Muhammad: His Character and Conduct. Adil Salahi
wisdom became widely recognized. The Quraysh needed to renovate the Kaʿbah, which they held to be a holy place. This cubic and nearly entirely black building had a stone of special significance (a meteoric black stone), which is placed at shoulder height in one corner of the building. This served as a mark for the beginning and end of the ṭawāf ritual. When the rebuilding was complete, this black stone needed to be placed back in position. Each clan wanted to have the honour of putting it back in place. Argument was heated and tempers flared up. Some people even called for a fight over this. However, a respected elderly person suggested arbitration, and the clans agreed to make the first entrant the arbiter. It was Muhammad who came through and they were all happy to let him arbitrate. He realized that reconciliation could only be achieved with a sharing of the honour. Therefore, he called for a cloth sheet to be placed on the floor. The black stone was put in the middle and a representative of each clan was chosen. These held the sheet and lifted it together. When the black stone was parallel with its location, Muhammad put it back in place. All were happy, as no clan could boast of having greater honour in the rebuilding of the Kaʿbah.
As Muhammad was approaching his mid-thirties, there was no indication that he would have anything but the continuity of his happy married life while enjoying a good position in society. There are no reports of any travels in this period. Khadījah’s trading was managed at home. Agents were hired to go with the trade caravans to Syria and Yemen. His two sons died in infancy, but his daughters were growing up and expected to move to their prospective husbands’ homes. It was about this time that he began to seek some solitude where he could have undisturbed reflection. He would go to a cave in a nearby mountain, where he would spend several days in worship. No special form of worship is recorded, but this must have been a mostly verbal prayer addressed to God, the Creator.
Again, we can now see this as part of the preparation God’s hand provided for him. Through long reflection in solitude, high up in the mountain where the universe appears so vast – particularly in the clear skies at night, with countless stars shining – the thought of God, the Omnipotent Creator, makes its presence clear. Another aspect of preparation that came even later, very close to the moment when he first received Divine revelations, was that of true dreams. Whenever he saw a dream pertaining to his social and physical environment, it would soon come true, just as it had happened in the dream. This was to reassure him in advance that he was not being subjected to any foul play.
As he approached forty, Muhammad was a well-established family man. He was a highly respected figure in his tribe and in the Makkah community in general. His kindness was always forthcoming and his readiness to help anyone in need was assured. Then the great moment arrived. He was sleeping in the Cave of Ḥirā’ in the mountain, when the angel came to him holding an open book and asking him to read. Muhammad was unlettered, and he replied that he could not read. The angel pressed on his chest with the book until he was almost out of breath, before releasing him and telling him again to read. Again he said he could not. This pattern was repeated twice. After the third time, the angel told him:
Read in the name of your Lord who created man out of a germ-cell. Read; for your Lord is the most Bountiful One, who has taught the use of the pen, taught man what he did not know. (96: 1-5)
He woke up trembling. When he had calmed down, the angel came to him once more in full wakefulness, repeating exactly what had been said and done in the dream. As soon as this was all over he ran home to his wife. As he was trembling, he asked her to cover him up, which she did. When he regained his composure, he told her what he saw. She reassured him that nothing evil could happen to him, because “you are faithful to your trust, kind to your kinsfolk and you always tell the truth.”
From that moment, Muhammad became God’s Prophet. He was soon to learn that he was to be entrusted with a message to deliver to mankind.
1 Muslim, Ṣaḥīḥ (Book of Funerals).
2 Ibn Saʿd, Al-Ṭabaqāt al-Kubrā, vol. 1, pp. 116-119.
3 Ahmad Khaleel Jumaah, Nisā’ min ʿAṣr al-Nabiy, Dār Ibn Kathīr, Damascus, 2003, p. 23.
4 Ibid., p. 25
5 Ibn Saʿd, Al-Ṭabaqāt al-Kubrā, Beirut, Dar Sadir, vol. 1, p. 158.
6 Al-Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ, Kitāb al-Manāqib (chapter on the Prophet’s description).
7 Ibid.
8 Ibid.
CHAPTER 2
SUMMARY OF EVENTS DURING THE PROPHET’S LIFETIME
AS A MATURE MAN OF FORTY, Muhammad was now also a Prophet. It took some time for him to be reassured of his role, and in this Khadījah played an important part. She was certain that her husband – clearly a man of moral rectitude and wisdom – could have nothing to do with the world of evil. Eventually, with reassurance came belief. Muhammad now believed in God’s Oneness and in the absolute falsehood of the idols that were worshipped by the Arabs. Once this was firmly established, the next stage was ushered in, and he became God’s Messenger, with the task to make the right faith known to people and to call on them to believe in it and to bring their daily life in accordance with it. He was told:
You, wrapped in your cloak, arise and give warning. Glorify your Lord’s greatness; clean your garments; stay away from all filth; do not hold up what you give away, showing it to be much; but to your Lord turn in patience. (74: 1-7)
In the first revelation, God told him to read. Bearing in mind that Muhammad was unlettered, this meant recitation from memory: an action that initially had little bearing on others. However, he was then told to arise and give warning. This was no longer a passive action to be performed for and by himself. Rather, this required interaction with others, as he was to warn them that they needed to believe in God’s Oneness and abide by His commands. Muhammad (peace be upon him) henceforth known by his titles of the Prophet and God’s Messenger – accepted both tasks and went about performing them as best as he could, praying to God to help him and trusting in His support. Following Divine guidance, he began to approach people, explaining to them his role and message and calling on them to accept Islam: the new faith whose very name means total submission to God.
On God’s instructions the Prophet began his mission in private, speaking to individuals who were close to him and whom he could trust. A family unit of Muslims was soon formed which included Zayd ibn Ḥārithah, who was around thirty years of age, Khadījah, and ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, the Prophet’s young cousin whom he had taken into his home to ease his uncle’s burden as Makkah went through hard times. Abū Bakr, the Prophet’s close friend, also accepted Islam without hesitation. Other recruits soon followed, including the Prophet’s daughters, Abū Ṭālib’s wife Fāṭimah bint Asad, and Umm Ayman. Young men, such as Talḥah ibn ʿUbaydillah, al-Zubayr ibn al-ʿAwwām, Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ and Saʿīd ibn Zayd, came forward, as did ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir and his parents Yāsir and Sumayyah. A small Muslim community thus came into existence. Although the advocacy of the new faith continued in secret, the Quraysh elders noticed that something was going on. However, they did not bother to look into this, as they assumed it could represent no danger to their established social order.
Three years later, the Prophet was instructed to make his message public and to call on people to accept it. As he was to prove throughout his career, he never shrank from the fulfilment of a duty. Therefore, he addressed his immediate Hāshim clan, and invited them for a meal. He compassionately appealed to them to accept Islam, as this would save them from the social ills that plagued their materialistic way of life and give them a future life to look forward to. He also addressed all the clans of the Quraysh, standing on al-Ṣafā hill, near the Kaʿbah, and made it clear to them that God had entrusted him with a message that was applicable to all mankind in all generations. In both cases, he was met with hostile