The Seal of Prophets - His Personality and Character — Page 3
The Seal of Prophets 3 Chapter 1 Kalima Shahada, and Western View of Muhammad SA To begin with, I recited before you the Kalima Shahada. Then I read the opening chapter of the Holy Qur’an and a verse from a chapter called Al-Kahf. Kalima Shahada, which I recited, was the more elaborate version of the one generally known. It is in two parts; first, Allah is one, there is no God but Allah; and the other, Muhammad is His servant, a man and a Prophet. The emphasis is on man before you move on to consider him as a prophet. It was the shorter version of the Kalima, ِ لَاِلٰاِلَّ اہللُ مَُمَّــدٌ رَّسُــوْلُ اہلل that was before Gibbon, a famous orientalist and historian, when he opined on it. Bosworth Smith writes about it in Mohammed and Mohammedanism (Lecture II, R. Bosworth Smith; Smith, Elder & Co. , 15 Waterloo Place, London, (1874) as follows: ”It is almost equally strange that Gibbon, who has done such full justice to Mohammed in the general result, should say at starting, ‘Mohammed’s religion consists of an eternal truth, and a necessary fiction - There is one God, and Mohammed is his prophet’. ” (Page 82)