Mecca - Part 6

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Mecca - Part 6

 

(p.44) The hanifs [*] had little impact on their contemporaries, because they

were chiefly concerned with their own personal salvation. They had no desire to

reform the social or moral life of Arabia, and their theology was essentially

negative. Instead of creating something new, they simply withdrew from the

mainstream. Indeed the word 'hanif' may derive from the root 'HNF': " to turn

away from. " They had a clearer idea of what they did 'not' want than a positive

conception of where they were going. But the movement was a symptom of the

spiritual restiveness in Arabia at the beginning of the seventh century, and we

know that Muhammad had close links with three of the leading hanifs of Mecca.

'Ubaydallah ibn Jahsh was his cousin and Waraqah ibn Nawfal was a cousin of

Khadijah: both these men became Christians. The nephew of Zayd ibn 'Amr, who

attacked the pagan religion of Mecca so vehemently that he was driven out of the

city, became one of Muhammad's most trusted disciples. It seems, therefore, that

Muhammad moved in 'hanafi' circles, and may have shared Zayd's yearning for

divine guidance. (p.45) One day, before he had been expelled from Mecca, Zayd

had stood beside the Kabah inveighing against the corrupt religion of the Haram

[sanctuary surrounding the Kabah]. But suddenly, he broke off. " Oh Allah! " he

cried, " If I knew how you wished to be worshipped, I would so worship you, but I

do not know. " [35]

 

[*] hanif--Originally a pre-Islamic monotheist. In the Qur'an, the word refers

to a person who followed the 'hanifiyyah', the pure religion of Abraham, before

this split into rival sects. (Glossary, p.216).

 

Muhammad was also seeking a new solution. For some years, accompanied by

Khadijah, he had made an annual retreat on Mount Hira' [mountain outside Mecca]

during the month of Ramadan, distributing alms to the poor who visited him in

his mountain cave and performing devotions. [36] We know very little about these

practices, which were believed by some of the sources to have been inaugurated

by Muhammad's grandfather. They seem to have combined social concern with

rituals that may have included deep prostrations before Allah, [37] and

intensive circumambulation of the Kabah. At this time, Muhammad had also started

to have numinous dreams, radiant with hope and promise, that burst upon him

" like the dawn of the morning, " a phrase that in Arabic expresses the sudden

transformation of the world when the sun breaks through the darkness in these

eastern lands where there is no twilight. [38]

 

It was while he was making his annual retreat on Mount Hira' in about the year

610 that he experienced the astonishing and dramatic attack. The words that were

squeezed, as if from the depths of his being, went to the root of the problem in

Mecca.

 

Recite in the name of your lord who created--

From an embryo created the human.

 

Recite your lord is all-giving

Who taught by the pen

Taught the human what he did not know before

 

The human is a tyrant

He thinks his possessions make him secure

To your lord is the return of everything

 

(p.46) This verse was an extension of the Quraysh's [Muhammad's tribe's] belief

that Allah had created each one of them. It identified the proud

self-sufficiency of muruwah [chivalric code of the Bedouin] as a delusion,

because humans are entirely dependent upon God. Finally, Allah insisted that he

was not a distant, absent deity but wanted to instruct and guide his creatures,

so they must " come near " to him. But instead of approaching God in a spirit of

prideful istighna' [haughty self-reliance], they must bow before him like a

lowly slave: " Touch your head to the earth! " God commanded [39]--a posture that

would be repugnant to the haughty Quraysh. From the very beginning, Muhammad's

religion was diametrically opposed to some of the essential principles of

muruwah.

 

When Muhammad came to himself, he was so horrified to think, after all his

spiritual striving, that he had simply been visited by a jinni that he no longer

wanted to live. In despair, he fled from the cave and started to climb to the

summit of the mountain to fling himself to death. But there he had another

vision. He saw a mighty being that filled the horizon and stood " gazing at him,

moving neither forward nor backward. " [40] (p.47) He tried to turn away, but, he

said afterwards, " Towards whatever region of the sky I looked, I saw him as

before. " [41] It was the spirit ('ruh') of revelation, which Muhammad would

later call Gabriel. But this was no pretty, naturalistic angel, but a

transcendent presence that defied ordinary human and spatial categories.

 

Terrified and still unable to comprehend what had happened, Muhammad stumbled

down the mountainside to Khadijah. By the time he reached her, he was crawling

on his hands and knees, shaking convulsively. " Cover me! " he cried, as he flung

himself into her lap. Khadijah wrapped him in a cloak and held him in her arms

until his fear abated. She had no doubts at all about the revelation. This was

no jinni, she insisted. God would never play such a cruel trick on a man who had

honestly tried to serve him. " You are kind and considerate to your kin, " she

reminded him. " You help the poor and forlorn and bear their burdens. You are

striving to restore the high moral qualities that your people have lost. You

honor the guest and go to the assistance of those in distress. This cannot be,

my dear. " [42] Muhammad and Khadijah had probably discussed their dawning

understanding of the true nature of a religion that went beyond ritual

performance and required practical compassion and sustained moral effort.

 

To reassure Muhammad, Khadijah consulted her cousin Waraqah, the hanif, who had

studied the scriptures of the People of the Book and could give them expert

advice. Waraqah was jubilant: " Holy! Holy! " he cried, when he heard what had

happened. " If you have spoken the truth to me, O Khadijah, there has come to him

the great divinity who came to Moses aforetime, and lo, he is the prophet of his

people. " [43] The next time Waraqah met Muhammad in the Haram, he kissed him on

the forehead and warned him that his task would not be easy. Waraqah was an old

man and not likely to live much longer, but he wished he could be alive to help

Muhammad when the Quraysh expelled him from the city. Muhammad was dismayed. He

could not conceive of a life outside Mecca. Would they really cast him out? he

asked in dismay. Waraqah sadly told him that a prophet was always without honor

in his own country.

 

It was a difficult beginning, fraught with fear, anxiety, and the threat of

persecution. Yet the Qur'an has preserved another account of the experience on

Mount Hira', in which the descent of the spirit is described as an event of

wonder, gentleness, and peace, similar to the conception of Jesus in the womb of

Mary. [44]

 

We sent him down on the night of destiny

And what can tell you of the night of destiny?

The night of destiny is better than a thousand months

The angels come down--the spirit upon her--

by permission of their lord from every order

Peace she is until the rise of dawn. [45]

 

In this 'surah' (chapter) of the Qur'an, there is a suggestive blurring of

masculine and feminine, especially in pronouns, which is often lost in

translation. In the Qur'an, the question " What can tell you? " regularly

introduces an idea that would have been strange to Muhammad's first audience,

indicating that they were about to enter the realm of the ineffable. (p.49) Here

Muhammad has self-effacingly disappeared from the drama of Mount Hira', and the

night ('layla') is center stage, like a woman waiting for her lover. The Night

of Destiny had inaugurated a new era of communion between heaven and earth. The

original terror of the divine encounter has been replaced by the peace that

filled the darkness as the world waited for day-break.

 

Muhammad would have understood the German historian Rudolf Otto, who described

the sacred as a mystery that was both 'tremendum' and 'fascinans'. It was

overpowering, urgent, and terrible, but it also filled human beings with

" delight, joy, and a sense of swelling harmony and intimate intercourse. " [46]

Revelation cannot be described in a simple manner, and the complexity of his

experience made Muhammad very cautious of telling anybody about it. After the

experience on Mount Hira', there were more visions--we do not know exactly how

many--and then, to Muhammad's dismay, the divine voice fell silent and there

were no further revelations.

 

It was a time of great desolation. Had Muhammad been deluded after all? Was the

presence simply a mischievous jinni? Or had God found him wanting and abandoned

him? For two long years, the heavens remained obdurately closed and then,

suddenly, the darkness was dispersed in a burst of luminous assurance:

 

(p.50)

 

By the morning hours

By the night when it is still

Your lord has not abandoned you

and does not hate you

 

What is after will be better

than what came before

To you the lord will be giving

You will be content

 

Did he not find you orphaned

and give you shelter

Find you lost

and guide you

Find you in hunger

and provide for you

 

As for the orphan--

do not oppress him

And one who asks for help--

do not turn him away

And the grace of your lord--

proclaim [47]

 

Here, Allah offered his assurance that he did not abandon his creatures, and

reminded men and women to imitate his continuous kindness and generosity. Human

beings, who had experienced the care of God, had a duty to help the orphan and

the deprived. (p.51) Anybody who had known dereliction, hunger, and oppression

must refuse under any circumstances to inflict this pain on others. The

revelation concluded by telling Muhammad that it was time to " proclaim " this

message to the Quraysh. But how would they respond?

 

Muhammad (Prophet For Our Time)

Chapter 1, 'Mecca', p. 44-51

Karen Armstrong

Harper Perennial - London, New York, Toronto and Sydney

ISBN-13 978-0-00-723248-2

ISBN-10 0-00-723248-9

 

Notes:

 

[35] Ibn Ishaq, 'Sirat Rasul Allah', 145, in Guillaume, 'Life of Muhammad'.

 

[36] Peters, 'Hajj', 39-40.

 

[37] Izutsu, 'God and Man', 148.

 

[38] Ibn Ishaq, 'Sirat Rasul Allah', 151, in Guillaume, 'Life of Muhammad', 105.

 

[39] Qur'an 96 in Michael Sells, ed. and trans., 'Approaching the Qur'an: The

Early Revelations' (Ashland, OR, 1999). Muhammad Asad translates lines 6-8:

" Verily man becomes grossly overweening whenever he believes himself to be

self-sufficient: for, behold, unto thy Sustainer all must return. "

 

[40] Qur'an 53:5-9, Sells translation.

 

[41] Ibn Ishaq, 'Sirat Rasul Allah', 153, in Guillaume, 'Life of Muhammad'.

 

[42] Ibid.

 

[43] Ibid., 154.

 

[44] Qur'an 21:91, 19:16-27. Sells, 'Approaching the Qur'an', 187-93.

 

[45] Qur'an 97, Sells translation.

 

[46] Rudolf Otto, 'The Idea of the Holy: An Inquiry into the Non Rational Factor

in the Idea of the Divine and its relation to the rational', trans. John W.

Harvey, 2nd ed., (London, Oxford and New York, 1950), 12-40.

 

[47] Qur'an 93, Sells translation.