The Prophet Mohammad’s (PBUH) Sermon Near the Mount

A Story by Twisted Bean

A brief exploration of the birth of Islam.

In his farewell sermon in the Uranah Valley of Mount Arafat, Mohammad (Peace Be Upon Him) was not only acting as a religious leader, endorsing faithful adherence to Islam, but also as a subtle statesman, ensuring economic prosperity. He used the most reliable, motivational tool at his disposal to promote prosperity in Arabia: religious fervor. Mohammad’s (PBUH) sermon signaled Islam’s transition from a war-centric religion to a relatively inclusive faith that spawned such economically successful empires as the Abbasid Caliphate and the Ottomans.

Pre-Islamic Arabia completely lacked higher-level political organization. One's first loyalty was to the family or tribe, instead of the state or country. In the seventh century, "with the exception of Yemen in the southwest, no part of the Arabian Peninsula had any government at any time, and the Arabs never acknowledged any authority other than the authority of the chiefs of their tribes" (Arabia before Islam). As a result of this small-scale world view, "tribes dissipated all their energies in tribal guerrilla fighting, all against all" (Grunebaum). Merchants, in particular, were affected by this situation, as, without a strong central government, each tribe was free to impose its own taxes upon traveling caravans, leading to exorbitant prices for luxury goods. In lieu of national laws, "the only protection for a man's life was the certainty established by custom ... The vendetta, tha'r in Arabic, is one of the pillars of Bedouin society" (Rodinson), and it led to blood feuds of varying degrees. As these feuds were ingrained in Bedouin culture, each new generation of Arabians was societally obligated to carry on the warfare of their predecessors, preventing the development of large-scale tribal alliances and a Bedouin Arabian state.

Mohammad (PBUH) specifically structured Islam in a way that prepared Arabia for a place on the world stage. He outlawed blood feuds and tribal warfare, stating "never is it for a believer to kill a believer except by mistake" (Quran 4:92). The hajj forced Muslim governments to protect roads for pilgrims and transformed Mecca into a center for learning and trade. He raised the living standards of the poor through the zakat, a mandatory 10% tithe on all income. He empowered women to keep their dowries after a divorce. He raised general health standards by mandating ritual hand and foot cleansing before prayer and by outlawing touching food with the usually dirty left hand. Mohammad (PBUH) (or the God that inspired him) was, primarily, a pragmatist and brilliant economist. Whether he designed Islam intentionally, or he was divinely inspired to do so, the result is the same - he knew what was best for the future of the faith and the people of Arabia. (Hussain)

In the sermon near Mount Arafat, Mohammad (PBUH) tried to shape the disparate Arabian tribes into a nation. After praising Allah and performing the normal formalities of a religious leader, he decreed that "every right arising out of homicide in pre-Islamic days is henceforth waived and the first such right that I waive is that arising from the murder of Rabi`ah ibn al Harith ibn `Abd al-Muttalib," (Sahih Muslim) a companion who had been killed in the earlier battle of Hunayn. By phrasing his command as a religious one and taking advantage of his audience's exhilaration from their recent battles, Mohammad (PBUH) convinced the tribal Arabs to discard the aspect of their culture (vendetta killings) that had prevented regional peace for generations. This command also set a precedent for Mohammad (PBUH) acting as a judge and lawmaker, a moral authority for his followers - a vital trait for the head of a faith.

However, some of his teachings, like not touching food with one's left hand, were only applicable to the prophet's (PBUH) contemporary times. Thus, in order to ensure the well-being of his people and Islam, Mohammad (PBUH) decreed, "do not write down anything from me except the Quran. Whoever wrote other than that should delete it." (Sahih Muslim, Book 42, Number 7147). While this can be interpreted as Mohammad (PBUH) trying to keep his personal views out of the divinely-inspired Quran, it can also be seen as a direct attempt to make Islam more dynamic, changing its interpretive comments over time, and accessible to outsiders, relying only on the inspired wisdom of the Quran and not the situationally specific commentary of Mohammed (PBUM). Many of the tenets in the Hadith are, to an outsider, alien. Keeping the Quran simple and clean ensured that Islam’s main tenets reached converts while adapting to the environments to which it spread. As seen with the Puritans in late Medieval Europe or Zoroastrian failure in Mesopotamia, rigid religions tend to fall. By contrast, as seen in the early development of Christianity and Hinduism, flexible faiths thrive and easily attract converts.

In the Jewish faith, rabbis use two separate versions of the Torah: the written version, the verbatim word of God, and the oral law, an explanatory text which explains the written word. This oral version, by virtue of its medium, changed and adapted over time as needed, allowing it to be more applicable to changing technological and social pressures. However, in the 3rd and 4th centuries CE, these oral traditions were in danger of disappearing due to the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. The rabbi Judah HaNasi compiled the oral teachings into texts, the Mishnah and Gemara, to prevent their loss. Thus, the most "traditional" sect of Jews, the Orthodox, still follow traditions from the 3^rd and 4^th centuries. Islam developed along similar lines. After the Hadith were codified in the 10th century or so, Mohammed’s (PBUH) sayings became set in stone, and Islam become too rigid to cope with technological and social progress. Followers of Islam could not compete with the more technologically flexible Europeans when the First World War occurred. If Mohammad's (PBUH) wishes had been kept, and his sayings would have been kept orally, changing from speaker to speaker, adapting to each country in which Islam spread, the Ottomans would have been a great deal more prepared for European invaders than they historically were.

Mohammad’s (PBUH) speech pushed Islam even further in the direction of global viability by emphasizing the need for liberalism and acceptance in Arabian culture. He reasoned that because “all mankind is from Adam and Eve, an Arab has no superiority over a non-Arab nor a non-Arab has any superiority over an Arab; also a white has no superiority over a black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action” (Sahih Muslim). By encouraging the development of Islam into a peaceful faith, he also encouraged foreign trade and internal commerce, which over time, contributes far more to national success than constant expansion (as demonstrated by the Late Roman Empire, which collapsed under its own size).

During the early years of Islam, when the religion’s adherents were comprised of Mohammad’s (PBUH) family and converts from Medina, Mohammad (PBUH) had adopted a warlike stance, telling his followers to “fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them, take them captive, harass them, lie in wait and ambush them using every stratagem of war” (Quran:9:5) and to “fight them until there is no more Fitnah [disbelief] and all submit to the religion of Allah alone” (Quran:8:39). But this was not a sign of instability or radicalism on the part of the prophet (PBUH) �" it was a stance calculated to quickly attract converts. Because Muslims numbered few in Arabia, religious fervor and the potential for pillaging and gold were the only viable way to attract adherents to Islam who could combat the surrounding tribes. By supporting radical ideals, the prophet (PBUH) was able to quickly incorporate disparate disenfranchised groups into his religion. This allowed Islam to grow large enough to repel advances from competing tribes and belief systems.

However, the dualism of the Muslim mindset (including both doctrine authorizing violent, bigoted expansion and doctrine that mandated peaceful commerce and tolerance) set the stage for manipulation of the faith by radicals. Mohammad’s (PBUH) early conquests created a precedent for Muslim leaders heading armies of religious fanatics against heathens. Mohammad appears to have understood this dichotomy. He tried to stem the tendency to radicalism and religion-sanctioned violent expansion by declaring that “no prophet or messenger will come after me and no new faith will be born … I am leaving you with the Book of God (the Quran) and my Sunnah (the life style and the behavioral mode of the Prophet), [and] if you follow them you will never go astray.” Mohammad (PBUH) closed the book of Islam, preventing other future religious leaders from doctoring his message. This did work, in a fashion. Mohammed’s injunction that he was the last prophet prevented large-scale revisions to Islam, such as was done to Judaism by Jesus and to Christianity by Joseph Smith. However, his call for peace and tolerance could not erase the early history of Islam, which led to many future wars and attacks that were rationalized as part of God’s will.

Mohammad’s (PBUH) farewell sermon was an attempt to save Islam from its own violent past. But despite his best efforts and high hopes for his followers, the prophet’s (PBUH) precedent for religious war provided a path to empire too easy and too simple to be ignored. The Abbasids and Ottomans followed similar patterns to Mohammad’s (PBUH) progression of Islam. For their first hundred to two hundred years, they flourished under the command of religiously-affiliated rulers. Their single-minded religious fervor allowed them to expand at astonishing rates, conquer vast stretches of land, and dominate their opponents. Then, during their golden ages (from 850 to 1258 for the Abbasids, and from the 1450s to the 1560s for the Ottomans), they adopted progressive economic policies and invited trade. Finally, in their later days, as traditionalism prevented social change, they fell to xenophobia, stagnation, and external invasion, unable to adapt to more flexible cultures. In modern times, Islam’s structure has given it a terrible public image. Despite the prophet’s (PBUH) many peaceful sayings and edicts near the end of his career, radical terrorists have taken the sayings of his earlier conquests out of context to justify their personal wars. In events ranging from the September 11 attacks to the attempted train hijacking in France earlier this year, Islam has been misused and mutated into a monster and a vehicle for terror. The prophet (PBUH) would be outraged.

Works Cited

Al-Ḥajjāj, Muslim Ibn. Sahih Muslim. N.p.: n.p., 1962. Print.

"Arabia before Islam." Al-Islam.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Sept. 2015. .

Ganeri, Anita. The Quran. London: Evans, 2002. Print.

Grunebaum, G. E. Von. Classical Islam: A History, 600 A.D. to 1258 A.D. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1970. Print.

Hussain, Musharraf. Five Pillars: Laying the Foundations of Divine Love and Service to Humanity. Markfield: Kube, 2011. Print.

Rodinson, Maxime. Mohammed. New York: Pantheon, 1971. Print.