LESSON 3
THE YOUNG MUHAMMAD

For Muslims, Muhammad was a messenger of God, the last and greatest prophet, who brought to perfection the universal religion that will last until the end of time. In Muslim belief Muhammad was in one way a nobody, since Islam is said to be founded by God and Muhammad was merely his mortal spokesman. On the other hand Muhammad was the greatest person in history, because no one could perform a greater role than to usher into the world God's definitive guidance, the Qur'ān. And so Muslims believe that no specimen of humanity could ever be as perfect and good as Muhammad. Consequently he is taken as the exemplar for all mankind, and all his words and actions are considered sunna, that is, a model for all to follow.

A Christian does not believe all that, but his own faith and objective history will lead him to credit Muhammad with some good.

Muhammad's life is not easy to know. The Qur'ān makes many references to incidents in his life, but these are vague and impossible to piece together into a biography, unless we first know the progress of his life from some other source. The oldest written information about his life dates from 125 years after his death. That is the Sīra or biography by Ibn-Ishāq, who died in 768. Yet the original of this biography is lost, and we only know it through the amplified edition of Ibn-Hishām, who died in 833, two centuries after the death of Muhammad.

How authentic and accurate are the stories these writers narrate? They all depend on oral traditions passed on by the Companions of Muhammad to succeeding generations. Any story changes in the telling and the longer the distance from the event the less reliable the story. The time gap of 125 years before the first of these biographies is one reason for making us cautious about believing everything in them. Nevertheless, the main outline of Muhammad's life seems reasonably credible.

Muhammad was born in the "Year of the Elephant", when the Ethiopian governor of Yemen used an elephant in an unsuccessful bid to capture Mecca (Q 105). That was around 570, give or take a couple of years. One legend tries to show that Muhammad is the light which God created in the beginning of the world which was put into Adam and passed on to Muhammad's father `Abdallāh:

`Abdallāh came into the house of another wife he had besides Āmina, and he was stained with the clay he had been working in. He asked her to have sex, but she put him off because he was dirty. So he left her and bathed, washing away the clay that was on him. Then he went out intending to go to Āmina. As he passed the other wife she invited him to come to her. He refused, since he wanted Āmina. He went into her, had intercourse, and she conceived Muhammad. When he passed the other wife again he asked if she still wanted him. She said, "No. When you just passed me there was a shining white spot between your eyes and I invited you, but you refused me and went to Āmina instead, and she has taken it away."

Muhammad's father died before Āmina delivered, and Āmina herself died when Muhammad was six years old. His uncle Abū-Tālib took charge of him, and took him along on trading trips to Syria. On one such journey the legendary meeting with the monk Bahira occurred:

The caravan camped in Burā in the land of Syria, where there was a monk called Bahīrā. He lived in a hermitage and had a good knowledge of Christianity. For a long time there was a monk in that hermitage who studied from a book, so they say, which each old monk passed on to his junior replacement.

Although the caravan had passed Bahīrā's hermitage many times before, he never spoke to them or even came out; yet when they camped near him this year he prepared plenty of food for them. That is because of something he is supposed to have seen from his hermitage; for, so the story goes, he spotted the Messenger of God from his hermitage when the caravan came near, and a cloud was shading him alone. They came up and camped in the shade of a nearby tree, and he saw the cloud overshadowing the tree and the branches of the tree bending down over the Messenger of God to give him shade. When Bahīrā saw that, he came out of his hermitage and sent a message to them saying, "I have prepared food for you, men of Quraysh, and want all of you to come, young and old, slave and free."

One of the men answered, "By God, Bahīrā, you have something in mind. You never did this for us before, the many times that we passed you. Why are you inviting us today?" Bahīrā said, "You are right in what you said, but you are guests and I am happy to honour you and prepare food for you. So all of you come to eat." So they gathered at his hermitage, but the Messenger of God stayed behind with the caravan under the tree because he was young. When Bahīrā looked at the men and did not see the mark he knew from his book he said, "Men of Quraysh, let none of you stay away from my food." They answered, "Bahīrā no one stayed behind who should come except a boy, the youngest of us. He is staying with the caravan." Bahīrā said, "Don't do that. Call him to come and eat with you."...

Bahīrā went and embraced him and sat him down with the men. When Bahīrā saw him he began to examine him carefully and notice features of his body which matched the description of his book... Bahīrā began asking him about his condition in sleep, his outward appearance and his affairs, and the Messenger of God told him everything. That matched the description that Bahīrā had of him; so he then looked at his back and saw the seal of prophecy between his shoulders just where his book said it would be.

This story reflects Muslim belief that Muhammad was foretold in the Bible. (See lesson 39.)

Another legend tells how God protected Muhammad from sinful action, as he himself tells:

I never gave a thought to what the people of the pagan era used to do but twice, because God prevented me from following my desires. Afterwards I never thought of evil when God honoured me with apostleship. Once I said to a young Quraysh boy who was shepherding with me on the hills of Mecca, "Please look after my animals for me while I go and spend the night in Mecca as young men do." He agreed and I went off with that intention, and when I came to the first house in Mecca I heard the sound of tambourines and flutes and asked what this was. I was told that a marriage had just taken place. I sat down to look at them when God struck my ear and I fell asleep until I was woken up by the sun. I came to my friend who asked me what I did. I said "Nothing" and told him the story. I asked him another night to watch my animals and exactly the same thing occurred. Afterwards I never thought of evil until God honoured me with his apostleship.

As a young man, Muhammad had the good fortune to be hired as a trading agent of Khadīja, a wealthy Meccan woman who was twice a widow. In this job he travelled at least one more time to Syria.

Muhammad's travels broadened his experience and no doubt set him thinking about many things, but his own personal future was decided by Khadīja's proposal of marriage. This enabled Muhammad to have a family and, with the help of her money, a business. At this time Muhammad was 25, and Khadīja at least 10 years older. (She is said to have been 40, but that is unlikely if she bore Muhammad six children.) She was attracted to Muhammad because he served her as an honest and successful agent. "When he returned to Mecca and brought Khadīja her property she sold it for about double her investment." She may also have been impressed by his spiritual qualities.

The couple had two sons: al-Qāsim and `Abdallāh (also known as at-Tāhir and at-Tayyib, although some would make these distinct persons) and four daughters: Zaynab, Ruqayya, Umm-Kulthūm and Fātima. The sons died young, while the daughters lived to maturity. Yet of these only Fātima gave Muhammad grandchildren and a lasting line of descendants.

QUESTIONS

1. What similar or different approaches do Muslims and Christians have in studying the life of Muhammad?
2. How reliable is our knowledge of the life of Muhammad compared with our knowledge of the "historical Jesus"?
3. How and why do the accounts of Muhammad's birth and youth present him as more than an ordinary human person?
4. Describe the circumstances of Muhammad's first marriage.

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