Introduction to the Study of The Holy Quran — Page 159
159 mouths. They even began to entertain doubts about God. The believers were then on trial. They were all given a shaking. The hypocrites and the spiritually diseased began to say, 'We have all been fooled by false promises made to us by God and His Prophet!' A party of them even began to unnerve the Muslim force saying, 'There is no fighting now. There is nothing to do but to go back. ' How true believers behaved on this occasion is also described in the Quran: And when the believers saw the confederates, they said, 'This is what Allah and His Messenger promised us; and Allah and His Messenger spoke the truth. ' And it only increased them in faith and submission. Among the believers are men who have been true to the covenant they had made with Allah. There are some of them who have fulfilled their vow, and some who still wait, and they have not changed their condition in the least. 178 The true believers, that is to say, were unlike the hypocrites and the weak. When they saw the huge numbers of the enemy, they were reminded of what God and His Prophet had told them already. This concerted attack by the tribes of Arabia was proof only of the truth of God and the Prophet. The true believers remained unshaken. Rather they increased in the spirit of obedience and in the fervour of faith. The true believers stood by their compact with God. Some of them had already attained to the goal of their lives by meeting their death. Some were only waiting to die in the path of God and reach their goal. The enemy attacked the ditch fiercely and uninterruptedly. Sometimes he succeeded in clearing it. One day, important generals of the enemy succeeded in going across. But they were attacked so bravely by the Muslims that they had to fall back. In this encounter, Nawfal, a big leader of the disbelievers, lost his life. So big was this leader that the disbelievers thought they would not be able to stand any insult to his dead body. They, therefore, sent word to the Prophet, that if he would return the body of this chief, they would pay ten thousand dirhams. It was a high price for the return of the dead body. The offer was made out of a sense of guilt. The disbelievers had mutilated the Muslim dead at Uhud and were afraid that Muslims would do the same. But the teaching of Islam was different. Islam forbade outright the mutilation of the dead. When the Prophet received the message and the offer, he said, "What use have we for this body? We want nothing in return for this. If it please you, take away the body. " 179 A passage in Muir’s Life of Mahomet (London-1878, p. 322) describes eloquently the fierceness of the attack on Muslims. We need not apologize for quoting it here: Next morning, Mahomed found the whole force of the Allies drawn out against him. It required the utmost activity and an unceasing vigilance on his side to frustrate the manoeuvres of the enemy. Now they would threaten a general assault; then breaking up into divisions they would attack various posts in rapid and distracting succession; and at last, watching their opportunity, they