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In the Name of Allah, The
Beneficent, The Merciful
During the centuries of the crusades,
all sorts of slanders were invented
against Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). But
with the birth of the modern age, marked
with religious tolerance and freedom of
thought, there has been a great change
in the approach of Western authors in
their delineation of his life and
character. The views of some non-Muslim
scholars regarding Prophet Muhammad,
given at the end, justify this opinion.
But the West has still to go a step
forward to discover the greatest reality
about Muhammad and that is his being the
true and the last Prophet of God
for the whole humanity. In
spite of all its objectivity and
enlightenment there has been no sincere
and objective attempt by the West to
understand the Prophethood of Muhammad (pbuh).
It is so strange that very glowing
tributes are paid to him for his
integrity and achievement but his claim
of being the Prophet of God has been
rejected explicitly or implicitly. It is
here that a searching of the heart is
required, and a review of the so-called
objectivity is needed. The following
glaring facts from the life of Muhammad
(pbuh) have been furnished to facilitate
an unbiased, logical and objective
decision regarding his Prophethood.
Up to the age of forty, Muhammad was
not known as a statesman, a preacher or
an orator. He was never seen discussing
the principles of metaphysics, ethics,
law, politics, economics or sociology.
No doubt he possessed an excellent
character, charming manners and was
highly cultured. Yet there was nothing
so deeply striking and so radically
extraordinary in him that would make men
expect something great and revolutionary
from him in the future. But when he came
out of the Cave (HIRA) with a new
message, he was completely transformed.
Is it possible for such a person of the
above qualities to turn all of a sudden
into 'an impostor' and claim to be the
Prophet of Allah and invite all the rage
of his people? One might ask: for what
reason did he suffer all those
hardships? His people offered to accept
him as their King and he would leave the
preaching of his religion. But he chose
to refuse their tempting offers and go
on preaching his religion
single-handedly in face of all kinds of
insults, social boycott and even
physical assault by his own people. Was
it not only God's support and his firm
will to disseminate the message of Allah
and his deep-rooted belief that
ultimately Islam would emerge as the
only way of life for humanity, that he
stood like a mountain in the face of all
opposition and conspiracies to eliminate
him? Furthermore, had he come with a
design of rivalry with the Christians
and the Jews, why should he have made
belief in Jesus Christ and Moses and
other Prophets of God (peace be upon
them), a basic requirement of faith
without which no one could be a Muslim?
Is it not an incontrovertible proof
of his Prophethood that in spite of
being unlettered and having led a very
normal and quiet life for forty years,
when he began preaching his message, all
of Arabia stood in awe and wonder and
was bewitched by his wonderful eloquence
and oratory? It was so matchless that
the whole legion of Arab poets,
preachers and orators of the highest
calibre failed to bring forth its
equivalent. And above all, how could he
then pronounce truths of a scientific
nature contained in the Qur'an that no
other human being could possible have
developed at that time?
Last but not least, why did he lead a
hard life even after gaining power and
authority? Just ponder over the words he
uttered while dying: "We the
community of the Prophets are not
inherited. Whatever we leave is for
charity."
As a matter of fact, Muhammad (pbuh)
is the last link of the chain of
Prophets sent in different lands and
times since the very beginning of the
human life on this planet. Read the
following writings of the Western
authors:
"If greatness of purpose,
smallness of means, and astounding
results are the three criteria of
human genius, who could dare to
compare any great man in modern
history with Muhammad? The most famous
men created arms, laws and empires
only. They founded, if anything at
all, no more than material powers
which often crumbled away before their
eyes. This man moved not only armies,
legislations, empires, peoples and
dynasties, but millions of men in
one-third of the then inhabited world;
and more than that, he moved the
altars, the gods, the religions, the
ideas, the beliefs and souls. . . his
forbearance in victory, his ambition,
which was entirely devoted to one idea
and in no manner striving for an
empire; his endless prayers, his
mystic conversations with God, his
death and his triumph after death; all
these attest not to an imposture but
to a firm conviction which gave him
the power to restore a dogma. This
dogma was twofold, the unity of God
and the immateriality of God; the
former telling what God is, the latter
telling what God is not; the one
overthrowing false gods with the
sword, the other starting an idea with
words.
"Philosopher, orator, apostle,
legislator, warrior, conqueror of
ideas, restorer of rational dogmas, of
a cult without images; the founder of
twenty terrestrial empires and of one
spiritual empire, that is Muhammad. As
regards all standards by which human
greatness may be measured, we may well
ask, is there any man greater
than he?"
Lamartine, HISTOIRE DE LA
TURQUIE, Paris, 1854, Vol. II, pp.
276-277.
"It is not the propagation but
the permanency of his religion that
deserves our wonder, the same pure and
perfect impression which he engraved
at Mecca and Medina is preserved,
after the revolutions of twelve
centuries by the Indian, the African
and the Turkish proselytes of the
Koran. . . The Mahometans have
uniformly withstood the temptation of
reducing the object of their faith an
devotion to a level with the senses
and imagination of man. 'I believe
in One God and Mahomet the Apostle of
God' is the simple and invariable
profession of Islam. The intellectual
image of the Deity has never been
degraded by any visible idol; the
honours of the prophet have never
transgressed the measure of human
virtue, and his living precepts have
restrained the gratitude of his
disciples within the bounds of reason
and religion."
Edward Gibbon and Simon Ocklay,
HISTORY OF THE SARACEN EMPIRE, London,
1870, p. 54.
"He was Caesar and Pope in
one; but he was Pope without Pope's
pretensions, Caesar without the
legions of Caesar: without a standing
army, without a bodyguard, without a
palace, without a fixed revenue; if
ever any man had the right to say that
he ruled by the right divine, it was
Mohammed, for he had all the power
without its instruments and without
its supports."
Bosworth Smith, MOHAMMAD AND
MOHAMMADANISM, London, 1874, p. 92.
"It is impossible for anyone
who studies the life and character of
the great Prophet of Arabia, who knows
how he taught and how he lived, to
feel anything but reverence for that
mighty Prophet, one of the great
messengers of the Supreme. And
although in what I put to you I shall
say many things which may be familiar
to many, yet I myself feel whenever I
re-read them, a new way of admiration,
a new sense of reverence for that
mighty Arabian teacher."
Annie Besant, THE LIFE AND
TEACHINGS OF MUHAMMAD, Madras,1932, p.
4.
"His readiness to undergo
persecutions for his beliefs, the high
moral character of the men who
believed in him and looked up to him
as leader, and the greatness of his
ultimate achievement - all argue his
fundamental integrity. To suppose
Muhammad an impostor raises more
problems than it solves. Moreover,
none of the great figures of history
is so poorly appreciated in the West
as Muhammad."
W. Montgomery Watt, MOHAMMAD
AT MECCA, Oxford, 1953, p. 52.
"Muhammad, the inspired man
who founded Islam, was born about A.D.
570 into an Arabian tribe that
worshipped idols. Orphaned at birth,
he was always particularly solicitous
of the poor and needy, the widow and
the orphan, the slave and the
downtrodden. At twenty, he was already
a successful businessman, and soon
became director of camel caravans for
a wealthy widow. When he reached
twenty-five, his employer, recognizing
his merit, proposed marriage. Even
though she was fifteen years older, he
married her, and as long as she lived,
remained a devoted husband.
"Like almost every major
prophet before him, Muhammad fought
shy of serving as the transmitter of
God's word, sensing his own
inadequacy. But the angel commanded "Read."
So far as we know, Muhammad
was unable to read or write,
but he began to dictate those inspired
words which would soon revolutionize a
large segment of the earth: "There
is one God."
"In all things Muhammad was
profoundly practical. When his beloved
son Ibrahim died, an eclipse occurred,
and rumours of God's personal
condolence quickly arose. Whereupon
Muhammad is said to have announced, "An
eclipse is a phenomenon of nature. It
is foolish to attribute such things to
the death or birth of a human
being." "At Muhammad's
own death an attempt was made to deify
him, but the man who was to become his
administrative successor killed the
hysteria with one of the noblest
speeches in religious history:
"If there are any among you who
worshipped Muhammad, he is dead. But
if it is God you worshipped, He lives
forever."
James A. Michener,
"ISLAM: THE MISUNDERSTOOD
RELIGION," in READER'S DIGEST
(American edition), May 1955, pp.
68-70.
"My choice of Muhammad to lead
the list of the world's most
influential persons may surprise some
readers and may be questioned by
others, but he was the only man in
history who was supremely successful
on both the religious and secular
level."
Michael H. Hart, THE 100: A
RANKING OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL
PERSONS IN HISTORY, New York: Hart
Publishing Company, Inc., 1978, p. 33.
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