Murder in the Name of Allah — Page 32
Murder in the Name of Allah been asked the tribe accepted whatever the members of the delegation or the elders of the tribe decided. So there was a large number of converts who had no opportunity of benefiting directly from the Prophet's sa teaching; they had never even seen him. They did not even have the chance to spend time with the Prophet's sa Companions. Religion is a personal experience and is learned especially by example and inspiration - things not available to the new converts. Misfortune was compounded by the death of the Holy Prophets soon after their conversion. . The Arab horizon was more than a little darkened by the passing away of. Muhammadsa. We can learn a great deal from that period of history. . When people reject the prophet of their time and extinguish his light by force, they are severely punished for it. . One result of that punishment is that most people see the light of iman (belief) when the source of that light is about to be extinguished. . Sometimes people only recognise a prophet long after his death. What a punishment! To persecute a prophet while he is alive; to accept him only after he has gone. . Since Maulana Maududi joined the worst enemies of Islam by arguing that the sword played a part in the preaching of Islam, let us reexamine the Prophet's life to see if at any stage people were converted against their will. . The division of the Holy Prophet's life into two periods, the Meccan and the Medinite, seems logical, but it is in reality an over-simplification. . After the Hijrah, the Prophets and the Emigrants had escaped persecution, but the struggle for survival was not over. It would be more logical to divide the Prophet's life into three phases: the first being the time up to his migration to Medina, and the second the time from his migration to the truce of Hudaybiyah, which was also a period of persecution; the third from the truce to the surrender of Mecca. (Though the Muslims were allowed to fight back, they were no match for the pagan opposition. . Medina was the only town where Muslims lived, but they did not control it. The three Jewish tribes and the non-Muslim members of the Aws and the Khazraj dominated the town. The size of the opposing armies at the battle of Badr³8 represented their actual strength. Therefore, this period should be considered an extension of the Meccan period of bitter struggle. ) The third period begins with the truce of Hudaybiyah and ends with the surrender of Mecca. It was a period of peace. The Meccan pagans did not attack the Muslims, though a few skirmishes took place with the. Jews and some Arab tribes who broke their agreements with the Muslims. 32