Muhammad: Seal of the Prophets — Page 477
MUHAMMAD : SEAL OF THE PROPHETS 477 ignorance, and observe Prayer, and pay the Zakat, and obey Allah and His Messenger. Allah desires to remove from you all uncleanness, members of the Household, and to purify you completely. Remember that which is rehearsed in your homes of the Signs of All ah, and of wisdom. Verily, Allah is the Knower of the minutest things, All Aware. There is no indication at all that any of them fell short in any respect of that which was prescribed for them, either during the life of the Holy Prophet or after his death. The period of widowhood in the case of some of them was quite prolonged. They spe nt it with great dignity, in beneficence and in the fear of God. That again is proof that their association with the Holy Prophet was at the highest moral and spiritual level. We may sum up the character of the Holy Prophet in the words of two Western scholars, one German, the other British. Tor Andrae has recorded ( Muhammad: The Man and his Faith, pp. 11, 12): That Muhammad really lived cannot be disputed. The development of Islam – at least when compared with the other world religions – is open to the clear light of history, and presents us with yet another proof that the Prophetic personality is the original s ource of the new religious creation. Truly: ‘My Prayers and my worship and my life and my death are unto God, Lord of the worlds. He hath no associate. This am I commanded, and I am the first of the Muslims’ (6:163,164). The first of the Muslims!