Muhammad (12 page)

Meanwhile the Quraysh had become more alarmed. The chiefs had dispatched a spy to report on the enemy troops. He was aghast to see the grim resolution on the faces of the Muslims and begged the Quraysh not to fight. He had “seen camels carrying Death—the camels of Yathrib laden with certain death.” Not one of the Muslims would die before he had killed at least one of the Meccans, and, the spy concluded despairingly, how could the Quraysh live with themselves after that? They would constantly be looking into the face of a neighbor who had killed one of their kinsfolk. But Abu Jahl was beyond reason and accused him of cowardice—a jibe that no Arab could ignore. He then turned to the brother of the man slain by the Muslim raiders at Nakhlah, who emitted a savage war cry. Immediately, said Ibn Ishaq, “war was kindled and all was marred and the folk held stubbornly to their evil course.”
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The Quraysh began to advance slowly over the sand dunes. Observing the command of the Qur’an, Muhammad refused to strike first, and even after the battle commenced, he seemed reluctant to unleash his men until Abu Bakr told him to leave his prayers and engage his troops, because God would certainly give them victory.

In the fierce skirmish that followed, the Quraysh soon found that they were getting the worst of it. They fought with careless bravado, as though this was a knightly tournament, and had no concerted strategy. But the Muslims did have a disciplined plan. They began by bombarding the enemy with arrows, drawing their swords for hand-to-hand combat only at the last minute. By midday, the Quraysh had fled in disarray, leaving some fifty of their leading men, including Abu Jahl himself, dead on the field. There were only fourteen Muslim casualties.

Jubilantly, the Muslims began to round up the prisoners and draw their swords. In tribal warfare, there was no quarter for the vanquished. Casualties were mutilated and captives were either slain or tortured. Muhammad immediately ordered his troops to desist. A revelation came down to ensure that the prisoners of war must either be released or ransomed.
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Even in war, Muslims would abjure the savage customs of the past.

Constantly the Qur’an insists upon the importance of mercy and forgiveness, even during armed conflict.
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While engaged in hostilities, Muslims must fight with courage and steadfastness in order to bring the conflict to an end as quickly as possible. But the moment the enemy asks for peace, Muslims must lay down their arms.
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They must accept any offer of truce, whatever conditions are imposed, even if they suspect the enemy of double-dealing. And although it is important to fight persecution and oppression, the Qur’an constantly reminds Muslims that it is much better to sit down and solve the problem by courteous discussion.
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True, God permitted retaliation in the Torah—eye for eye, tooth for tooth—“but he who shall forgo it out of charity will atone better for some of his past sins.”
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Retaliation would be strictly confined to those who had actually perpetrated the atrocity, a great advance on the law of vendetta, which permitted revenge against any member of the killer’s tribe. The Qur’an reminded the Muslims that they were not fighting the whole tribe of Quraysh; those who had remained neutral throughout the conflict and those Muslims who had chosen to remain in Mecca must not be attacked or injured in any way.
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Muhammad was not a pacifist. He believed that warfare was sometimes inevitable and even necessary. After the battle of Badr, the Muslims knew that it was only a matter of time before Mecca took her revenge, and they dedicated themselves to a long, gruelling
jihad.
But the primary meaning of that word, which we hear so often today, is not “holy war” but the “effort” or “struggle” necessary to put the will of God into practice. Muslims are exhorted to strive in this endeavor on all fronts: intellectual, social, economic, spiritual, and domestic. Sometimes they would have to fight, but this was not their chief duty. On their way home from Badr, Muhammad uttered an important and oft-quoted maxim: “We are returning from the Lesser Jihad (the battle) and going to the Greater Jihad,”—the immeasurably more important and difficult struggle to reform their own society and their own hearts.

Badr had given Muhammad a far higher profile in the oasis. As they prepared for the inevitable Qurayshan riposte, a covenant was drawn up between the Prophet and the Arab and Jewish tribes of Medina, who agreed to live peaceably beside the Muslims and promised not to make a separate treaty with Mecca. All the inhabitants were required to defend the oasis against attack. The new constitution was careful to guarantee the religious freedom of the Jewish clans, but expected them to provide aid to “whosoever wars against the people of this document.”
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Muhammad needed to know who was on his side and some of those who were unwilling to accept the terms of this treaty left the oasis. They included several of the hanifs, whose devotion to the Kabah required them to remain loyal to the Quraysh. Muhammad was still a controversial figure, but as a result of his victory at Badr, some of the Bedouin tribes were willing to become allies of Medina in the forthcoming struggle.

There were also changes in Muhammad’s family life. On his return from Badr, he learned that his daughter Ruqayyah had died. ‘Uthman was sincerely grieved, but was glad to accept the hand of his late wife’s sister Umm Kulthum and retain his close relationship with the Prophet. One of the prisoners of war was Muhammad’s pagan son-in-law, Abu l-‘As, who had remained true to the traditional faith. His wife Zaynab, who was still living in Mecca, sent the ransom money to Medina together with a silver bracelet that had belonged to Khadijah. Muhammad recognized it at once and became momentarily distraught with sorrow. He let Abu l-‘As go free without taking the ransom, hoping that this would encourage him to accept Islam. He refused conversion but sadly agreed to the Prophet’s request that he send Zaynab and their little daughter Umamah to him in Medina, because life would now be impossible for them in Mecca. It was also time for Muhammad’s youngest daughter, Fatimah, to be married, and Muhammad gave her to ‘Ali. The couple set up house near the mosque.

Muhammad also took a new wife: ‘Umar’s daughter Hafsah, who had been recently widowed. She was beautiful and accomplished, and at the time of her marriage to the Prophet was about eighteen years old. Like her father, she could read and write, but she also had ‘Umar’s quick temper. ‘A’isha was happy to welcome her into the household. ‘A’isha would be jealous of Muhammad’s other wives, but the growing bond between their fathers made these two girls firm friends. They particularly enjoyed ganging up together against the stolid, unimaginative Sawdah.

‘A’isha may by this time have moved into the apartment that had been prepared for her in the mosque, though Tabari says that because of her youth she was allowed to remain for a while longer in her parents’ house. Muhammad was an indulgent husband. He insisted that his wives live frugally in their tiny, sparse huts, but he always helped them with the household chores and looked after his own personal needs, mending and patching his clothes, cobbling his shoes, and tending the family goats. With ‘A’isha particularly he was able to unwind, challenging her to footraces and the like. She had a sharp tongue and was by no means a shy or submissive wife, but she liked to spoil Muhammad, anointing his hair with his favorite perfume, and drinking from the same cup. One day, while they were sitting together, the Prophet busily repairing his sandals, she saw his face light up at a passing thought. Watching him for a moment, she complimented him on his bright, happy expression, and Muhammad got up and kissed her forehead, saying “Oh ‘A’isha, may Allah reward you well. I am not the source of joy to you that you are to me.”
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Muhammad lived cheek by jowl with his family and companions and saw no opposition between his public and private life.
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It was possible for his wives to hear every word that was spoken in the mosque from their apartments. The Emigrants had immediately noticed that the women of Medina were different, less rigorously controlled than in Mecca, and soon found that their own wives were picking up the free and easy ways of the Medinese women: ‘Umar was furious when his wife started to answer him back instead of meekly accepting his reproaches, and when he rebuked her she simply replied that the Prophet allowed his wives to argue with him.
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Trouble was brewing. Muhammad’s deliberate conflation of private and public was a blow to male supremacy, which can only exist if this distinction is maintained.

After the euphoria of victory had faded, Muhammad found that even though his prestige had increased in Arabia as a whole, the fear of an imminent Meccan attack was swelling the opposition party in Medina. Ibn Ubayy and his supporters were backed by three of the largest Jewish tribes—Nadir, Qurayzah and Qaynuqa‘—who depended upon their commercial links with the Quraysh and wanted no part in any war against Mecca. A third column was opening up in the oasis. About ten weeks after Badr, Abu Sufyan led a token ghazu of two hundred men to the fields outside Medina, and under cover of night slipped into the territory of Nadir, where he was entertained by its chief, Sallam ibn Mishkan, who, according to Ibn Ishaq, “gave him secret information about the Muslims.”
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Muhammad’s scouts kept him informed of these developments. These three Jewish tribes were clearly a security risk. They had large armies and were experienced soldiers. If a Meccan army were to camp south of Medina, where Nadir and Qurayzah had their territories, it would be easy for them to join forces with the Quraysh and breach the city’s defences. If the Quraysh decided to attack from the north, which would be their best option, Nadir and Qurayzah could attack the Muslims from the south. But a more urgent concern was Qaynuqa‘, the wealthiest of the Jewish tribes and former allies of Ibn Ubayy, who controlled the market in the center of Medina.
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The Muslims had established a little market of their own, and for religious reasons did not charge interest. Taking this as a direct challenge, the Qaynuqa‘ decided to break their agreement with the Prophet and join the opposition. Muhammad visited their district and asked them, in the name of their common religion, to keep the peace. They listened in mutinous silence and then replied:

O Muhammad, you seem to think that we are your people. Do not deceive yourself, because you have encountered a tribe [at Badr] with no knowledge of war and got the better of them; for by Allah, if we fight you, you will find that we are real men!
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Muhammad withdrew and grimly awaited developments.

A few days later fighting broke out in the market of Qaynuqa‘, when one of the Jewish goldsmiths insulted a Muslim woman. As the hakam, Muhammad was called in to arbitrate, but the chiefs of Qaynuqa‘ refused to accept his judgment, barricaded themselves into their fortress and called upon their Arab allies for aid. Qaynuqa‘ had an army of seven hundred men, and had their allies responded, they would certainly have defeated and probably eliminated the ummah. But the Arabs remained staunchly behind the Prophet, and Ibn Ubayy found that he was powerless to help his old confederates. After a siege of two weeks, the Qaynuqa‘ were forced to surrender unconditionally. Muhammad would have been expected to massacre the men and sell the women and children into slavery—the traditional punishment meted out to traitors—but he acceded to Ibn Ubayy’s plea for clemency and spared them, provided that the whole tribe left Medina immediately. Qaynuqa‘ were ready to go. They had taken a gamble, but had underestimated Muhammad’s new popularity. Neither their Arab allies nor the other Jews protested. Tribes had often been driven out of the oasis during the internecine wars before the hijrah, so this expulsion was part of a process that had started long before Muhammad’s arrival.
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Bloodshed was avoided, but Muhammad was caught in a tragic moral dilemma: the justification for the jihad against the Quraysh had been the Muslims’ exclusion from their native city, which was condemned by the Qur’an as a great evil. Now, trapped in the aggressive conventions of Arabia, he was compelled to eject another people from their homeland.

The people of Medina anxiously waited for the inevitable Meccan attack. Since Abu Jahl had been killed at Badr and Abu Lahab had died shortly afterwards, Abu Sufyan was now the leading chieftain of the Quraysh and a far more formidable opponent. In the late summer, a contingent of Muslim ghazis captured a large Meccan caravan. Abu Jahl would have retaliated immediately, but Abu Sufyan did not allow this defeat to interfere with his long-term objectives. He simply intensified his preparations, building up a large confederacy of Bedouin allies. Once the winter rains were over, three thousand men with three thousand camels and two hundred horses left Mecca on March 11, 625 and began their journey northward. After a journey of a little over a week, they camped to the northwest of Medina on the plain in front of Mount Uhud.
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The Medinese had only a week’s notice of the Meccan advance. There was no time to get the crops from the field, but Muhammad and the other chiefs managed to bring in the people from the outlying areas and barricade them into the “city.” The experienced warriors urged caution. It was very difficult to sustain a siege in Arabia; and they suggested that everybody should stay behind the barricades and refuse to engage with the Quraysh, who would eventually be forced to retire. But after the victory at Badr, the younger generation wanted action and managed to carry the day. Muhammad, who was not the supreme commander, had to bow to this disastrous decision. The main Jewish tribes refused to fight and Ibn Ubayy withdrew his men from the army, so on the following morning, Muhammad faced the Quraysh outnumbered three to one. As the two armies began their advance, Abu Sufyan’s wife Hind marched behind the Meccans with the other women, singing war songs and beating their tambourines. The Muslims were routed almost immediately with a brilliant charge by the Meccan cavalry. Muhammad was knocked senseless and word spread that he had been killed.