This was not the picture of Muhammad I had come to know. It was raw, far less flattering. Here was an unfiltered, or at least a less-filtered, version of Muhammad. What’s more, there was a cross-reference to another hadith in Sahih Bukhari that elaborated even further: 9.111. I retrieved volume nine from Abba’s bookcase, found hadith 111, and read through it.
In an instant, the hadith shattered my illusion of familiarity with Muhammad. It said that when he saw Gabriel, his “neck muscles twitched in terror,” and when Gabriel had gone for a while, the Prophet became so depressed “that he intended several times to throw himself from the tops of high mountains and every time he went up the top of a mountain in order to throw himself down, Gabriel would appear before him and say, ‘O Muhammad! You are indeed Allah’s Apostle in truth,’ whereupon his heart would become quiet and he would calm down.”
I was shocked motionless. Was this Sahih Bukhari really saying Muhammad contemplated suicide?
As if to emphasize, the hadith went on to say that whenever the break in inspiration became long, “he would do as before, but when he used to reach the top of a mountain, Gabriel would appear before him.”
I stared at the book in disbelief. Far from a noble call to prophethood, Muhammad was violently accosted by a spiritual force that terrified him, driving him to contemplate suicide on multiple occasions. And this was not just any book, this was Sahih Bukhari, the most trustworthy book of hadith.
It was then that I began to realize that I had inherited an airbrushed image of Muhammad.
Of course, the real Muhammad was not a picture. He was a historical man with a real past. That was the Muhammad I resolved to know, and if anywhere, he would be found in the pages of history. But it was as if each effort to regroup and learn more resulted in another bomb being dropped.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
VEILING THE VIOLENCE
AS I CONTINUED READING from volume 1, hadith 3, I found many hadith with teachings I had heard often, including that Muslims should avoid harming others (1.10), feed the poor and greet strangers kindly (1.11), and even follow the golden rule (1.12). No doubt, this was the loving, peaceful Islam I had always known.
But when I arrived at hadith 1.24, my jaw dropped.
In it, Muhammad says, “I have been ordered by Allah to fight against people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah’s Apostle, and offer the prayers perfectly and give the obligatory charity . . . then they will save their lives and property from me.”
Were my eyes playing tricks on me? Muhammad was saying that he would fight people until they became Muslim or until he killed them and took their property. That was impossible! It ran counter to everything I knew about Muhammad, and it contradicted the Quran’s clear statement that “there is no compulsion in religion.”
I simply could not believe it, and so I hurriedly moved on to the next hadith. But 1.25 said that the greatest thing a Muslim can do after having faith is to engage in jihad. As if to clarify what kind of jihad, Sahih Bukhari clarifies, “religious fighting.”
The mental dissonance was too much to bear. I could not process it, could not think, could not even get myself to move, in fact. From right where I was, flopped on my belly in Abba’s library, I called out to my father for help. “Abba, I need you!” Sons do not normally summon their fathers in our culture, but Abba heard my cry and came right away. He was my father after all.
“Kya baat hai, beyta?” he asked while briskly approaching me, a note of concern in his voice.
“I don’t know what to do with these. Look.” I handed Abba the two open books, pointing to the hadiths with Muhammad’s contemplation of suicide and his vow to kill or convert non-Muslims. Abba silently considered them for a short while. He tried to mask his surprise, but I could read him too well. That he had to check the cover of the books to make sure this was actually Sahih Bukhari was also a dead giveaway.
All the same, he did not betray any concern when he finally spoke. “Nabeel, there are some things that we do not understand because we are not scholars. Read the scholars’ books, and it will all make sense.”
“But Abba,” I protested, as Abba began searching the bookcases, “if the hadith are the most trustworthy sources, those are what I’d rather read.”
Abba found what he was looking for and removed a book from the shelf. “Beyta, it takes years and years to learn all this information well enough to draw appropriate conclusions. It’s good that you are starting, but these scholars are farther down the road. They’ve asked the questions you’re asking and have found the answers. It’s wise to learn from their efforts instead of reinventing the wheel.” He gently but firmly placed the book before me.
I surveyed its green and golden cover. It was written by a man with a Western name, Martin Lings, and its title boldly read, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. It looked like Abba might be right; this was the kind of thing I was looking for, a story of Muhammad’s life based on the earliest sources.
I thanked Abba and decided to research the author online before reading the book. I soon learned that Martin Lings was an Englishman who had studied at Oxford, a student and close friend of C. S. Lewis. But despite being steeped in Protestant English tradition, he converted to Sufi Islam.
Lings’ conversion and ensuing book sent ripples of jubilation throughout the Islamic world, and he became a household name among learned Muslims. His sirah is renowned for its scholarship and held aloft as an example of Muhammad’s irresistible character and truth. For me, this was a reassuring sign that critical Westerners who studied Islam with sincerity would embrace its truth.
With a surge of newfound excitement, I returned to Lings’ book and flipped straight to the section about Muhammad’s first revelation. My elation was short lived. Here again, I found an incomplete picture. Lings referred to Muhammad’s terror, but he made no mention of suicidal thoughts. There was no reference to it at all, not even an explanation for its omission. It was as if Martin Lings did not know, or did not want us to know, that it even existed. I quickly looked for Allah’s order to Muhammad to convert or kill non-Muslims, and I could not find that either.
Lings was certainly using the earliest sources to write his biography, but at the end of the day, it was still a filtered biography. It ignored the problematic traditions instead of explaining them. In that sense, this widely acclaimed scholastic account of Muhammad’s life was no different from the stories my parents told me. Where was the truth? Why did no one deal with the difficulties in Muhammad’s past?
As I read through Lings’ book, I came across another section that challenged what I knew about Islam. Titled “The Threshold of War,” the chapter seemed to say that it was the Muslims who were the first aggressors against Mecca after Muhammad had migrated to Medina. Muhammad sent eight Muslims to lie in wait for a Meccan trade caravan during the holy month. Even though this was a time of sacred truce for Arabs, the Muslims killed one man, captured two others, and plundered their goods.
Lings made every effort to exculpate the Muslims, but that did nothing to allay my growing concerns. My teachers unrelentingly had asserted that the Muslims were always the innocent ones, the victims at the receiving end of Meccan ridicule and persecution. That is why they fled to Medina. Could it be that after Muhammad and the Muslims were finally able to live freely and peacefully, they were the ones to draw first blood?
If I had learned anything through my new insights, it was that I did not know the whole story, and modern biographers were not about to tell me the facts if it did not fit their portrait. Was Lings leaving anything out?
For the next few weeks, I began studying these matters on the internet, my online research slowly consuming me. I uncovered reams of information about Muhammad that I had never known. It seemed that each point had been brought under the microscope of anonymous online investigators who were either criticizing or defending Muhammad. The online debates were rank with rhetori
c on both sides.
On the one hand, non-Muslims would criticize violent stories about Muhammad, sometimes being gracious in their conclusions but usually defaming our beloved prophet. In response, Muslims would zealously defend Muhammad either by dismissing the stories outright or providing an explanation.
Examples of dismissals are plenty. One such account is when Muhammad ordered a warrior to assassinate a mother of five, Asma bint Marwan. She was breastfeeding a child when she was murdered, her blood splattering on her children. When the assassin told Muhammad he had difficulty with what he had done, Muhammad showed no remorse.81
Even though this account is in the earliest biographies about Muhammad, the Muslims online pointed out that it is not in Sahih Bukhari or other trustworthy hadith. Therefore, they just dismissed it outright. As a Muslim who trusted in the limitless compassion of Muhammad, I really wanted to believe that they were right.
But sometimes the Muslims online tried to provide an explanation for a horrific event, and I just could not go along with it. For example, in the aftermath of the Battle of the Trench, Muhammad captured and beheaded over five hundred men and teenage boys from the Jewish tribe of Qurayza. After the Muslims killed the men, they sold the women and children into slavery and distributed their goods among themselves.82
Since this account was found in both hadith and sirah, the Muslims online could not argue that it was fabricated. They instead looked to justify Muhammad’s actions, usually arguing that the Jews had been treacherous and deserved what they got.
But I could not accept these explanations. The merciful, kind Muhammad that I knew as my prophet would never order men and boys to be beheaded. He was a prophet of mercy and peace. Nor would he sell women and children into slavery. He was a defender of the rights of women and children.
I found one violent story after another about Muhammad. I consciously tried to dismiss each one, just like the Muslims online, but subconsciously, the pressure was building. How many could I dismiss? How was I going to go on like this?
Chapter Thirty-Nine
MUHAMMAD RASUL ALLAH?
IN A FEW WEEKS, David got back to me with his studies on Muhammad. To say that he had been thorough would be an understatement.
We had set out to study the question, “Is Muhammad a prophet of God?” Surveying Sirat Rasul Allah, Sahih Bukhari, and Sahih Muslim, he found dozens of traditions that he argued stood against Muhammad’s prophethood. He compiled them in a binder and handed it to me. He was pursuing the following question: “Would an objective investigator conclude that, based on Muhammad’s life and character, he is a prophet of God?”
In his binder, there were a whole host of issues that I had not come across. Some of these bothered him a lot more than they bothered me. For example, Islam commands Muslims to have no more than four wives at a time, yet Muhammad had at least seven at one point. I told him that Allah had given Muhammad special permission in the Quran to have unlimited wives, so it was not really a problem.83 He responded, “Don’t you think that’s suspicious? At least a little?” My knee-jerk reaction was to say it was not.
David also took serious issue with Muhammad’s marriage to Aisha. According to a handful of hadiths, she was six when Muhammad married her, and he consummated the marriage with her three years later, when he was fifty-two.84 David argued that because of his example young girls all across the Muslim world are forced to marry at an age far too young for their well-being.85 But my jamaat taught that these hadith were inaccurate, too, so I was not bothered by them either.
One by one, David presented additional traditions that challenged the idea of Muhammad’s prophethood, each progressively more offensive. Muhammad had been poisoned;86 on his deathbed, he felt as if the poison were killing him;87 he had black magic cast on him;88 he revealed verses he later admitted had been from Satan;89 he tortured people for money;90 he led an attack on unarmed Jews;91 he caused his adopted son to divorce so he could marry his daughter-in-law Zainab;92 he told people to drink camel’s urine.93 The list went on and on.
At first, I tried to respond to the particulars of each tradition, but with each additional story, it was clear I was not being objective. In my frustration, I began studying books on hadith methodology by acclaimed scholars, listening to scholastic lectures, and reading commentary after commentary, trying to determine how to discredit the traditions that maligned Muhammad’s character and defend the hadith that portrayed the prophet I loved. But there was just no razor I could use to dissect the two. None except the idea, “Muhammad must be a prophet, and therefore these stories must be false.”
But there were just too many stories, even from reputable sources of hadith.
Over time, they reached a critical mass, after which I just denied the authenticity of each tradition. It was all I could do; otherwise, I would be overwhelmed. I began to understand why the biographers and my teachers had all done the same thing.
When I realized I was trying to dismiss about a hundred such stories, I could no longer avoid a hard truth: these stories came from sources that built the historical foundations of Islam. How much could I dismiss without causing the foundations to crumble?
Put another way, I realized that if I kept denying the reliability of the traditions, I had no basis for calling him a prophet in the first place. I could no longer proclaim the shahada, not unless there was something else, something other than history, that could vindicate Muhammad.
There was only one way out of the dilemma: the Quran.
To read an expert contribution on the historical Muhammad by Dr. David Wood (PhD in philosophy, Fordham University), Director of Acts 17 Apologetics and host of Jesus or Muhammad, visit contributions.NabeelQureshi.com.
Part 8
THE HOLINESS OF THE QURAN
So much that I thought I knew about the Quran simply is not true. Is it really Your book?
Chapter-Forty
THE CASE FOR THE QURAN
IF YOU CAN IMAGINE God’s mystery and wisdom, His power, depth, and perfection, His divine mandates and prophecies, all synergistically inhabiting the physical pages of a book, vivifying it with the very essence of God, you will begin to understand how and why Muslims revere the Quran.
It should not be assumed that the Quran is the Islamic analogue of the Bible. It isn’t. For Muslims, the Quran is the closest thing to an incarnation of Allah, and it is the very proof they provide to demonstrate the truth of Islam. The best parallel in Christianity is Jesus himself, the Word made flesh, and his resurrection. That is how central the Quran is to Islamic theology.94
It was now the foundation of my faith. The historical Muhammad, who once stood as the second pillar of my worldview, now also rested on the Quran for authentication. By the time I began scrutinizing the scripture, I was acutely sensitive to its weight.
The truth of Islam, everything Muhammad stood for, and my life as I knew it hinged on the divine inspiration of the Quran.
Just as when I began investigating the life of Muhammad, I was convinced the Quran would stand up to scrutiny. No one in the ummah doubted its divine inspiration. To the contrary, we knew that the Quran was so perfect and miraculous that no one would dare question it, not even secular Westerners. We considered our arguments incontrovertible.
The boldest argument for the divine inspiration of the Quran was its inimitability, primarily its literary excellence. “No one can emulate its eloquence,” other Muslims would say alongside me. Our argument stemmed from the Quran itself. When people in Muhammad’s day accused him of forging the Quran, the Quran responded multiple times that doubters should try writing something like it.95 When they tried, even if they had help from men and jinn, they fell short.
This is the challenge of the Quran: no one can produce anything that rivals it.
Having read these challenges in the Quran from childhood, and given that my worldview was forged by teachers who continually proclaimed the Quran was preeminent in its beauty, I and most Muslims like me were more than
confident that the Quran was truly unmatchable.
Imagine my incredulity when I discovered an answer to the Quran’s challenge, Al-Furqan al-Haqq. Translated “the true measure of discernment,” it is a book that responds to the challenge of the Quran by writing Christian teachings in Quranic style.96 This book apparently reproduced the Quranic style so effectively that some who recited it aloud in public areas were thanked by Arab Muslims for having recited the Quran itself.
Its inimitability is the only defense the Quran provides for itself, yet here was a book that effectively responded to the challenge. This news was explosive.
I was not the only one to consider Al-Furqan al-Haqq dangerous. At least one nation has “for the maintenance of security . . . , hereby absolutely prohibit[ed] import of the book . . . including any extract there from, any reprint or translation thereof or any document reproducing any matter contained therein.”97
My faith in the Quran was such that, in my view, it was impossible for its challenge to have been answered. I concluded that the challenge must actually mean something else. I did my best to ignore the difficulty, marshaling additional arguments.
Muslim apologists do not limit themselves to the Quran’s own defense of its inspiration. The four other arguments they most commonly appeal to are these: fulfilled prophecies, mathematical patterns, scientific truths, and textual preservation. I set out to examine each of them, not to see whether they were reliable but rather to build my positive case for Islam, to make the truth of Islam as obvious to the objective investigator as it is to the ummah. As it was to me.
Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus: A Devout Muslim Encounters Christianity Page 20