Hijrah - Part 3

[Guest guest]

('Hijrah' - migration, especially the Muslims' migrations to Medina. [Muhammad

Prophet For Our Time Glossary pg. 216].)

 

 

Hijrah - Part 3

 

(p.97) The story of the night journey reveals Muhammad's longing to bring the

Arabs of the Hijaz, who had felt that they had been left out of the divine plan,

into the heart of the monotheistic family. This is a story of pluralism.

Muhammad was abandoning the pagan pluralism of Mecca, because it had degenerated

into the self-destructive arrogance and violence of jahiliyyah, but he was

beginning to embrace monotheistic pluralism. Muhammad was abandoning the pagan

pluralism of Mecca, because it had degenerated into the self-destructive

arrogance and violence of jahiliyyah, but he was beginning to embrace

monotheistic pluralism. In Jerusalem, he discovered that all the prophets, sent

by God to all peoples, are " brothers. " Muhammad's prophetic predecessors do not

spurn him as a pretender, but welcome him into their family. The prophets do not

revile or try to convert each other; instead they listen to each other's

insights. (p.98) They invite the new prophet to preach to them, and, in one

version of the story, Muhammad asks Moses for advice about how frequently

Muslims should pray. Originally, God wanted salat [the ritual worship performed

five times a day by Muslims] fifty times a day, but Moses kept sending Muhammad

back to God until the number of prescribed prayers had been reduced to five

(which Moses still found excessive). [8] The fact that this appreciation of

other traditions is written into the archetypal myth of Muslim spirituality

shows how central this pluralism was to early Islam.

 

From this point, the Qur'an began to emphasize this shared vision. In one

remarkable passage, Allah makes it clear that the faithful must believe

indiscriminately in the revelations of every single one of God's messengers:

 

Say: We believe in God, and in that which has been bestowed from on high upon

us, and that which has been bestowed upon Abraham and Ishmael and Isaac and

Jacob and their descendents, and that which has been vouchsafed by their

Sustainer unto Moses and Jesus and all the [other] prophets: we make no

distinction between any of them. And unto Him do we surrender ourselves ('lahu

muslimun').[9]

 

You could not be a muslim unless you also revered Moses and Jesus. True faith

required surrender to God, not to an established faith. Indeed, exclusive

loyalty to only one tradition could become 'shirk', an idolatry which puts a

human institution on the same level as God. This is one of the first passages

in the Qur'an to emphasize the words " islam " and " muslim, " which both derive

from the verb 'aslama': " surrendering oneself entirely to someone else's will. "

[10] (p.99) The verse continues:

 

For if one goes in search of a religion other than self-surrender (islam) unto

God, it will never be accepted from him, and in the life to come, he shall be

among the lost. [11]

 

This verse is often quoted to " prove " that the Qur'an claims that Islam is the

one, true faith and that only Muslims will be saved. But " Islam " was not yet the

official name for Muhammad's religion, and when this verse is read correctly in

its pluralistic context, it clearly means the opposite.

 

The Qur'an depicts one prophet handing on the revelation to another. The message

passes from Abraham to Ishmael and Isaac to Moses, and so on, in a continuous

narrative. The Qur'an is simply a " confirmation " of the previous scriptures,

[12] and the Torah, the Gospel, and the Qur'an are simply moments in God's

continuous self-disclosure: " Verily, those who have attained to faith [in this

divine writ], as well as those who follow the Jewish faith, and the Sabians,*

and the Christians--all who believe in God and the Last Day and do righteous

deeds--no fear need they have, and neither shall they grieve. " [13] There was no

thought of forcing everybody into the Muslim ummah [community]. (p.100) Each of

the revealed traditions had its own din, its own practices, and insights. " Unto

every one of you have We appointed a [different] law and way of life, " God told

Muhammad:

 

And if God had so willed, He could surely have made you all one single

community: but [He will it otherwise] in order to test you by means of what he

has vouchsafed unto you. Vie, then, with one another in doing good works! Unto

God you must all return; and then He will make you truly understand all that on

which you were wont to differ. [14]

 

God was not the exclusive property of one tradition, but was the source of all

human knowledge: " God is the light of the heavens and the earth, " Allah

explained in one of the most mystical verses in the Qur'an. The divine light

could not be confined to any individual lamp, but was common to them all,

enshrined in every one of them:

 

The parable (ayah) of this light is, as it were, that of a niche containing a

lamp; the lamp is [enclosed in glass], the glass [shining] like a radiant star:

[a lamp] lit from a blessed tree--an olive tree that is neither of the east nor

the west--the oil whereof [is so bright that it] would well-nigh give light [of

itself], even though fire had not touched it--light upon light. [15]

 

(p.101) The olive tree signifies the continuity of revelation, which springs

from one root but branches into a multitudinous variety of religious experience

that cannot be confined to a single faith or locality, and is neither of the

east nor of the west.

 

*The Sabians are thought to be a monotheistic sect in southern Arabia (modern

Yemen), though some commentators believe that the Qur'an refers here to the

Zoroastrians of the Persian empire.

 

Muhammad (Prophet For Our Time)

Chapter 3, 'Hijrah', p. 97-101

Karen Armstrong

Harper Perennial - London, New York, Toronto and Sydney

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

ISBN-10 0-00-723248-9

 

Notes:

 

[8] Ibn Ishaq, 'Sirat Rasul Allah', 271, in Guillaume, 'Life of Muhammad'.

 

[9] Qur'an 3:84, cf. 2:136, Asad translation.

 

[10] Toshihiko Izutsu, 'Ethico-Religious Concepts in the Qur'an' (Montreal and

Kingston, ON, 2002), 189.

 

[11] Qur'an 3:85, Asad translation.

 

[12] Qur'an 12:111.

 

[13] Qur'an 5:69, Asad translation.

 

[14] Qur'an 5:48, Asad translation.

 

[15] Qur'an 24:35, Asad translation.