Today is the Birthday of the Prophet Muhammad – Pbuh. I was moved to remember the phenomenal events that continued to astonish the Contemporians of the Prophet from his birth until his death again in Rabbial Awwal 12th - 63 years later; almost on a daily basis. These events recorded in much detail by eyewitness accounts and
its transmission subjected to the most rigorous literary and historical quality control ever undertaken by man, brings this life of a true servant of Allah in all its happy moments and tragic moments vividly to our attention - in sharp focus. [1]
He presented to the people of his time
the Holy Koran, as the ultimate miraculous proof of his prophethood. Further down in this post is a beautiful examination of this aspect of the Koran written by a brother, and I share his thoughts with you. [2]
About the Prophet –Pbuh the Koran says …
*
{You have indeed in the Messenger of Allah a beautiful pattern (of conduct) for anyone whose hope is in Allah and the Final Day, and who engages much in the Praise of Allah.}* (Al-Ahzab 33:21) [3]
This being as it is, is it any wonder that many people had wonderful things to say of the final Messenger of Allah? Here below are but a few of the reactions to reading of this truly wonderful life. May Allah Bless His noble Prophet. May Allah increase the love we have for Allah & His Prophet –Pbuh in our hearts. [4]
1. The British philosopher,
Thomas Carlyle, who won the Nobel Prize for his book ‘The Heroes’ wrote: “It is a great shame for any one to listen to the accusation that Islaam is a lie and that Muhammad was a fabricator and a deceiver. We saw that he remained steadfast upon his principles, with firm determination; kind and generous, compassionate, pious, virtuous, with real manhood, hardworking and sincere. Besides all these qualities, he was lenient with others, tolerant, kind, cheerful and praiseworthy and perhaps he would joke and tease his companions. He was just, truthful, smart, pure, magnanimous and present-minded;
his face was radiant as if he had lights within him to illuminate the darkest of nights; he was a great man by nature who was not educated in a school nor nurtured by a teacher as he was not in need of any of this.” [5]
2.
George Bernard Shaw, the British playwright said: “The world is in dire need of a man with the mind of Muhammad; religious people in the Middle Ages, due to their ignorance and prejudice, had pictured him in a very dark way as they used to consider him the enemy of Christianity.
But after looking into the story of this man I found it to be an amazing and a miraculous one, and I came to the conclusion that he was never an enemy of Christianity, and must be called instead the savior of humanity. In my opinion, if he was to be given control over the world today, he would solve our problems and secure the peace and happiness which the world is longing for.”[6]
3.
J.W.H. Stab wrote in ‘Islam and its Founder ’ : “ Judged by the smallness of the means at his disposal, and the extent and permanence of the work that he accomplished,
no name in world's history shines with a more specious luster than that of the Prophet of Makkah. To the impulse, which he gave, numberless dynasties have owed their existence, fair cities and stately palaces and temples have arisen, and wide provinces became obedient to the Faith. And beyond all this, his words have governed the belief of generations, been accepted as their rule of life, and their certain guide to the world to come. At a thousand shrines the voices of the faithful invoke blessings on him, whom they esteem the very Prophet of God, the seal of the Apostles… Judged by the standards to human renown, the glory of what mortal can compare with his?” [7]
4.
Dr. Gustav Weil writes in ‘History of the Islamic Peoples ’: “Muhammad was a shining example to his people.
His character was pure and stainless. His house, his dress, his food - they were characterized by a rare simplicity. So unpretentious was he that he would receive from his companions no special mark of reverence, nor would he accept any service from his slave which he could do for himself. He was accessible to all and at all times. He visited the sick and was full of sympathy for all. Unlimited was his benevolence and generosity as also was his anxious care for the welfare of the community.” [8]
5.
Alphonse de La Martaine wrote in ‘Historie de la Turquie’: "
If greatness of purpose, smallness of means, and astonishing results are the three criteria of a human genius, who could dare compare any great man in 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, 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 the souls. Philosopher, Orator, Apostle, Legislator, Conqueror of Ideas, Restorer of Rational beliefs... 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?” [9]
6.
Michael Hart , author of ‘The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History’ said: "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.” [10]
7. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the German writer said: “Us,
Europeans, with all our concepts could not reach what Muhammad has reached, and no one will be able to precede him. I have looked in the history of humanity for an example and found that it was Muhammad, as the truth must be revealed. Indeed, Muhammad succeeded to subdue the entire world to monotheism”. [11]
Finally Allah orders us regarding the Prophet –Pbuh …
Indeed, one of the major problems with the Bible as it stands today is that the current Bibles force us to study ancient Hebrew and Aramaic scriptures through Greek and Latin glasses as seen by people who are neither Jews, Greeks, nor Romans. [13]
Such practices (as demonstrated in the book " What did Jesus really say?"), have seriously handicapped any attempts to faithfully translate the original author's intended meanings. [14]
This problem, all thanks be to the Almighty, has been completely avoided in the Qur'an, since it has remained from the time of its inspiration to the present day in the same language it was originally revealed in, the language has remained a living language from that day to this, and the book itself has always been in the hands of the people and not "the elite." [15]
The foremost miracle of the Qur'an is in its text. The text of the Arabic language! You cannot translate a miracle no matter how you may try. The Arabic language cannot be compared to any other language in its intricate complexity, diversity of form, richness of meaning, brevity of parlance, beauty of construct and power of delivery. To give an example of this let us look at the most basic of measures, that of dictionaries: [16]
A fairly comprehensive and authoritative reference on the English language would be the "Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary" tenth edition, in 1500 pages. On the other hand, a common Arabic dictionary is "Lisan Al-Arab" in 18 volumes, each averaging about 650 pages, or about 11700 pages in all. [17]
In other words, even if we were to disregard all of the other aspects of the Arabic language, such as its grammar, we would still be faced with a language, which is about eight times as complex as the English language. It is not at all uncommon in the Arabic language to find over one hundred words that refer to the same entity, each one of them giving a slightly different detailed description than all of the others. This has resulted in a language, which can translate complete English sentences into only one Arabic word. [18]
But the Arabic language is not simply a list of words. Far from it, it is a very complex collection of literary sciences which have been developed, refined, and fine-tuned for generations and millennia beyond counting. The end result of this is a group of literary sciences which literally have no parallel whatsoever in the English language, such as the science of "Sarf" or the multifarious sciences of "Balaghah," among others. [19]
Even when the English language can lay claim to a parallel science to that of the Arabic language, such as for example the science of "grammar," even in this case anyone who has the slightest understanding of the Arabic language finds that even these equivalent sciences fade nearly into oblivion when faced with the tremendous complexities and inestimable attention to the minutest detail in Arabic grammar which can literally reverse the meanings of a sentence simply by changing a single squiggle (diacritic) above the last letter of only one word in that sentence (Imagine being able to reverse the meaning of an English sentence by removing the dot over one "i" in that sentence). [20]
William Shakespeare was considered to be one of the leading masters of English literature known to date. However, he never had to deal with the Arabic language. Now, taking into consideration that the Arab nation was one obsessed with literary perfection and refinement of prose, it becomes apparent that what we had here was a nation of literally hundreds of "William Shakespeares."[21]
Indeed an individual's mastery of the Arabic language was considered one of the primary distinguishing criteria in selecting tribal leaders. Just as in the wild west people used to have public shoot-outs at high noon, so too did the ancient Arabs have public face-downs in literary composition. [22]
These public confrontations could at times be so scathing and destructive as to totally destroy a given individual or tribe and cause them to disband in shame and humiliation, erased from the pages of history (such as happened with the tribe of "Numair"). [23]
The greatest of these literary masters had their compositions transcribed and hung up on the walls of the noble Kaaba as a badge of honor and an example for future generations. These compositions which were regarded the "best of the best" where given the name of "Al-Muallaqat" (the hanging poems). [24]
These were the people whom God sent Muhammad (pbuh) to, and these are the people whom prophet Muhammad (pbuh) repeatedly challenged, over 23 years, to produce a work similar to the Qur'an, standing alone with no tribe to support him and no ally to defend him but God Almighty. [25]
In other words he was challenging them in a field, which they were the world’s foremost authorities in, and the source of their greatest strength and pride. Indeed all of God's prophets throughout history have been sent with miracles in the very fields, which that prophet's people excelled in so that they might fully comprehend the magnitude of that miracle and have no excuse in ignorance. [26]
These people whom prophet Muhammad (pbuh) stood alone against and challenged to face the Qur'an were no timid sheep. They were men of great pride, misdirected as it may have been, who would rather go to war and die a slow and torturous death rather than allow the slightest indignity to be attached to their names or the most trivial challenge go unanswered. [27]
These were people who would go to war at the drop of a hat or the slightest disrespectful word. In spite of all that, when prophet Muhammad (pbuh) brought them the word of God in the noble Qur'an they suddenly fell silent and refused to face its challenge. [28]
God continued to reduce the challenge to them, from challenging them to produce a book like the Qur'an, to challenging them to produce a single surah (chapter) like it, to finally challenging them to produce even a few verses like it. And still, no one was able to face the challenge. [29]
On the contrary, those who were the best versed in these issues were among the first to convert to Islam and accept God's message. Some of them even went so far as to completely give up altogether on their previous literary work and to publicly declare that faced with the utter perfection and completion of this book that there was nothing left to say and nothing left to compose. Perfection had already been achieved . Taken from brother Mishaal ibn Abdullah. Please include him in your prayers. May Allah Bless the Prophet – Pbuh, his family, his companions & All Muslims. [30].
In Conclusion, We saw that Allah Himself has described Prophet Muhammad -Pbuh as the best role model for us to follow. Allah and His angels send praises upon him, and
He commands us to do the same:
*{Allah and His angels send blessings on the Prophet: O you who believe! Call for Divine blessings on him and salute him with a becoming salutation.}*
(Al-Ahzab 33:56) [31]
Please correct me when I err. Allah Knows Best,
Peace! [32]
