Download Historicity of Muhammad

Historicity of Muhammad
Since the biographies on the Prophet appeared much after his death and were based
on these traditions, the early twentieth century scholars working at that time considered them
suspect i. Their conclusions were subsequently investigated by a group of Soviet Islamologists
ii
who concluded that the life of Muhammad and that of his immediate successors are as
‘mythical’ as the accounts of Christ and the Apostles (discussed later) and that Islam was
merely an offshoot of Arianism (a Greek Christian doctrine) and that the Arian Islamites were
indistinguishable from the Jews until the impact of the Crusades made them assume a separate
identity. In fact some of them wondered if Muhammad was not a necessary fiction since every
‘historical’ religion must needs have a founder.
From the 1950s, Islamic studies received a further impetus under Schacht iii. His
conclusions were even more radical and disturbing. He proved that many Islamic traditions did
not exist at a particular time by showing, for example, that they were not used as a legal
argument in a discussion that would have made reference to them imperative, had these
traditions existed. He in fact concluded that every tradition allegedly traced back in time to the
Prophet must be considered inauthentic and the fictitious expression of a legal doctrine
formulated at a later date! Traditions introduced from around the time of the Successors (to
the Prophet) were offered as traditions from the time of the Companions (contemporaries of the
Prophet), and traditions from the time of the Companions to the Prophet were offered as
traditions practiced by the Prophet himself. Details from the life of the Prophet were invented
to support legal doctrines. He also showed that the beginnings of the Islamic law cannot be
traced further back in the Islamic tradition, than to about a century after the Prophet’s death.
Thus it did not directly derive from the Koran, but developed out of popular and administrative
practices under the Ummayads which diverged often from the intentions and even the explicit
wording of the Koran. The integration of the two was done at a later stage.
Many scholars were convinced of the essential soundness of Schacht’s analysis and developed
his thesis further. Wansbrough iv argued that the Koran and the hadith grew out of sectarian
controversies over the course of a long period and then were projected back in time onto an
invented Arabian point of origin. He felt that Islam emerged only when it came into contact
with rabbinical Judaism.
Historical research, however, indicates otherwise. Wansbrough showed that far from being
fixed in the seventh century, the definitive text of Koran had still not been achieved even as
late as the later part of the ninth century. Thus, a statement of Muslim creed, Fiqh Akbar I,
dated to the middle of eighth century, does not refer to the Koran at all, which is quite
surprising. The ninth century also saw the first collections of the ancient Arab poetry seeing the
light of day, in which too there are instances of manipulation, as alleged by some scholars.
Both have perhaps gone hand in hand with an attempt to prove the antiquity and sacredness of
the Arabic language and culture so that God could hand over the Koran in pure Arabic. Very
much influenced by rabbinic Judaism outside Arabia, the early Muslim community took Moses
as a model and Muhammad’s credentials as a prophet were gradually established in Moses’
likeness. The aim was to have a swadeshi prophet and a scripture in competition with the Jews
and Christians!
A group of scholars, Cook, Crone and Hinds v continuing the work of
Wansbrough, took an even more radical stand. They regarded the entire traditional Islamic
history down at least to the time of Abd al Malik (685-705 AD) as a later fabrication. As a
counter check, they studied the contemporary, neighbouring non-Muslim sources like the
Greek, Syrian and Armenian. A totally unexpected picture emerged, as a result. The only facts
they could confirm were that a merchant called Muhammad existed, that something significant
happened to him in 622 (the year of Hijra), and that Abraham was central to his teachings. But
there is no mention of Mecca, no indication that Muhammad’s career unfolded in inner Arabia
and no reference to the Koran until the last years of the seventh century. Also, the Muslims
prayed in a direction much further north than Mecca; hence their sanctuary could not have been
in Mecca. Also when the first Koranic quotations appeared on coins and inscriptions towards
the end of the seventh century, they showed divergence from the canonical texts. The earliest
Greek source speaks of Muhammad being alive in 634 AD, two years after his death as per the
accepted version of Islamic traditions. An Armenian chronicler of the 660s describes
Muhammad as establishing a community which comprised both Arabs and Jews with the aim
of conquering Palestine. The break with the Jews is placed immediately after the Arab
conquest of Jerusalem. The oldest Greek source makes the sensational statement that the
prophet who had appeared among the Arabs (Saracens) was proclaiming the coming of the
(Jewish) messiah, and speaks of the Jews who mix with the Arabs, and the danger to life and
limb by falling into the hands of these Jews and Arabs.
On the basis of available non Muslim evidence, Cook and Crone vi give a new
account of the rise of Islam. Muhammad told his Arab followers that as descendants of
Abraham through his first son, Ishmael, they too had a claim to the land God had promised to
Abraham and his seed. His message appeared as Judaic messianism which lead to intimacy
with Jews and marked hostility towards Christians. The Arabs soon quarrelled with the Jews
and their attitude softened towards Christians. But they yet had to develop a religious identity
and religious structures. Here they were influenced by Samaritan philosophy. The latter were
an offshoot of the Jews but they had a separate identity. They only accepted Pentateuch, the
first five books of the Old Testament and had a high regard for Moses. Under their influence,
the Arabs proceeded to pattern their faith after Moses as follows
Moses
Muhammad
Exodus
Hijra
Pentateuch
Koran
Mt. Sinai
Mt. Hira
Shechem
Mecca
Evidence Of Fabrication
1. There is no reference to Mecca in early non- Muslim references. Mecca was
supposed to be a very flourishing trading centre as it was on the trade route from South to
North Arabia (i.e. from India to Europe) when Muhammad was born, but Crone has shown that
geographically it does not fall on this natural trade route. In fact, the alignment of early
mosques and literary evidence of Christian sources, suggests that the direction in which the
early Muslims prayed was northwest Arabia. Mecca was chosen as a Muslim sanctuary much
later in order to relocate their history within Arabia, to complete their break with Judaism and
finally to establish their separate religious identity.
2. According to the traditions, Koran had many versions and Utthman destroyed
all but one. Similarly Hajjaj (661-714 AD), the governor of Iraq, had collected and destroyed
all the writings of the early Muslims
3. The Koran is strikingly lacking in overall structure. It appears to be a product
of hasty and imperfect editing of materials from a plurality of traditions
4. Many traditions in the Hadith appear to have been invented to explain the presence of some
passages in Koran. Seemingly precise data seems to have been cooked up to provide
authenticity. Thus the early historian, Ibn Ishaq (d. 768) was vague about many events,
whereas Waqidi (d. 823) gave precise dates and other details for the same events! If so much
spurious information had accumulated in two generations, it is hard to avoid the conclusion
that even more must have accumulated in the three generations between the Prophet and Ibn
Ishaq
i
Islamic History, A Framework for Inquiry, Humphreys, R. S., Princeton, 1991
Mohammedanism, Hurgronje Snouck, C., New York, 1916
ii Russia and Islam, Smirnov, N. A., London, 1934
iii An Introduction to Islamic Law, Schacht Joseph, Oxford, 1964
iv Quranic Studies, Wansbrough, J., Oxford, 1977
v Muhammad, Cook, M., Oxford, 1983
God’s Caliph, Crone P., and Hinds M.,Cambridge, 1986
vi Hagarism: The Making of the Muslim World, Crone P., and Cook, M., Cambridge, 1977