Muhammad
Mohammed (c. 570 – 632; Arabic: محمد also spelled Muhammed or Muhammad, all unexact transcriptions of Arabic ﷴ spoken [mʊˈħæmmæd]; full name Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib ibn Hāshim or it is written in Arab script as محمد ابن عبد الله ابن عبد المطلب ابن هاشم) is claimed to be the founder of Islam and is regarded by Muslims as the "last messenger and prophet of God" (Allah), and is also regarded as a prophet by the Druze and as a "Manifestation of God" by the Baha'i Faith.[1] Many Muslims do not believe that Mohammed was the creator of a new religion, but the restorer of the original, uncorrupted monotheistic faith of Adam, Abraham and others. They see him as the last and the greatest in a series of prophets of Islam, with the exception of the sect Ahmadiyya and the quasi-religious group Nation of Islam who do not see him as the final prophet.
Contents
Life
Sources on Muhammad’s life concur that he was born ca. 571 AD in the city of Mecca on the Arabian peninsula.[2] He was orphaned at a young age and was brought up by his uncle, later worked mostly as a merchant, and was married by age 26. At some point, discontented with life in Mecca, he retreated to a cave in the surrounding mountains for meditation and reflection. According to Islamic tradition, it was here at age 40, in the month of Ramadan, where he received his first revelation from God. Three years after this event, Muhammad started preaching these revelations publicly, proclaiming that “God is One”, that complete “surrender” to Him (lit. islām)[3] is the only way (dīn),[4] acceptable to God, and that he was a prophet and messenger of God, in the same vein as Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus, and other prophets.[5][6][7]
Muhammad gained few followers early on, and was largely met with hostility from the tribes of Mecca; he was treated harshly and so were his followers. To escape persecution, Muhammad and his followers migrated to Yathrib (Medina)[8] in the year 622. This historic event, the Hijra, marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar. In Medina, Muhammad managed to unite the conflicting tribes, and after eight years of fighting with the Meccan tribes, his followers, who by then had grown to ten thousand, conquered Mecca. In 632, on returning to Medina from his “Farewell pilgrimage”, Muhammad fell ill and died. By the time of his death, most of Arabia had converted to Islam.
The revelations (or Ayats, lit. Signs of God), which Muhammad reported receiving till his death, form the verses of the Qurʿān,[9] regarded by Muslims as the “word of God”, around which the religion is based. Besides the Qur'an, Muhammad’s life (sira) and traditions (sunnah) are also upheld by Muslims.
Jews
He forced three Jewish clan deportation form Medina. These were Banu Qaynuqa, Banu Nadir, and Banu Khurayza. The mentioned clans breached treaties between Muslims and Jews. As a result, they were sentenced by Muslims as a deportation from Medina.
Personal life
One of Mohammed's many wives was Safiyya bint Huyayy, a Jewess, who he had captured and enslaved from the Banu Nadir tribe, when she was 17 years old. She became a Muslim after the marriage. The pedophile prophet married a child named Aisha bint Abi Bakr when she was 6 years old and consumated his marriage with her when she was only 9. At the time he was 54.[10] Muhammed also beheaded between six hundred and nine hundred men personally. [11]
See also
References
- ↑ The Cambridge History of Islam (1977) writes that "It is appropriate to use the word 'God' rather than the transliteration 'Allah'. For one thing it cannot be denied that Islam is an offshoot of the Judaeo-Christians tradition, and for another the Christian Arabs of today have no other word for 'God' than 'Allah'." cf p.32.
- ↑ Encyclopedia of World History (1998), p.452
- ↑ The word “islām” derives from the triconsonantal Arabic root sīn-lām-mīm, which carries the basic meaning of safety and peace. The verbal noun “islām” is formed from the verb aslama, a derivation of this root which means to accept, surrender, or submit; thus, “Islam” effectively means submission to and acceptance of God. See: Islam#Etymology and meaning
- ↑ “Islam” is always referred to in the Qurʼan as a “dīn”, a word that means “way” or “path” in Arabic, but is usually translated in English as “religion” for the sake of convenience
- ↑ Esposito (1998), p.12; (1999) p.25; (2002) pp.4–5
- ↑ "Muhammad", Encyclopedia of Islam Online
- ↑ Peters (2003), p.9
- ↑ After Muhhammad’s migration to Yathrib, the city came to be known as Madina al-Nabi, lit. “City of the Prophet”; hence, the name Medina
- ↑ The term Qur'an was first used in the Qur'an itself. There are two different theories about this term and its formation that are discussed in Quran#Etymology cf. “Qurʼan”, Encyclopedia of Islam Online.
- ↑ http://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles/sina/ayesha.htm
- ↑ http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/58326
