Muhammad: Seal of the Prophets (Early Years I)

 By: Muhammad Zafrulla Khan

Abdul Muttalib, the son of Hashim, grandson of Abd Manaf, father of Abdullah and grandfather of Muhammad, was, in his time, the foremost chief of Mecca. In the year 570, occurred the memorable invasion of Mecca by Abraha, the Abyssinian viceroy of the Yemen. He had built a magnificent cathedral at Sana’a whither he sought to attract the worship of Arabia; and, thwarted in the attempt, vented his displeasure in organizing an attack on Mecca with the purpose of destroying the Ka’aba. Upon this enterprise he set out with a considerable army. In its train was an elephant; a circumstance so singular for Arabia that the commander, his host, the invasion and the year, are still called by the epithet of the elephant. Arriving in the vicinity of Mecca, Abraha sent forward a body of troops to scour the valley and carry off what cattle they could find. They were successful in the raid, and, among the plunder, secured 200 camels belonging to Abdul Muttalib.

Abraha sent an embassy to Mecca carrying the message that he had no desire to do them injury. His only object was to demolish the Ka’aba; that done, he would retire without shedding the blood of any man. The citizens of Mecca had already resolved that it would be vain to oppose the invaders by force of arms; but they refused to allow the destruction of the Ka’aba on any terms. The embassy, however, prevailed on Abdul Muttalib to repair to the viceroy’s camp, and there plead the cause of the Meccans. Abdul Muttalib was treated with great honour by Abraha, who, to win him over, restored his plundered camels, but could obtain no satisfactory answer from him regarding the Ka’aba. Abdul Muttalib returned to Mecca and Abraha made preparations to advance upon the city. Abdul Muttalib advised the Meccans to retire in a body to the hills and defiles about the city on the day before the expected attack. He himself repaired to the Ka’aba and, leaning upon the ring of the door of the Ka’aba, prayed aloud: ‘Defend, O Lord, Thine own House, and suffer not the cross to triumph over the Ka’aba.’ He then betook himself with the rest to the neighbouring heights and watched what the end might be. Meanwhile, a pestilential distemper broke out in the camp of the viceroy, with deadly pustules and blains. In confusion and dismay, the army commenced their retreat. Abandoned by their guides, the men perished among the valleys and a flood swept multitudes into the sea. Scarcely any recovered who was smitten by the pestilence; and Abraha himself, a mass of malignant and putrid sores, died miserably on his return to Sana’a. This event is mentioned in the Holy Quran, where it is said (105:2-6):

Dost thou not recall how thy Lord dealt with the People of the Elephant? Did He not destroy them and thus cause their design to miscarry? Then He sent upon their corpses swarms of birds, which beat them against hard lumps of clay, and thus made them like broken straw, left over.

The significance of this event is that the birth of the infant whom God intended to bring up under His care so that in due time he might become the recipient of the comprehensive and universal divine guidance for man, was approaching. Through him, the Ka’aba would be restored to the worship of the One True God, for which it had been originally built. God Almighty would, therefore, not suffer any harm to be done to the Ka’aba or to Mecca, which was about to be honoured as just mentioned.

Some months previous to the invasion of Abraha, Abdul Muttalib had affianced his then youngest son, Abdullah, who was twenty-four years of age, to Amina, the niece of Wahb of Bani Zuhra, under whose guardianship she lived. The marriage took place, and not long after Abdullah left his wife, who was with child, and set out on a mercantile expedition to Syria. On his way back, he fell ill at Medina, and was left behind by the caravan with his father’s maternal relatives. When Abdul Muttalib learnt of Abdullah’s illness he dispatched his eldest son, Harith, to take care of his brother. Arriving in Medina, Harith found that Abdullah had died about a month after the departure of the caravan. Amina was thus widowed only after a few months of her marriage before giving birth to her child. The child was born on 20 April 570. As soon as Abdul Muttalib was informed of the blessed event, he visited Amina, took the baby in his arms, went to the Ka’aba and, standing beside the Holy House, gave thanks to God. The child was called Muhammad, according to a dream of Amina. The word means ‘one greatly praised’.

It was not the custom for the better class of women at Mecca to suckle their children. They procured nurses for them, or gave them out to nurse among the neighbouring desert tribes. The child thus developed a robust frame, and acquired the pure speech and free manners of the desert. The infant Muhammad, shortly after his birth, was made over to Thuweiba, the slave of his uncle Abu Lahab, who had lately suckled his baby uncle Hamzah. He was nursed by her for only a few days, but he retained in later life a lively recollection of her.

He periodically sent her clothes and other presents until the seventh year of the Hijra, when he received intimation of her death. He inquired after her son, his foster-brother, but he too was dead, and she had left no relatives.

When Thuweiba had nursed the child for some days, a party of Bani Sa’d, a clan of Hawazin, arrived at Mecca with ten women who offered themselves as nurses. They were soon provided with children, excepting Halima, who, somewhat reluctantly, took the infant orphan Muhammad, whose charge had been declined by the other women. Incidentally, Sa’d means ‘fortunate’, and indeed it was fortunate for Bani Sa’d that the child whom God had intended to be the greatest of His messengers, should be reared among them. Sixty years later, after the battle of Hunain, the prisoners taken from Bani Sa’d were released by the Holy Prophet as a matter of grace in memory of the days that he had spent among Bani Sa’d in his childhood.

Halima means ‘the gentle one’, and she proved a very gentle and affectionate foster-mother for her charge. At two years of age he was weaned and Halima took him to his home. His mother was delighted with his healthy and robust appearance and she asked Halima to take him back with her again to the desert, for she feared the unhealthy air of Mecca. Thus Halima returned with him to her tribe. He already looked like a child double his age. After another two years Halima again took the boy to his mother, who again persuaded her to take him back once more to the encampment of her tribe. She loved her foster-child and was happy that she had been able to keep him for so long. After one more year, she returned him to his mother and grandfather.

There can be no doubt that the constitution of Muhammad was rendered robust, and his character free and independent, by his five years among Bani Sa’d. Also his speech was formed upon one of the purest models of the language of Arabia.

Muhammad always retained a grateful impression of the kindness he had experienced as a child among Bani Sa’d. On one occasion, Halima visited him at Mecca after his marriage with Khadija. It was a year of drought in which many cattle had perished. Muhammad spoke to Khadija and she gave Halima a camel used to carrying a litter, and forty sheep with which she returned to her people.

Muhammad spent the sixth year of his life at Mecca with his mother, under the care of his grandfather. His mother then planned a visit to Medina and took him along with her to show him to the maternal relatives of his father. She was accompanied by her slave-girl, Um Aiman, who tended the child. They rode upon two camels. Arrived in Medina, she alighted at the house where her husband had died. The visit was of sufficient duration to imprint the scene and the society upon the memory of Muhammad, notwithstanding his tender age. In later days he used to recall things that happened on this occasion. Forty-seven years afterwards, when he entered Medina as a refugee, he recognized the place, and said: ‘In this house I sported with Uneisa, a little girl of Medina; and with my cousins, I used to put to flight the birds that alighted upon the roof.’ As he gazed upon the scene, he added: ‘Here it was my mother lodged with me; in this place is the tomb of my father; and it was there, in that pond, that I learned to swim.’

After staying at Medina for about a month, Amina decided to return to Mecca, and set out in the same manner as she had come. When they reached a spot called Abwa, about halfway to Mecca, Amina fell ill and died; and was buried there. The little orphan was carried back to Mecca by Um Aiman, who, although only a girl was a faithful nurse to the child, and continued to be his constant attendant.

It has been opined that the early loss of his mother imparted to the youthful Muhammad something of that pensive and meditative character by which he was afterwards distinguished. In his seventh year, he could appreciate the bereavement and feel the desolation of his orphan state. Many years later, during his journey from Medina to Hudaibiyya, he visited his mother’s tomb by the way, and lifted up his voice and wept, and his companions also wept. When they asked him about it, he said: ‘This is the grave of my mother; the Lord hath permitted me to visit it. So I called my mother to remembrance, and the tender memory of her overcame me and I wept.’

The charge of the orphan was now undertaken by Abdul Muttalib who had by this time reached the age of eighty. The child was treated by him with singular fondness. A rug used to be spread under the Ka’aba and on it the aged chief reclined in shelter from the heat of the sun. Around the carpet, but at a respectful distance, sat his sons. Little Muhammad would run up close to his grandfather and take possession of his rug. His sons would seek to drive him off, but Abdul Muttalib would interpose, saying: ‘Let my little son alone.’ He would stroke him on the back and would be delighted to listen to his childish prattle. The boy was still under the care of his nurse, but he would often quit her and run into the apartment of his grandfather, even when he was alone or asleep.

The guardianship of Abdul Muttalib lasted but two years, for he died at the age of eighty-two. The orphan child felt the loss of his indulgent grandfather bitterly; as he followed the bier he was seen to weep, and when he grew up he retained a distinct remembrance of his death. The heart of Muhammad, in his tender years, was thus again sorely wounded, and the fresh bereavement was rendered more poignant by the dependent position in which it left him. The nobility of his grandfather’s descent, the deference paid to him by everyone in Mecca, and his splendid hospitality towards the pilgrims, in furnishing them with food and drink, must have been witnessed with satisfaction by the thoughtful child.

The events that Muhammad’s father had died before his birth, that his mother died in his seventh year, and that his grandfather died a couple of years later, were not a series of coincidences of little significance. They were part of the divine design, so that he might develop early the qualities of self-reliance, reflection and steadfastness. Though repeatedly bereaved at a tender age, he had been well looked after, as he was under God’s special care. We read in the Holy Quran about Moses: ‘I surrounded thee with My love, so that thou mightest be reared under My care.... We delivered thee from sorrow and proved thee in diverse ways.... Then thou camest up to the standard, Moses, and I chose thee for Myself’ (20:40-2). As with Moses, so with Muhammad. He was under the direct care of God even from before his birth and was being prepared, step-by-step, for the great responsibility that God intended to place upon his shoulders. He would be screened and sheltered from all harm, whether physical or moral, but would have to undergo all that was needed for the coordinated and balanced development of his personality.

The death of Abdul Muttalib left the children of Hashim without any powerful head, which enabled the other branch of Quraish, descended from Umayya, to gain ascendancy. Their chief at this time was Harb, who held the leadership in war and was followed by a numerous and powerful body of relations.

Of Abdul Muttalib’s sons, Harith, the eldest, had died; and the chief of those who survived were Zubair and Abu Talib, both by the same mother as Abdullah, and Abu Lahab, Abbas and Hamzah. The last two were still very young. Zubair was the oldest, and to him Abdul Muttalib bequeathed his dignity and offices. Zubair left them to Abu Talib who, finding himself too poor to discharge the expensive and onerous obligations of providing for the pilgrims, waived the honour in favour of Abbas. But the family of Hashim had fallen from its high state and Abbas was able to retain only the giving of drink, while the furnishing of food passed into the hands of another branch. Abbas was rich, and his influential post, involving charge of the well Zam Zam, was retained by him till it was confirmed to his family by the Holy Prophet on the fall of Mecca; but he never attained to a commanding position at Mecca. Abu Talib, on the other hand, possessed many noble qualities and won greater respect, but he too remained in the background. Thus, the prestige of the house of Hashim began to wane and the rival Umayyad branch rose to importance.

The dying Abdul Muttalib had consigned the guardianship of his orphan grandchild to Abu Talib, who discharged the trust kindly and faithfully. His fondness for his charge equalled that of Abdul Muttalib. He made him sleep by his bed, eat by his side, and go with him wherever he walked abroad. This tender treatment was continued until his nephew emerged from childhood.

It was during this period that Abu Talib undertook a mercantile journey to Syria. He intended to leave the boy behind, for he was now twelve years of age and was able to take care of himself. But when the caravan was ready to depart and Abu Talib was about to mount, the boy, overcome by the prospect of so long a separation, clung to his uncle. Abu Talib was moved, and carried him along with the party. The expedition extended to Basra, perhaps farther. It lasted for several months and afforded to young Muhammad opportunities of observation, which, it is supposed, he did not neglect.

Between the years 580 and 590 the valley of Mecca and its surrounding country were disturbed by one of those bloody feuds so frequently excited by the fiery pride and prolonged by the revengeful temper of Arab tribes. It was known as the Sacrilegious War as it began in one of the four sacred months in which fighting was prohibited. Several battles were fought between the rival tribes with varied success, and hostilities were prolonged for four years, when a truce was called. The dead were numbered up, and as twenty more had been killed of Hawazin than of Quraish, the latter agreed to pay the price of their blood, and for this purpose delivered hostages. One of these was Abu Sufyan, the famous antagonist of Muhammad in later days. In some of these conflicts the whole of Quraish and their allies were engaged. The descendants of Abd Shams were headed by Harb, son of Umayya, and took a distinguished part in the warfare. The children of Hashim were present also, under the command of Zubair, the eldest surviving son of Abdul Muttalib. In one of the battles Muhammad attended upon his uncles, but, though now near twenty years of age, he had not acquired love of arms. His efforts were confined to gathering up the arrows of the enemy as they fell and handing them to his uncles. continue....