Military career of Muhammad
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Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, was, amongst other things, a general during the last ten years of his life.
History
Muhammad spent his last ten years, from 622 to 632, as the ruler of a Muslim community in Medina and was engaged in constant war. Through raids, sieges, and diplomacy, he and his followers allied or subdued most of the tribes and cities of the Arabian peninsula in their struggle with the powerful Banu Quraish of Mecca.
They also sent out raiding parties against Arabic-speaking communities under Byzantine rulership. Muslims believe that Muhammad was Divinely chosen to spread the religion of God and warfare was one part of this strive after the truth was clarified in its ultimate form.[1]
Raiding Meccan caravans
Before it started, Sa'd ibn Mua'dh had warned the Meccans of upcoming raids. It started by raiding caravans going to and from Mecca, by some of the Muslims. Such activities were denounced by Muhammad. When a group of Muslims started raiding caravans with Abu Basir, Muhammad said, "Woe to his mother! What excellent war kindler he would be, should he only have supporters".[2]
The Muslims, who fled to Madinah after their suffering at the hands of Quraysh in Mecca, and had left all their possessions and houses in Mecca, which were not seized by the Quraishites. The Muslims were still not given permission to fight. Small groups of men were only sent to gather intelligence, but some did not follow the restraint orders for offence-free missions. These were the actions that were denounced by Muhammad. It was only when they were permitted to fight, that the Muslim community started a mission to capture the wealth of a caravan arriving from Syria, which was returning with the profit of trading. This thus lead to the Battle of Badr. Some attribute this retaliation of Meccans to the raiding of caravans, and some to Meccans' fierce hatred towards Islam, which challenged their faith and social system.
The Meccans then fought against the Muslims at the Battle of Uhud. They made a final attempt at the Battle of the Trench. Uhud was a battle started purely by the Meccans for retaliation to their military loss in Badr, and the Battle of the Trench was the final trial by the Meccans to end the Muslim presence. The latter was also exclusively started by the huge Meccan forces, accompanied by other armies from outside Mecca.
Raids against other tribes
The Muslims also set their new military organization against various non-Meccan groups. In light of the alleged betrayal of the Jews at the Battle of the Trench, where the the leader of the Jews talked about becoming allied with the Meccan assailants,the Muslims defeated and killed, the last Jewish tribe in Medina. The result was that they eventually became the rulers of the oasis to which they had fled as refugees.
As a result of these campaigns, some nomadic tribes decided that it was in their best interests to ally with the Muslims. They accepted Islam, destroyed their cult figures and shrines, and accepted Muhammad as their leader.
Muslim alliance versus Meccan alliance
By expanding their military operations and negotiating with the nomads, the Muslims had created an alliance with greater resources than Mecca, alone, could muster. The Meccans in their turn made alliances with Bedouin tribes. Two large alliances faced each other, poised for warfare.
Hudaybiya
By old custom, during the months of pilgrimage, tribal hostilities stopped and all were free to visit Mecca. In March of 628, Muhammad put on the garb of a pilgim and taking a large force and camels for sacrifice, set out for Mecca.
According to the early chronicler Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad took 700 men (Guillaume 1955, p. 500). According to Watt, Muhammad took 1400 to 1600 men (Watt 1957, p. 46).
The Meccans did not accept the Muslim professions of peaceful intent and sent out a raiding party against them. The Muslims evaded them by taking a side route through the hills around Mecca, and then camped outside Mecca, at Hudaybiya. Ibn Ishaq describes a tense period of embassies and counter-embassies, including a bold foray by Uthman ibn Affan into the city of Mecca, where he was temporarily held as a hostage. The Meccans told the Muslims that Uthman had been killed and open warfare seemed imminent.
Then the situation shifted radically. Uthman was revealed to be alive, and the Meccans expressed their willingness to negotiate a truce. The Muslims wanted to attack, but Muhammad held out for a peaceful resolution.
The treaty of Hudaybiya committed both sides to a ten-year truce. The Muslims were to be allowed to return the next year, to perform the pilgrimage.
Muslim alliance expands
Free of the Meccan threat, the Muslims expanded their activities against other oases and tribes. They conquered the rich oasis of Khaybar (see Battle of Khaybar) and sent raiding parties against the Ghatafan, Murrah, Sulaym, and Hawaizin (Watt 1957 pp. 52-53).
Muslims take Mecca
Less than two years after the truce of Hudaybiya, the truce was broken by a squabble between tribes allied to the Meccans and Medinans. There had long been bad blood between the Khuza'ah and the Banu Bakr bin Abd Manat, and the two groups lined up on opposite sides, the Khuza'ah with the Muslims and the Banu Bakr with the Meccans. Watt (p. 62) says that some of the Quraysh helped the Banu Bakr ambush the Khuza'ah. This was apparently the work of a few men, but in the eyes of the Muslims, all of Mecca stood convicted as truce-breakers. The Meccans sent an emissary, Abu Sufyan, to Medina to try to arrange a compromise. Accounts of what happened during Abu Sufyan's visit vary greatly.
What is known is that shortly afterwards, a large Muslim force of some 10,000 men headed for Mecca. They camped outside Mecca and the usual round of emissaries and negotiations began. Apparently Abu Sufyan had negotiated, then or earlier, a promise that he and those under him would not be attacked if they submitted. A few Meccans, from the Makhzum faction, prepared to resist.
On or near January 11, 630, Muhammad sent four columns of troops into Mecca. Only one column met any resistance. Twenty-eight Meccans were killed and the rest of those opposing the Muslim entry fled. The remaining Meccans formally submitted to Muhammad and to Islam. A few Meccans were killed for previous offenses against the Muslims, but most of the Meccans, even those who had been notable for their hatred of the Muslims, were spared.
The idols in the Kaaba were destroyed and the Kaaba became a Muslim shrine.
Last two years
After the fall of Mecca, other tribes hastened to submit to the Muslims. Those who did not submit were harried until they submitted. The historian Fred Donner, in his book The Early Islamic Conquests, argues that the early Islamic state organized the nomads, the Bedouin, under the leadership of urban Arabic-speakers. This arrangement was inherently unstable as long as there were any nomads outside Muslim rule. Otherwise, any rebellious tribe had only to move its flocks and tents outside the area that the Muslims controlled in order to be free again. The Muslims would have to control the entire Syro-Arabian steppe in order to be secure. Muhammad, and the caliphs that followed him, Abu Bakr and Umar al-Khattab, put a great deal of effort into extending and solidifying these tribal treaties and conquests.
Legacy
His efforts led to the unification of the Arabian penisula.
Views
Muslim View
Muslims view that the Muslims fought only when attacked, or in the context of a wider war of self-defense. They argue that Muhammad was the first among the major military figures of history to lay down rules for humane warfare, and that he was scrupulous in limiting the loss of life as much as possible.
Javed Ahmed Ghamidi writes in Mizan that there are certain directives of the Qur’an pertaining to war which were specific only to the Prophet Muhammad against Divinely specified peoples of his times (the polytheists and the Israelites and Nazarites of Arabia and some other Jews, Christians, et al) as a form of Divine punishment -- for they had persistently denied the truth of the Prophet's mission even after it had been made conclusively evident to them by God through the Prophet, and asked the polytheists of Arabia for submission to Islam as a condition for exoneration and the others for jizya and submission to the political authority of the Muslims for exemption from death punishment and for military protection as the dhimmis of the Muslims. Therefore, after the Prophet and his companions, there is no concept in Islam obliging Muslims to wage war for propagation or implementation of Islam, hence now, the only valid reason for war is to end oppression when all other measures have failed.[1][3]
Non-Muslim view
Muhammad's critics often hold that the Muslims engaged in wars of aggression, that they caused much bloodshed and suffering, that they imposed Islam at the point of a sword, and that Muhammad's conduct is not an example to be imitated [original research?]. Conversely, other non-Muslims academics believe that Muhammad was a reluctant warrior, such that he disliked fighting except when he believed it to be absolutely necessary.[4]
Ibn Ishaq's list of Muhammad's battles
The early chronicler Ibn Ishaq gave a list of all the raids or battles in which Muhammad joined or fought. The list is:
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Ibn Ishaq continues: "He actually fought in nine engagements: Badr; Uhud; Al-Khandaq; Qurayza; al-Mustaliq; Khaybar; the occupation; Hunayn; and al-Ta'if." (Guillaume 1955 pp. 659-660)
See also
References
- ^ a b Javed Ahmed Ghamidi, Mizan, Chapter:The Islamic Law of Jihad, Dar ul-Ishraq, 2001. OCLC: 52901690 [1]
- ^ Sahih Bukhari, Template:Bukhari-usc
- ^ Misplaced Directives, Renaissance, Al-Mawrid Institute, Vol. 12, No. 3, March 2002.[2]
- ^ Forward (1998) Muhammad: A Short Biography. Oxford: OneWorld Publishers. ISBN 1851681310. p. 27
also:
- Donner, Fred, The Early Islamic Conquests, Princeton University Press, 1981
- Guillaume, A., The Life of Muhammad, Oxford University Press, 1955
- Watt, Montgomery, Muhammad at Medina, Oxford University Press, 1957