's father died before he was born and was given away by his mother after birth.^[11] He was given to Halimah bint Abi Dhuayb and her husband until he reached 2 years old. At six his mother also passed away, leading Muhammad into orphanage.^[12] For the following two years he lived with her paternal grandfather Abdul-Muttalib until his death. He then came under the care of his uncle Abu Talib who had became the leader of the Hashim tribe.^[10]

First marriage

In 595 AD, aged twenty-five, Muhammad married his first wife and employer Khadijah. She was a wealthy women, aged fourty, who had three children from two previous marriages. She would eventually bear him two sons (both died in childhood) and four daughters.^[13] Khadijah's mother was a third cousin of Muhammad's mother.^[14][15] According to some sources, Khadijah's father, Khuwaylid bin Asad, whose sister was Muhammad's great grandmother,^[16] was opposed to the idea of his affluent daughter marrying such an "insignificant youth." Thus, Khadijah executed a plan to get her father drunk enough to accept the marriage.^[17]

Revelation

The begginings of the Qur'an were conceived as Muhammad began to leave his wife and children to pray alone in a cave several weeks each year.^[18][19] According to Islamic belief, when he was about forty years old (610 AD) he was visited by the Angel Gabriel (جبريل Jibreel) and commanded to recite verses sent by Allah.^[20] These verses would later become what is believed to be the first part of Sura 96.^[21] This experience frightened him, and originally thinking he was possessed by a demon, he became suicidal. According to Sahih Bukhari^[22] After this first 'revelation' no new ones came for a time, but then after a long period they started up again and continued at a steady rate till his death. The collection of these verses is known as the Qur'an.^[23]

Read in chronological order some scholars note over time the revelations change in style from a poetic to a more straight forward and aggressive form in the later years.^[24] The messages of the later revelations also changed and abrogated the earlier ones. Typically from the now famous 'no compulsion verse' to the 'verse of the sword'. These alterations followed Muhammad's place in society. What are known as the "early revelation" were recorded in Mecca while Muhammad had only a few followers. The later "Medinan verses" were revealed once Muhammad had gained more followers and became the head of the first Islamic state in Medina.^[24]

These revelations continued until his death twenty-three years later. According to Sahih Bukhari, these divine revelations would sometimes come to him while dressed in Aisha's clothes.^[25] Sahih Bukhari also describes how the revelations appear, describing them sometimes as the "ringing of a bell" and "sometimes the Angel comes in the form of a man"^[26]

Preaching in Mecca

He began preaching as a prophet in Mecca, warning of a day of judgement when all humans who have rejected his claims of prophethood would burn for eternity in Hell (جهنم Jahannam).^[27] Even during the early days of his self-proclaimed prophethood he was often accused by the Meccans of imperfectly plagiarising the "ancients fictitious tales."^[28] This was complimented by the fact that Muhammad was an illiterate man who had come into contact with followers of the Abrahamic faiths before his proclamation of prophethood (e.g. Zaid bin 'Amr bin Nufail).^[29] The elites in Mecca were left unimpressed by what was preached. Eventually, Muhammad delivered verses that condemned idol worship and the Meccan forefathers who engaged in polytheism.^[30] Muhammad's opposition in Mecca came as a reaction to his antagonism of 'idolaters'. As Muhammad's followers remained few in numbers, in an attempt to entice the polytheists into converting to Islam he revealed the now infamous "Satanic Verses". Muhammad, hoping to be acknowledged by his tribe, declared the existence of three Meccan goddesses and associated them as the daughters of Allah. Muhammad later retracted the verses, claiming that the verses were whispered by the devil himself.^[31][32][33]

The Verses in the Quran 53:19-23 read:

"Have ye seen Lat. and 'Uzza, And another, the third (goddess), Manat? What! for you the male sex, and for Him, the female? Behold, such would be indeed a division most unfair! These are nothing but names which ye have devised,- ye and your fathers,- for which Allah has sent down no authority (whatever). They follow nothing but conjecture and what their own souls desire!- Even though there has already come to them Guidance from their Lord!"^[34]

Muhammad was also criticized for claiming he rode the Buraq (a mythical flying horse-like creature) on an alleged "Night Journey" to the "nearest heaven" and then back to Mecca in a single night.^[35] An event which is now celebrated by in Islam every year.^[36]

Emigration

After the death of his uncle Abu Talib, who, although not becoming a Muslim, had protected Muhammad throughout, in 622, Muhammad left Mecca in a journey known to Muslims as the Hijra (هِجْرَة Migration).^[27] He, along with his followers, settled in Medina (then known as Yathrib) a large agricultural oasis, where he was the leader of the first Islamic theocracy. He ordered his followers not to contact their relatives who were left behind in Mecca. By severing links between his followers and their non-Muslim relatives, Muhammad furthered his hold on them. This Hijra (traditionally translated into English as "flight") marks the beginning of the (rather crude) Islamic lunar calendar. The Muslim calendar counts dates from the Hijra, which is why Muslim dates have the suffix AH (After Hijra).

Medina was home to a number of Jewish tribes, divided into three major clans: Banu Qainuqa, Banu Qurayza and Banu Nadir, and some minor groups.^[37] Among the things Muhammad did was draft a document known as the Constitution of Medina (date debated), "establishing a kind of alliance or federation" among the eight Medinan tribes and Muslim emigrants from Mecca, which specified the rights and duties of all citizens and the relationship of the different communities in Medina.^[37]

War with the Meccans

In March of 624, Muhammad led some three hundred converts in a raid on a Meccan merchant caravan. The Meccans successfully defended the caravan, but then decided to retaliate and marched against Medina. On March 15, 624 near a place called Badr, the Meccans and the Muslims clashed. Though outnumbered more than three times (one thousand to three hundred - majority of Muslim historians put the exact total at 313) in the battle, the Muslims met with success, killing at least seventy Meccans and taking seventy prisoners^[38] for ransom; only fourteen Muslims died.^[39] This marked the beginning of Muslim military battles. Among the prisoners was Al Nadir, a storyteller and poet who had mocked him. He was not allowed to be ransomed by their clans and was executed on Muhammad's orders.^[40] Muhammad also ordered twenty-four Meccans to be thrown into the well of Badr as disrespect for the dead,^[41][42]

A further four years of continuous war between Muslim and Meccan forces followed, culminating later in a Muslim victory and the conquest of Mecca. The Muslims subsequently removed and destroyed everything they considered idolatrous from the Ka'aba, while Muhammad recited verses from the Qur'an. The townspeople either accepted Islam or were expelled. In March 632,^[43] Muhammad led the pilgrimage known as the Hajj (حج).

Spouses

Main Article: Muhammad and Women

Following the death of his (at that time) only wife Khadijah, Muhammad began to practice polygamy and became known as a womanizer.^[44] After an initial protest from Aisha's father, Muhammad's best friend and companion Abu Baker,^[45] Muhammad, then 53, married her at 6 years old. In Medina, he married Hafsah, daughter of Umar (who would eventually become Abu Bakr's successor). Eventually he would go on to marry (and house independently) a total of fifteen women,^[46] and according to Sunni scholar Ibn al-Qayyim, owned numerous concubines, including his Coptic slave, Mariyah.^[47]

Attitude towards Jews

A few years after his migration, Muhammad's attitude towards the Christians and Jews changed. Having encountered rejection from the Jewish scholars in Medina, he became antisemitic. The Jews were skeptical of the compatibility between the Qur'an and their own scriptures, and while many in Medina converted to Islam, very few were from the large Jewish populations. This was the start of the long history of persecution and subjugation of Dhimmis (non-muslim second class citizens).^[48]

After each major battle with the Medinans, Muhammad accused one of the Jewish tribes of treachery and attacked it.^[49] After Badr and Uhud, the Banu Qainuqa and Banu Nadir, respectively, were expelled from Medina, and much of their possessions were confiscated by Muhammad.^[50] After the Battle of the Trench in 627, Muhammad accused the Jews of Banu Qurayza of conspiring with the Meccans, then wiped them out.^[51] The women and young children were taken captive by Muslims to be sold in slave markets,^[52][53] and the men and boys who had begun to grow pubic hair were beheaded.^[54] Muslim historian Ibn Ishaq describes the incident:

"Then they surrendered, and the apostle confined them in Medina in the quarter of d. al-Harith, a woman of B. al-Najjar. Then the apostle went out to the market of Medina (which is still its market today) and dug trenches in it. Then he sent for them and struck off their heads in those trenches as they were brought out to him in batches. Among them was the enemy of Allah Huyayy b. Akhtab and Ka`b b. Asad their chief. There were 600 or 700 in all, though some put the figure as high as 800 or 900. As they were being taken out in batches to the apostle they asked Ka`b what he thought would be done with them. He replied, 'Will you never understand? Don't you see that the summoner never stops and those who are taken away do not return? By Allah it is death!' This went on until the apostle made an end of them."^[55] al-Tabari VIII:35/Ishaq:464

One of the explanations given by some Arab historians and biographers for Muhammad's treatment of the Jews of Medina is that "the punishment of the Medina Jews, who were invited to convert and refused, perfectly exemplify the Qur'an's tales of what happened to those who rejected the prophets of old."^[56]

In the year 632, Muhammad became infirm with severe head pain and weakness. He died on June, 8^th, 632 at the age of 62 or 63. Muhammad was poisoned by a Jewish woman, following the conquest of Khaibar, where he took Safiyah as a wife, and ordered the torture and beheading of her husband Kinana, the chief of the Jews at Khaibar. He spent his last day with the young Aisha, who was considered to be his favorite wife. At the time of his death, Ali (who would later become the fourth caliph of Islam) reported that Muhammad's penis was erect.^[57] He was buried in his house near the Mosque of the Prophet in Medina.

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