Main Body
Chapter 1: Primary Sources on the Life of Muhammad
As is the case with the histories of the founders of most major religions, there has been plenty of debate among historians over the biography of the Prophet Muhammad. On the one hand, biographies and stories exist about the prophet that include extensive details regarding his personal life, his family, and his earliest followers, including topics such as what he looked like, what foods he liked to eat, and his daily personal habits. The problem is that most of these stories were passed down orally for several generations before being committed to writing 150-200 years after the Prophet’s death. There are also indications that many of the stories about Muhammad’s life, which circulated through the Muslim world in the first few centuries after his death, were fabricated.
In Kathryn Walbert’s discussion about primary sources, which you read in Week One, she defines a primary source as one that was “created during the historical period that you are studying.” Primary sources include “documents, objects, and other sources that provide us with a first-hand account of what life was like in the past.” On the other hand, “Secondary sources are written after the fact and can use many primary sources at once to develop an author’s analysis or interpretation of the past.”
By this definition, there are very few primary sources that date back to the life of the Prophet Muhammad. The documents most commonly viewed by historians as being primary sources for his life are the Qur’an (the Islamic holy book) and the Constitution of Medina. However, some historians even challenge the idea that these sources actually date back to the time of Muhammad.
The Qur’an is the Islamic holy book, believed by Muslims to have been dictated directly to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel over a twenty two year period, from roughly 610-632 CE. It consists of 114 chapters (suras), some of which are identified as having been revealed to the prophet in his hometown of Mecca, while others are asserted to have been proclaimed in the city of Medina. Muhammad initially received his revelations when he was about forty years old and was living in Mecca. He began proclaiming his message to his community around 610 CE, obtaining a number of followers but also encountering opposition from the leaders of his tribe (the Quraysh). The Quraysh profited from the idolatry practiced at a nearby shrine known as the Kaaba, which they oversaw. Muhammad, however, denounced the idols as false gods and called the people to worship the one true God (Allah). The prophet and his followers are believed to have fled to Medina to escape persecution in 622 CE, in a trip known as the hijra.
The format of the majority of the Qur’an presents Allah as speaking in the first person to Muhammad (and through him to his followers). This style is similar to that of Biblical prophets such as Isaiah or Jeremiah (i.e. “Thus says the Lord”). The Qur’an references a number of past prophets, both Biblical and non-Biblical, who are viewed as predecessors to Muhammad, having received similar messages to the ones he received from the same God. The material in the suras often appears to be somewhat randomly connected, and the Qur’an does not use the narrative style encountered in large portions of the Bible. Rather, it is poetic in its style, preferring to draw on short stories from the lives of various prophets to illustrate its points. These stories are scattered throughout the pages of the Qur’an in a seemingly haphazard manner, with the main theme being that Allah has sent messengers throughout human history to call upon men and women to turn from worshiping idols to worship and serve the one true God.
Since this is the case, how much can we learn about the prophet Muhammad from the Qur’an? Muhammad is not the subject of the Qur’an and there is no narrative history of his life to be found in the Islamic holy book. In fact, Muhammad is mentioned by name only five times in the Qur’an (although he is referred to indirectly much more often). By contrast, the Qur’an mentions Moses by name 136 times and Jesus 78 times. Of course, assuming the Qur’an actually does date back to Muhammad, one can learn many things about him even without a narrative story of his life, especially in regards to the message that he preached. The linked text below (Qur’anic Excerpts) includes seven suras, some of which are identified as Medinan suras (“Madani” in the text) and other as Meccan suras (Makki). Your assignment is to read through these suras and identify what things you can learn about the prophet from their text.
