Muhammad and The Jews — Page 42
the same effect. Noldeke, while accepting it as the last revelation-- l 14th, has placed some of the verses between 2/623 and 7/628. Verses 45-55, however, have been placed after "the massacre of Bani Quraidha" and prior to the expedition against the Jews of Khaybar in A. H. 7" by Noldeke, and Wherry concurs with the view. 1 Verses 46 and 47 say : Should they (the Jews) come to thee seeking judgment in a dispute, either judge between them or leave them. If thou keepest away from them, they shall not harm thee at all. But if thou undertake to judge, then judge between them with equity. Surely Allah loves the just. And how will they make thee their judge, when they have the Torah containing Allah's commandments? Yet, they turn their backs, and they certainly do not believe. A reference to the Jews seeking the Apostle's judgment in their disputes would be pointless if there were no Jews in Medina. Since the verses were revealed prior to the expedition to Khaybar, the Jews of Khaybar, Fadak and the neighbouring regions were not expected to bring their disputes to the Apostle. No demographic data of the population of Yathrib at the time of the Hijrah is available to us, so it is not possible to give any exact figures for the Jewish population of Medina during the lifetime of the Apostle. However some definite figures have been provided by Ibn · lsi,liiq and other biographers, which give an approximate idea of the Jewish strength. The B. Qaynuqi{· provided 700 men to protect "'Abd Allah b. Ubayy 2 and 600 to 900 fighting men of the B. Quray+ah are reported to have been executed after the battle of the Abziib. 3 The B. al-Nagir occupied a position of prestige in Medina and were the rivals of the B. Quray+ah. The number of their male members is not given but, when they left Medina nine hundred camels were loaded with their belongings. One may reasonably conclude that they were not smaller in number than the B. Qaynuqa"' and the B. Quray+ah. This gives us a conservative estimate of three thousand male members for the three tribes which clashed with the Apostle. When the B. Qaynuqa"' provided 700 men to protect "'Abd Allah b. Ubayy they probably did not give all their men. If the other nine Jewish tribes 1 W. Montgomery Watt, Bell's· Introduction to the Qur'iin (Edinburgh, 1970), p. 207; Rev. E. M. Wherry, A Comprehensive Commentary on the Qura11 (London, 1896), Vol. II, p. 119. 2 Ibn Hisham, p. 546. 3 Ibid. , p. 690. 42