Page:Khwaja Kamal-ud-Din - Ethics of War.djvu/17

 himself. This made him leave the place. Some few months before his emigration to Madina, he received the following revelation from Above:

"Permission (to fight) is given to those upon whom war is made because they are oppressed, and most surely Allah is well able to assist them"; "Those who have been expelled from their homes without a just cause except that they say: Our Lord is Allah …" (xxii. 39, 40).

This revelation was, in a way, a warning to the Muslims that they would soon be attacked by their enemies. Hardly one year had passed after the emigration of the Prophet to Madina when an army of a thousand mighty archers marched from Makka to crush down the new dispensation. The Prophet heard of it. He could not count on the people of Madina, with the exception of the few who had joined the ranks of Islam. With a small band of three hundred and thirteen, many of whom were young men in their teens, the Prophet left Madina to meet the coming army. The two forces met at Badr, some thirty miles from Madina. Most of the Makkan army