The Excellent Exemplar - Muhammad — Page 52
THE EXCELLENT EXEMPLAR — MUHAMMAD 52 This reduced the forces at his disposal at the trench facing the Confederate army to seven hundred and fifty men. Again, the disparity in numbers and in every other respect between the opposing forces was not only striking but pitiful. The Confederate army now pressed their attack across the trench, and there was continuous and desperate fighting. The plight of the Muslims is graphically described in the Quran (33:11 - 24). During one of the attacks, when a party of the Confederates had crossed the trench and were repulsed, a noted tribal chief was left dead on the Muslim side. His people, fearing that the Muslims would mutilate his dead body, as would have been their own pro cedure, offered a sum of ten thousand dirhems for the recovery of his body. They did not know that the Prophet had abolished all barbarous customs and that their fears were unfounded. When their offer was conveyed to the Prophet he declined to receive any payment, saying, “A corpse has no value for us. They can remove it whenever they like. ” Before the day decided upon for the joint assault by the Confederates and the Jews, relief came from an unexpected source: the weather. It was a stormy and turbulent night. The fierce wind caused great confusion in the Confederate camp. Further consternati on arose when one of the tribal chiefs observed that the fire in front of his tent had gone out; according to Arab superstition, this portended death or defeat for him in the next day’s fighting. To avoid this, the chief told his people to strike camp so t hat they could withdraw quietly into the desert for a day or two. This move was interpreted by both Jew and Confederate as a device to secure safety against a feared night