Chapter 15 : The Deaths of Khadija and Abu Talib - A.D. 619
Thanks to the chivalry and gallantry of the five paladins of Makkah, the members of the clan of Banu Hashim could now live in their homes once again. But they had barely begun to recover from the rigors of living in a mountain hide-out for three years, when Khadija, the wife, the friend and the companion of Muhammad Mustafa, the Messenger of God, and the benefactress of Islam and the Muslims, fell ill and died. All her life she had lived in the midst of luxury and abundance but the three years of exile had been a time of excessive austerity for her which inevitably took its toll.
As noted before, Khadija was the very first woman in the whole world to declare that God was One, and Muhammad was His Messenger to all mankind. The honor and glory of being the First Believer in the whole world is hers to all eternity. She had sacrificed her comfort, her wealth, and her home for Islam; and now it would appear that she sacrificed her life also. Without a doubt, if she had lived in her spacious and luxurious house in Makkah, surrounded by her maid-servants, she might have lived for many more years. But she preferred to stand by her husband and his clan, and to share the bitters of life with them. During the siege, she had to endure not only the pangs of hunger and thirst but also the extremes of heat in summer and cold in winter, and yet no one ever heard a word of gripe from her, and she never lost her serenity. Whether times were good or bad, whether she had abundance or she had nothing, she was always cheerful. She was cheerful even in exile. Privation and austerity never soured her temperament. It was her temperament that was an unfailing source of strength, comfort and courage for her husband during the bleakest moments of his life.
During the years of the siege, Khadija spent her immense fortune on buying essentials like water, food and clothing for the clan of her husband. When she returned to her house, her last cent was gone; and when she died, there was not enough money in the house to buy a shroud. A cloak of her husband was used as a shroud for her, and she was given burial in it.
Muhammad Mustafa never married another woman as long as Khadija lived, and if she had not died, it is most probable that he would not have married any other woman.
Edward Gibbon
During the 24 years of their marriage, Khadija's youthful husband abstained from the right of polygamy, and the pride or tenderness of the venerable matron was never insulted by the society of a rival. After her death, the Prophet placed her in the rank of four perfect women, with the sister of Moses, the mother of Jesus, and Fatima, the best beloved of his daughters. (The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire)
Sir John Glubb
Khadija was Mohammed's first convert. From the moment of his first call, until her death nine years later, she never faltered. Whenever he encountered mockery or contradiction, he was sure, when he returned home in the evening, to find a cheerful and loving comforter. She was always ready by her confident equanimity to restore his courage and to lighten the burden of his fears. (The Life and Times of Mohammed, New York, 1970)
Ibn Ishaq, the biographer of the Prophet, says that when there was resumption of Divine revelation after its cessation following the first revelation, Khadija received a Divine tribute and a salutation of peace from God. The message was communicated to Muhammad by Gabriel, and when he conveyed it to Khadija, she said: "God is Peace (as-Salam), and from Him is all Peace, and may peace be on Gabriel."
Muhammad Mustafa forever remembered Khadija with love, affection and gratitude. During her brief illness, he kept a night-long vigil, nursing her, comforting her and praying for her. He told her that God had built for her a palace of pearls in Paradise. Her death filled his heart with deep sorrow.
Khadija died on the 10th of Ramadan of the 10th year of the Proclamation of Islam. She was buried in Hujun above Makkah. After the burial, the Apostle himself smoothed the earth on her grave.
One month after the death of Khadija, the Prophet sustained another shock in the death of Abu Talib, his uncle and guardian. Abu Talib was the bulwark of Islam since its birth. The death of these two friends, Khadija and Abu Talib, was the greatest shock and sorrow that he had to endure in the fifty years of his life. He called the year of their death "The Year of Sorrow."
The year 619 turned out to be a year of sorrow for Muhammad Mustafa in more than one sense. The death of one's loved ones is naturally a cause for sorrow. But in his case, the death of these two friends was not merely a subjective experience. He was soon made conscious of the meaning of their death by a series of extraneous events.
Ibn Ishaq
Khadija and Abu Talib died in the same year, and with Khadija's death troubles followed fast on each other's heels, for she had been a faithful supporter to him in Islam, and he used to tell her of his troubles. With the death of Abu Talib, he lost a strength and stay in his personal life and a defense and protection against his tribe. Abu Talib died some three years before he (Mohammed) migrated to Medina, and it was then that Quraysh began to treat him in an offensive way which they would not have dared to follow in his uncle's lifetime. A young lout actually threw dust on his head.
Hisham on the authority of his father, Urwa, told me that the Prophet went into his house, and he was saying, "Quraysh never treated me thus while Abu Talib was alive." (The Life of the Messenger of God)
Washington Irving
Mohammed soon became sensible of the loss he had sustained in the death of Abu Talib who had been not merely an affectionate relative, but a steadfast and powerful protector, from his great influence in Mecca. At his death there was no one to check and counteract the hostilities of Abu Sofian and Abu Jahl.
The fortunes of Mohammed were becoming darker and darker in his native place. Khadija, his original benefactress, the devoted companion of his solitude and seclusion, the zealous believer in his doctrine, was dead; so also was Abu Talib, once his faithful and efficient protector. Deprived of the sheltering influence of the latter, Mohammed had become, in a manner, an outlaw in Mecca, obliged to conceal himself and remain a burden on the hospitality of those whom his own doctrines had involved in persecution (sic). If worldly advantage had been his objective, how had it been attained? (Life of Mohammed)
In stating that Muhammad had become "a burden on the hospitality of those whom his own doctrines had involved in persecution," the historian quoted above, has expressed an opinion with which we cannot agree. Muhammad was never a burden to anyone at any time. The members of his clan, the Banu Hashim, considered it a privilege and an honor to protect and to defend him against his enemies.
Sir William Muir
The sacrifices to which Abu Talib exposed himself and his family for the sake of his nephew, while yet incredulous of his mission (sic), stamp his character as singularly noble and unselfish. They afford at the same time strong proof of the sincerity of Mohammed. Abu Talib would not have acted thus for an interested deceiver; and he had ample means of scrutiny.
When the Patriarch felt that life was ebbing, he summoned his brethren, the sons of Abd al-Muttalib, around his bed, commended his nephew to their protection; and, relieved of the trust, died in peace, and was buried not far from Khadija's grave. Mohammed wept bitterly for his uncle; and not without reason. For forty years he had been his faithful friend - the prop of his childhood, the guardian of his youth, and in later life a tower of defense. His very unbelief (sic) made his influence stronger. So long as he survived, Mohammed needed not to fear violence or attack. But there was no strong hand now to protect him from his foes. A second Khadija might be found, but not a second Abu Talib. (The Life of Mohammed, London, 1877)
Sir John Glubb
The Apostle made great efforts to persuade Abu Talib to repeat the Muslim witness of faith, but he only lay silent making no response, until he passed away (sic). Abu Talib seems to us an attractive character. Outspoken, loyal and sympathetic, he endured many worries, losses and contradictions in order to protect his nephew, although he did not believe in his preaching (sic). He is not considered a hero by Muslims, for he died in unbelief (sic). Nevertheless, if it had not been for the staunch courage with which he stood by his nephew, Islam might have died in its cradle. (The Life and Times of Mohammed, New York, 1970)
I have quoted above Sir William Muir and Sir John Glubb verbatim. They have insinuated that Abu Talib died in unbelief. If challenged to produce authority for such a statement, they would advert to Bukhari. Bukhari says that when Abu Talib was on his death-bed, the Apostle urged him to become a Muslim but he said that doing so would embarrass him with his Qurayshi friends.
The author(s) of this "tradition" forgot one thing. Abu Talib was dying, and knew that he was not going to see his Qurayshi "friends" any more. He knew that he was going into the presence of his Creator. At a moment like this he could not have cared less for the Quraysh. His anxiety at all times was to win the pleasure of God, and he proved by his deeds more than anyone else could ever prove by his words, that his faith in the Oneness of God, and in the mission of Muhammad as His Messenger, was rocklike and unshakable.
Abu Talib was a fervent believer in Islam. His attachment to Islam is pointed up by his consistency, and by the logic of facts.
No man can love Muhammad and idolatry at the same time; the two loves are mutually exclusive. And no man can love Muhammad yet hate Islam. The love of Muhammad and the hatred of Islam cannot coexist. Whoever loves Muhammad, must, inevitably, love Islam. Nor can anyone hate Muhammad and love Islam. Such a postulate would be a monstrous absurdity.
If there is any one thing beyond any doubt in the history of Islam, it is the love of Abu Talib for Muhammad. As noted before, Abu Talib and his wife, Fatima bint Asad, loved Muhammad more than they loved their own children. Both husband and wife were ever ready to sacrifice their sons for Muhammad. Such love could have had only one fountainhead, that of faith in Muhammad and Islam. Abu Talib's wife, Fatima bint Asad, the foster-mother of Muhammad, was the second woman to accept Islam, the first being Khadija.
Abu Talib was proud that God had chosen Muhammad, the son of his brother, Abdullah, in all creation, to be His Last Messenger to mankind. Muhammad was the greatest love and the greatest pride of his uncle, Abu Talib.
The glorious deeds of Abu Talib are an integral part of the story of Islam. No story of Islam would either be complete or true if it did not comprehend an account of his role, as the protector of Muhammad and the defender of Islam. His deeds are the most eloquent testimony of his faith in Allah and His Messenger.
May Allah bless His devout slaves, Khadija; Abu Talib and his wife, Fatima bint Asad. All three of them were the "instruments" through which He consolidated Islam, and made it viable.
Chapter 16 : Muhammad's Visit to Ta'if
More than ten years had passed since Muhammad, may God bless him and his Ahlul-Bait, had first begun to preach Islam. His success in these ten years had been rather modest, limited as it was to the conversion of fewer than 170 men and women in Makkah. But after the death of his wife, Khadija, and his uncle, Abu Talib, it appeared that the Quraysh would wrest even that limited success from his hands. Makkah had proved inhospitable to Islam and it occurred to the Prophet that he ought, perhaps to try to preach the new faith in some other city. The nearest city was Ta’if, 70 miles in the south-east of Makkah, and he went there in late 619. Zayd bin Haritha went with him.
In Ta’if, Muhammad, the Messenger of God, called on the three chiefs of the local tribes, and invited them to abandon their gross idolatry, to acknowledge the Oneness of God, to repudiate man-made distinctions of high and low, and to believe in the equality and brotherhood of all men.
The chiefs of Ta’if were a conceited and arrogant crew, and they did not want even to listen to Muhammad. They greeted him with mockery and ridicule and set upon him the idlers and the louts of the city. They pelted him and Zayd with clods and rocks. Wounded and covered with blood, Muhammad staggered out of Ta’if. Once he was outside the city walls, he almost collapsed but a certain gardener took him into his hut, dressed his wounds, and let him rest and recuperate until he felt strong enough to resume his journey across the rough terrain between Ta’if and Makkah.
But when Muhammad arrived in the environs of Makkah, he sensed that he could not reenter his native city now that his uncle, Abu Talib, was not there to protect him. Pagan hostility toward him had reached the flash point. He realized that if he entered Makkah, he would be killed.
Muhammad could not enter his hometown, and there was no other place to go to. What was he to do?
In this extremity, Muhammad sent word to three nobles in the city asking each of them to take him under his protection. Two of them refused but the third one – the gallant Mutim ibn Adiy – responded to his signal of distress. It was the same Mutim who had, earlier, flouted the chiefs of Quraysh by tearing into pieces their covenant to boycott the Banu Hashim, and had brought the two clans of Banu Hashim and Banu al-Muttalib from the Sh’ib Abu Talib back into the city.
Mutim ordered his sons, nephews and other young men of his clan to put on their battle-dress. He then marched, in full panoply of war, at their head, out of the city. He brought Muhammad Mustafa with him, first into the precincts of the Kaaba where the latter made the customary seven circuits, and then escorted him to his home.
Abd-al-Rahman ‘Azzam
None of the Makkan chieftains from whom Muhammad requested protection for safe entry into the city would extend him help; but a good-hearted pagan chief, al-Mut’im ibn-‘Adi, took him under his protection and brought him home. Thus did Muhammad re-enter Makkah - guarded by a polytheist! (The Eternal Message of Muhammad, published by the New English Library, London, 1964)
Sir John Glubb
In Taif the Prophet was stoned and chased. Afraid to return to Mecca now that he no longer enjoyed the protection of Abu Talib, he sent a message to several leading idolaters, asking their protection. Two refused but eventually Mutim ibn Adi, chief of the Nofal clan of Quraysh, agreed to protect him. Next morning, he, his sons and nephews went fully armed to the public square of the Kaaba, and announced that Mohammed was under their protection. The protection of Mutim ibn Adi enabled the Apostle to return to Mecca. (The Life and Times of Mohammed, New York, 1970)
The application of Muhammad Mustafa, the Apostle of God, upon his return from Ta’if, to Mutim ibn Adiy, a non-Muslim, seeking his protection, raises once again, a most uncomfortable question, in a most pointed manner, on the attitude and conduct of the Muslims. Why didn’t the Apostle ask any of them to take him under his protection even though some of them were said to have been rich and influential, and some others were touted to have been the terror of the pagans? Why is it that the Apostle sought the protection of a non-Muslim but didn’t condescend even to inform the Muslims that he wanted to reenter Makkah and was in need of protection?
Or another question! Why didn’t the Muslims themselves go to the city gate and escort their Prophet to his home? Here they had a splendid opportunity to demonstrate to him that they were worthy of his trust even if he had considered them unworthy. But they missed the opportunity. They did not do anything that would show that they had any anxiety for his personal safety.
Pagan Arabia, however, was not devoid of its share of chivalry and heroism. These qualities were personified in Mutim ibn Adiy, Abul Bukhtari and a few others. They were the knights of Arabia, and it was their chivalry that was to make their country famous in later centuries. Pagan Arabia never produced nobler figures than these. Even Muslims ought to acknowledge their debt of gratitude to them. After all it were they who dared the Quraysh in some of the most critical moments of the life of the Prophet of Islam. In doing so, they were inspired only by their own ideals of chivalry. They considered it their duty to defend the defenseless.
The failure at Ta’if was utterly heart-breaking for the Prophet, and he knew that but for the heroic intervention of Mutim ibn Adiy, he might not have been able to enter Makkah at all. To a casual observer it might appear that the Prophet had reached the limits of human endurance and patience. The progress of Islam had come to a standstill, and the outlook for the future could not look bleaker.
But did Muhammad give way to despair in the face of persistent failures and in the face of violent confrontations with the polytheists? It would only be natural if he did. But he did not. He never despaired of God’s boundless mercy. He knew that he was doing God’s work, and he had no doubt at all that He would lead him out of the wilderness of hopelessness and helplessness to the destination of success and felicity.
It was in one of the darkest and most dismal moments in his life that Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam, was elevated by God to the highest heavens, perhaps in recognition of his refusal to accept defeat and failure in the line of duty. God honored His Messenger with Isra’ and Me’raj. Isra’ is his nocturnal journey from "the Sacred Mosque" to "the Distant Mosque" (Masjid el-Aqsa); and Me’raj is his ascension to the Heaven. Isra’ and Me’raj foreshadowed the great and the historic events that already loomed over the horizons, though at the moment there was no way to perceive them.
The mystic meaning of Me’raj refers to the constant struggle of the individual soul against evil. It has its setbacks and failures. But if it is true to itself, and is true to Faith in God, He will give it victory against evil.
The story of Me’raj, therefore, is a fitting prelude to the journey of the human soul through life. The first step on this journey is to be taken through moral conduct – a sense of personal responsibility for the welfare of fellow human beings, service to God through service to His creation, and an awareness of His presence with us at all times.
Isra’ is referred to in the first verse of the 17th chapter of Al-Qur’an al-Majid as follows :
Glory to God who did take His slave for a journey by night from the sacred mosque to the farthest mosque whose precincts We did bless, in order that We might show him some of Our signs: for He is One who heareth and seeth all things.
Isra’ and Me’raj took place on the night of the 27th of Rajab (the seventh month of the Islamic calendar) of the twelfth year of the Proclamation, i.e., one year before the Migration of the Prophet from Makkah to Medina.
Chapter 17 : The New Horizons of Islam
Yathrib was a town in an oasis about 250 miles in the north of Makkah. In A.D. 620, six Yathribites visited Makkah for pilgrimage. A fortuitous meeting with Muhammad led to their conversion to Islam. They told him that they had left Yathrib in a state of simmer and that it could erupt anytime into warfare. But they expressed the hope that God would restore peace to their city through His Messenger. They also promised to return to Makkah and to meet him in the following year.
This was the beginning of Islam in Yathrib.
When these six new Muslims returned to Yathrib, they talked with their folks and friends about Islam, and found them willing, even eager to listen. A year later, when the season of pilgrimage arrived, twelve citizens of Yathrib, including the original six, visited Makkah. Among them there were two women also. They met the Apostle of God at Aqaba. He briefed them on the Articles of Faith in Islam, and all of them accepted Islam. At the same time, they also gave him their pledge of loyalty. This is called the First Pledge of Aqaba.
These Muslims solemnly assured the Apostle of God that :
they would never associate partners with Allah,
they would not worship anyone except Him;
they would never rob or steal;
they would never kill their female infants;
they would never revile others;
they would never defame women;
they would always be chaste and pure;
they would obey Allah and His Apostle;
and they would be faithful to him at all times.
The neophytes requested the Apostle of God to send some teacher with them to Yathrib to teach them Qur’an and the precepts of Islam. He sent Mas'ab ibn Umayr, one of his uncles (Mas'ab was the cousin of his father), with the group to propagate Islam in Yathrib. Mas'ab's mission was successful, and many families in Yathrib accepted Islam.
This was the first time that Muhammad Mustafa had chosen an official. Professor Margoliouth says that Mas'ab ibn Umayr was the first choice of an official in Islam.
The Second Pledge of Aqaba
In A.D. 622, seventy-five citizens of Yathrib came to Makkah in the season of the pilgrimage. The Apostle gave them audience at the same spot at Aqaba where he had met the group of twelve the year before. These 75 men and women also accepted Islam. They gave him their pledge of loyalty, and invited him to Yathrib.
The Apostle's uncle, Abbas ibn Abdul Muttalib, was with him on this occasion. He is reported to have said to the "hosts" from Yathrib: "Muhammad is held in high esteem by his own people. If you can stand by him through thick and thin, take him with you to Yathrib; if not, then abandon the whole idea."
One of the leaders of the Yathribites was Bera'a ibn Ma'roor. He said: "When we were children, our favorite toys were swords and spears." Another chief, Abul Haithum, interrupted him, and said: "O Messenger of God! What will happen when Islam becomes great and strong? Will you then leave Yathrib and return to Makkah?"
Muhammad Mustafa smiled and said: "No. Your blood is my blood and my blood is your blood. From this day you are mine and I am yours, and I shall never part company with you."
The Yathribite Muslims were satisfied by the assurance given to them by Muhammad Mustafa, and they returned to Yathrib to spread Islam among their folks. Islam began to make steady progress in Yathrib. When it appeared that the new faith had found a haven in that city, the Apostle suggested to the victims of persecution in Makkah to emigrate there. Following his suggestion, Muslims began to leave Makkah, in small groups, and to settle in their new homes in Yathrib.
The Second Pledge of Aqaba is a landmark in the history of Islam. It was the "anchor" on which the frail vessel of Islam came to rest at last, after being buffeted for thirteen years in the turbulent seas of paganism in Arabia.
