Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/579

Rh MOHAMMED.] Tradition has it that be found comfort in the fact that at least the Jinns listened to him as by the way he chanted the Koran in the sacred grove of Nakhla. 1 In the present circumstances it was now impossible for him to return into the town, after having openly announced his intention of breaking with it and joining another community. He did not venture to do so until, after lengthened negotiations, he had assured himself of the protection of a leading citizen, Mot im b. Adi. Notwithstanding all that had happened, he resolved, two months after the death of Khadija, to enter upon a second marriage with Sauda bint Zam a, the widow of an Abyssinian emigrant. Chance soon afterwards brought to pass what fore thought (on his journey to TAif) had failed to accomplish. After having given up the Meccans, Mohammed was wont to seek interviews with the Arabs who came to Mecca, Majanna, Dhu 1-Majaz, and OkAz, for the purpose of taking part in the feasts and fairs, and to preach to them. 2 On one such occasion, in the third year before the Flight The men (A.D. 619-620), he fell in with a small company of citizens of Me- of Medina, who to his delight did not ridicule him, as was dma. usually the case, but showed both aptness to understand and willingness to receive his doctrines. For this they had been previously prepared, alike by their daily inter course with the numerous Jews who lived in confederation with them in their town and neighbourhood, and by the connections which they had with the Nabatseans and Christian Arabs of the north. Hanifitism was remarkably widely diffused among them, and at the same time there were movements of expectation of a new religion, perhaps even of an Arabian Messiah, who should found it. Medina was the proper soil for Mohammed s activity. It is singular that he owed such a discovery to accident. He entered into closer relations with the pilgrims who had come from thence, and asked them to try to find out whether there was any likelihood of his being received in their town. They promised to do so, and to let him hear from them in the following year. At the pilgrim feast of next year, accordingly, twelve citizens of Medina had a meeting with Mohammed, 3 and gave him their pledge to have no god but Allah, to with hold their hands from what was not their own, to flee for nication, not to kill new-born infants, to shun slander, and to obey God s messenger as far as was fairly to be asked. 4 First This is the so-called First Homage on the Akaba, 5 The Homage twelve men now returned, as propagandists of Islam, to of the success of their efforts at the same place on the following year. One of the Meccan Moslems, Mos ab b. Omair, was sent along with or after them, in order to teach the people of Medina to read the Koran, and instruct them in the doctrines and practices of Islam. Islam spread very quickly on the new soil. It is easy to understand how his joy strengthened the Prophet s spirit to try a higher flight. As a symptom of his exalted frame we might well regard his famous night-journey to Jerusalem (sur. xvii. 1 ; vi. 2), if we could be sure that it 1 Sur. xlvi. 28 ; Ixxii. 1. On the impossibility of historically fixing the date of this occurrence see Noldeke, op. cit., p. 101. 2 Muir (ii. 181 sq. ) assumes, with good reason, that he had already done so during the time when he was living in the Shi b Abi Talib, and assigns to this period the story that Abu Lahab followed him in this in order to counteract his preaching, and sow tares among the wheat. 3 Sprenger (ii. 526) identifies this meeting with the first, which tra dition distinguishes from it and places a year earlier. He is probably right. 4 Afterwards this was called the women s oath. It is a noteworthy summary of the features by which Islam is distinguished from heathenism. 5 On the Akaba compare Vakidi, pp. 417, 427, 429. It was a station between Arafa and Mind. 551 belonged to this period. 6 The prophecy also of the final triumph of the Romans over the Persians (contained in sur. xxx. 1 sqg.) might very well pass for an expression of his own assurance of victory, as at that time he still had a feeling of solidarity with the Christians. But the prophecy (the only one contained in the Koran) belongs, it would appear, to a much earlier date. 7 At the Meccan festival of the last year before the Flight (in March 622) there presented themselves among the pil grims from Medina seventy-three men and two women who had been converted to Islam. In the night after the day of the sacrifice they again had an interview with the Prophet on the Akaba ; Al- Abbds, his uncle, who after Abu TAlib s death had become head of the Banu Hashim, was also Second present. This is the so-called Second Homage on the Homage. Akaba, at which Mohammed s emigration to Medina was definitely settled. Al- Abbas solemnly transferred his nephew from under his own protection to that of the men from Medina, after these had promised a faithful discharge of the duties this involved. They swore to the Prophet to guard him against all that they guarded their wives and children from. He, on the other hand, promised thence forward to consider himself wholly as one of themselves, and to adhere to their society. According to the tradition this remarkable scene was brought to a close by a sudden noise. The Meccans soon got wind of the affair, notwithstand ing the secrecy with which it had been gone about, but Ibn Obay, the leader of the Medina pilgrim caravan, whom they questioned next morning, was able with good con science to declare that he knew nothing at all about it, as, being still a heathen, he had not been taken into the con fidence of his Moslem comrades, and he had not observed their absence over night. The Meccans did not gain certainty as to what had occurred, until the men of Medina had left. They set out after them, but by this they gained nothing. They next tried, it is said, violently to prevent their own Moslems from migrating. After a considerable pause, they renewed the persecution of the adherents of the Prophet, compelling some to apostasy, and shutting up others in prison. But the measures they adopted were in no case effective, and at best served only to precipitate the crisis. A few days after the homage on the Akaba, Mohammed issued to his followers the formal command to emigrate. In the first month of the first year of theTheemi- Flight (April 622) the emigration began; within two& ration - months some 150 persons had reached Medina. Apart from slaves, only a few were kept behind in Mecca. 8 Mohammed himself remained to the last in Mecca, in the company of Abubekr and All. His reason for doing so is as obscure as the cause of his sudden flight. The explana tion offered of the latter is a plan laid by the Meccans for his assassination, in consequence of which he secretly withdrew along with Abubekr. For two or three days the two friends hid themselves in a cave of Mount Thaur, south from Mecca, till the pursuit should have passed over (sur. ix. 40). They then took the northward road and arrived safely in Medina on the 12th of Rabf of the first year of the Flight. 9 Meanwhile, All remained three 6 See Muir, ii. 219 sqq. ; Sprenger, ii. 527 sqq. ; and on the other side, Noldeke, Koran, p. 102. The masrd was afterwards called mi rdj (ascension), and, originally represented as a vision, came to be regarded as an objective though instantaneous occurrence. 7 See on the one hand Muir (ii. 223 sqq.) and Spreuger (ii. 527 sqq.), and on the other Noldeke (Qoran, p. 102 ; Tabari, p. 298). The manner in which Sprenger seeks to make the prophecy a vaticinium ex evcntu is unfair. 8 Ibn Hisham, pp. 315 sq., 319 sq. 9 The 12th of Rabf is, according to tradition, the Prophet s birth day, the day of his arrival in Medina, and the day of his death. It is certain that he died at mid-day on Monday the 12th of Rabf, but
 * Akaba. ^ e ^ r h mes with the injunction to let their master hear