The
Compassionate, The Merciful Prophet!
By
Syed Kamran Mirza
The Prophet of Islam was a
most compassionate and most merciful human being without any
doubt. And
this is the most fundamental belief of 95% devout innocent
Muslims of the world. The
assertion by Qur’an confirms it even further: “Wammaa
arsalnaaka illaa rahmatal
lil- aalameen!(21:107).” [O Muhammad We sent you not, but
as a mercy for all creature.”
Allah asserted in clear words—He created Prophet
Muhammad as the mercy for not only just Muslims, but for all the
creatures of the earth.
Prophet of Islam was the true example of a perfect
(having all the best qualities) human being and Qur’an ordered
all human being to follow this prophet ‘in Toto’ without any
failure. As Muslims
we are required to accept and adhere to all of the teachings of
Prophet (sas). Allah
told us in the Qur’an-(8:24) :“
O you who believe ! Answer Allah (by obeying Him) and As His
Messenger (obeying him) when he calls you to that which will
give you life.”
Therefore, pious Muslims should follow Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)
in every aspect of earthly life.
Well, these are only some instructions from Almighty
Allah that I have mentioned in this essay.
But one could find many more Qur’anic verses and
Hadiths, which will instruct all most the same order again and
again. Let us
examine if the Prophet of Islam was really a mercy for all
creatures by some historical evidences below:
Readers have been fortunate
to get a rare chance of reading a written debate (posted in
series in NFB) between an Iranian Mullah Ayatollah Montazeri and
Dr. Ali Sina an Iranian progressive intellectual.
The debate discussion was focused on some historical true
stories directly related to our compassionate and merciful
Prophet of Islam. These
important stories were generated and recorded about some 7th
century happenings during the early propagation of Religion
Islam. These
happenings disclosed so much human cruelties that it is
unfathomable to understand to many including myself.
After I read this debate completely, I could not sleep
several nights, and still today I awake up with bad dream and
after that I could not sleep.
Because, those cruel episodes vividly described by
trenchant logic of the writer still hunts me after all these
years. After I
experienced this scenario, I thought I should share this with
some of my friends in North America.
So, I e-mailed this debate to my friends, all of them who
read it had the same feelings like me.
One senior retired professor in Canada wrote me: “this
debate broke my heart, I could not sleep for several nights, and
it has surely shattered my dream which I was harboring in my
heart for the last sixty some years. As a human being—I have
become completely naked. Especially, I could not understand why
and what for Prophet of Islam had to slaughter (beheading) some
900 hundreds of surrendered unarmed human beings in the war of
Banu Qurayza. I can not imagine what was the actual scenery of
that cruel episode? And
I will never understand how the Prophet named this religion
as—religion of peace?”
Dear readers, I have the
same question—how is Islam called a religion of PEACE???
Please help me out to understand the very philosophy of
killing unarmed/surrendered fellow human beings?
Could any defender of Islam tell me exactly how it was
justified for the compassionate Prophet to slaughter these 900
human beings called Jews—only because they refused to accept
his brand of religion?
Let
Us Compare Similar War Situation:
Consider this scenario of
1971 war of independence for Bangladesh.
About 90,000 (Ninety Thousand) Pakistani soldiers were
surrendered unconditionally to the joint force of Mukti
Bahini and Indian Army. These Pak soldiers committed
enormous atrocities, killed about 3 millions of unarmed
Bangalees, raped approximately an astounding 300,000 thousands
Bangalee women, destroyed and burned billion dollars worth of
properties of Bangladeshi citizens.
What would happen if the Merciful force of Mukti
Bahini did follow the foot prints of our merciful prophet?
What would be the scenario if the joint force did
slaughter all 90,000 Pakistani soldiers, enslaved their women
and children, distributed wives and daughters of those Pakistani
soldiers among the valiant Bangalee freedom fighters as the
captives to share their (Muktis) beds, and distributed all of
their wealth among those valiant, dedicated Muktijuddha
and Indian Army as a booty???
What would be the reaction of the civilized world to
these heinous and barbaric actions of the joint force of
Bangladesh??? Well,
my dear readers—it was exactly what was done in the war of
Banu Qurayza by our compassionate Prophet, and of course,
everything was done as per the wish of most merciful Allah.
Horrendous
Episodes in Medina:
(a) Allow me to take the
readers to the Medina to observe a horrific scene happened in
the 7th century period.
Dear readers, please close your eyes and imagine this!
Islamic heroes (energized by the dreams of Islamic
heaven) were taking one after another all those 900 (Nine
hundred) unconditionally surrendered Jews of Banu Qurayza tying
theirs both hands with their necks and were beheading those Jews
near the trench dug in the Bazar of Medina?
History also tells us that our compassionate Prophet of
Islam himself participated in digging trench to bury those
beheaded Jews and he himself beheaded at least two of the
leading Jews. What
was the scenario prevailed among those unfortunate wives and
children of surrendered Jews?
How those women and children probably felt about this
episode? How did
they cope with this horrendous episode?
What was their crime, or should I say, how serious was
their crimes compared to the crimes committed by Pakistani
soldiers? Those
Jews did not accept prophet Muhammad’s new religion, and
that’s it. May be
they insulted, or even harmed prophet by their conspiracy or
they may have broken any peace treaty.
Were these crimes anyway justified their summary
execution by beheading??? How
merciful and compassionate action was this?
Can anybody please tell me how in the world the religion
Islam was named as religion of peace?
(b) Think about this again.
Think about that young Jewish widow Safiyya one more time
please! This young
and beautiful 17 year old newly wed Jewish young lady was among
those captured women and children at the war of Kaybar.
She was the daughter of the leader of Bani Nadir Huyay
Ibne Aqtab. Her father was executed by the Prophet, and she just
lost her brother, husband and all other male relatives in that
war. She was soaked
with profound grief by this great tragedy and was weeping with
endless tears. But
so what? Because of
her paragon beauty—she was already selected as the booty
(spoils) for the compassionate Prophet.
The Prophet has had sex with this young Safiyya on their
way back to Medina on the same night in the tent. Of course,
according to some Sahi Hadiths, prophet asked for sex the same
day but she did not allow because of her menstruation period and
on the second day prophet has had married her and consummated
her on the way back to medina.
Whatever is true, it was for sure that Prophet asked for
sex with Safiyya in a period when that poor Safiyya was in
terrible grief by loosing her father, brother, husband and
relatives and before the blood of her relatives was even dry.
By what yardstick can we measure the mercifulness and
compassionateness of our Prophet?
Could any Islamist tell me why our prophet had to set
this terrible example?
Banu
Qurayza’s Massacre supported by Merciful Allah:
Allah
of Islam emphatically encouraged Muslims to kill and to take
women and properties of the prisoners as booty (Ganimatter
Maal). He (Allah) made Ganimater Maal Halal for Muslim
warriors. One can
find all those tempting verses of Sura
Anf’al (8:1,41,69) from Allah (?) inviting Muslims to
enjoy booty sanctioned for them.
8:69—“But
(now) enjoy what ye took in war (booty), lawful and good; but
fear God…” (Allah encouraging Muslims to accept
booty spoils of war “Maal-E-Ganimat”)
8:67—“It
is not fitting for an Apostle that he should have prisoners of
war until He thoroughly subdued the land….” (Allah
insisting Prophet to kill all the prisoners, and should not keep
any prisoners alive)
8:17—It
is not ye who Slew them; it is God; when thou threwest a handful
of dust, it was not Thy act, but God’s…..”
Sura-47:4—“when
you meet the unbelievers, strike off their heads; then when you
have made
wide Slaughter among them, carefully tie up the remaining
captives”
Readers,
please note—Allah of Islam was taking all the blames of
killings Himself, yet encouraging to kill those prisoners of
war. Why did
Allah the Almighty could not either correct, or kill those
disobedient people by his Angel of Death???
Well, many can have doubts
about the authenticity of the happenings in the war of Banu
Quryza as we have learned from the debate of Dr. Ali Sina and
Ayatollah Montazeri. To
verify the truth of the matter—I have checked some Sahi
Hadiths translated by Maulana Mustafizur Rahman (which is the
selected Hadiths book in Madrassha Curriculum in Bangladesh).
There are plenty of Sahi Hadiths about all those
scenarios of Banu Qurayza war, but I will cite only two related
Hadiths here:
Sahi
Buchari Hadiths #143, page-700 : Sulaiman
Ibne Harb…Aannas Ibne Malek (ra) narrated,
“in the war of Khaiber after the inhabitants of Banu
Qurayza was surrendered, Allah’s
apostle killed all the able/adult men,
and he (prophet) took all women and children as captives
(Ghani mateer maal)..
Among the captives Safiyya Bint Huyy Akhtab was taken by
Allah’s Apostle as booty whom He married after freeing her and
her freedom was her Mahr.”
Sahi
Buchari Hadiths (#149, page-704): Ahmed
Ibne Saleh…Annas Ibne Malek narrated,
“….when we told Apostle of Allah about the paragon
beauty of Safiya Bint Huyay (who was newly wed and the husband
was killed in the battle), then
Allah’s Apostle sanctioned her for himself…”
Above two Hadiths clearly
and undoubtedly have confirmed at least two things: (1) Prophet
killed all those surrendered unarmed Jews in cold blood (Thanda
Mathai), (2) Prophet was attracted by Safiyya’s alluring
beauty and he had sex with her (I don’t care after marriage or
before marriage).
More
proofs According to “Sirat A, Rasul” (page 464):
“Then
they surrendered, and the apostle confined them in Medina in the
quarter of al-Harith, a woman of B. al-Najjar. Then the apostle
went out to the market of Medina (which is still its market
today) and dug trenches in it. Then he sent for them and struck
off their heads in those trenches as they were brought out to
him in batches. This went on until the apostle made an end of
them. Among them was the enemy of Allah Huyayy b. Akhtab and
Ka`b b. Asad their chief, and they were
brought with their hands bound to their neck by a rope.
There were 600 or 700 in all, though some put the figure as high
as 800 or 900. Apparently
Muhammad himself worked on the digging of the trench into which
the massacred Jews were to be thrown. But he did not only take
part in those preparations, the formulation of the text states
that HE sent for them and STRUCK OFF their heads. This sounds
like he personally struck off at least the heads of those two
mentioned men and may be of more.
We need to recognize that Muhammad got rid of a
large group that was challenging his sole authority and power
over Medina, and which was in particular refusing to believe him
to a true prophet from God. The elimination of the challenge to
his spiritual authority might well have been Muhammad's main
motivation. However, Muhammad also had had huge spoils (Maal-E-Ganimat)
from this "final solution".
Prophet
Muhammad positive reaction to Judgement (Sirat page-464):
The judgment over the Banu
Quraiza was given by famous Jew hating soldier of Islam named,
Sa`d bin. Mu`adh who was seriously wounded in that war and was
dying. This Jew hating fellow gave his judgement: “Then
I give the judgment that the men should be killed, the property
divided, and the women and children be taken captives.
Compassionate Prophet
Muhammad answers in endorsement of this: “You
have given the judgement of Allah above the seven heavens...”.
Readers should not compare
these killings (of 900 unarmed men) with any other killings in
the war. I mean nobody should consider this as a war casualty.
These Jews of Banu Qurayza were not killed at the war.
Thousands of people could be killed in the battle by theirs
direct involvement. But
in this case, those prisoners were unarmed and surrendered
unconditionally. These
surrendered Jews were brought to the market of Medina by tying
their hands and were unarmed.
They were then slaughtered in cold blood with a vested
purpose and interest. Prophet
of “Peace” could have easily let them go away (exiled) from
that land. As a
holy prophet (?) he could sanction clemency to let them leave
Arabia for some other destination.
But he did not consider this an alternative.
Therefore, how can we judge his character? Would you
label this man as “Shanti’r
Protik” (Epitome of Peace), which is what we are led to
believe by not only half-educated Mullahs in Islamic world but
by Islamic Intellectuals who are now living in obscure part of
America and those who are busily offering Khutba
in the Jumma prayer
in various Mosques in urban area of America.
Some
questions to ponder:
As we have read at the
beginning of this article—Allah has asserted that the Prophet
has been sent as the mercy for all creatures and Allah also
asked emphatically to follow every footstep of Prophet
(Quran-8:24), should not all human being of this planet earth
follow him in toto?
How about the assertion of our Islamists by saying, “Islam
is the code of life?"
If this world starts to follow the footprints of the
Prophet of Allah and do the job exactly like Prophet did in Banu
Qurayza, how good will it look?
What are the minimum standards of UN Chartered for POW?
How could this be compared with the code of principle
that was set by the most compassionate prophet of Allah?
What is the difference between Prophet Muhammad and
Hitler, Genghis Khan or any other warlords?
Is that why, Muslims are required to write/utter the
phrase “peace be upon him” every time they write or
utter Prophet’s name?
------------------
Syed Kamran
Mirza writes from Virginia [email protected]
|