The Life of Mohammad Part 24

His ten thousand soldiers were joined by more than two thousand Makkans, lately converted, and impatient to prove their devotion and fervour. The effect produced by the army of the Believers was so imposing that a voice in the group of the Banu Bakr, it is said, cried out: 'Truly we need not fear defeat with such a big army!'

This exclamation of pride displeased the Prophet greatly, for vanity weakens endeavour and causes forgetfulness of the fact that victory is granted by Allah. Mohammad blamed the boastful cry in the most severe terms.

On the bank of a "wadi," the troops saw a big green tree, growing by itself, which the idolaters worshipped and looked upon with superst.i.tious awe. Beneath its shade, they sacrificed victims and, on its branches, they hung their weapons, imagining they would become invincible by this verdant contact. Several soldiers, their minds not yet sufficiently purified from the stain of fetich observances, longed to possess likewise a tree, "Dhat Anwat,"--"Carrier of Weapons"--and sent in a demand to the Apostle which made him very indignant.

'Your demand,' he replied, 'is just as abominable as that of the Banu-Isra'il, when saved by a miracle from Pharaoh's hosts and the waves of the sea, they asked Moses for an idol in human shape. Ye are a stupid "qawm" accustomed to adopt without reflecting the vilest custome of your neighbours!'

Quoth Jabir ibn Abdullah: "Shortly before daybreak, we reached the "wadi" of Hunain, at the entrance of an extremely narrow and deep defile. All of a sudden, while we were still in the black shadows of the lofty crags, the first rays of the sun, on the other side of of the pa.s.s, lit up a sight that made our hearts leap impatiently.

"Under the careless guard of a few sentinels, our enemies' tents were pitched in the plain. Between them, women and children pa.s.sed to and fro. Round the encampment, countless flocks of sheep and herds of camels were about to depart to pasture-land. Without waiting for the Prophet's orders, overwrought by the hope of plunder, we rush into the pa.s.s, so narrow that we were pressed together, shoulder to shoulder.

No sooner was the entire army in the defile, when a lengthy, whistling murmur was heard in the air and, like great swarms of locusts, clouds of arrows darkened the sky. The darts were showered on us, aimed from two ridges, overlooking the pa.s.s.... We had fallen into an ambush organised by cunning Durayd.

"In consequence of the sting of the arrows from which there was no escape, for not one was lost in the soil, all finding a target as they pierced with a hissing noise the flesh of men, horses and camels, mad terror overcame us. Indescribable panic was also caused by our foes, lying in wait, concealed at the egress of the pa.s.s and who, with savage shouts, charged into our ranks. Tugging at the bridles of our camels, we turned round, the poor beasts grunting gloomily and shaking their long necks bristling with arrows. In the inextricable confusion of their stampede and fright, they tripped each other up and rolled over on the ground with their riders, who were at once trampled on by fleeing comrades....

"Whilst the archers continued to distress us with their darts, we discovered that the entry into the pa.s.s was barricaded by another detachment of our enemies who had allowed us to ride through and now awaited our return. At their head was a soldier of the Hawazin, bestriding a gigantic red camel and he was signalling with a spear to which he had fixed a black flag. When a Believer pa.s.sed within reach, he lowered his lance to run him through, and perchance he missed, he signalled with his flag lifted again to those following him, and they pursued the Mussulman and put him to death."

The defeat seemed irretrievable. Already many of the Prophet's old enemies, their hearts still br.i.m.m.i.n.g with, rancour, began to gloat over the critical situation of the Mussulmans. 'Their flight will not cease until they reach the sea coast!' cried Abu Sufyan, who busied himself with consulting his divining arrows which he carried concealed in his quiver. 'Mohammad's sorcery is powerless this day!' exclaimed Kalada ibn Hanbal in his turn. But his brother Safwan, although not yet converted, silenced him with these words: 'May a gag close thy mouth!'

In the midst of general confusion, the Prophet alone was cool and collected. He posted himself on a low hill, to the right of the valley. 'I am the Prophet of Allah and no impostor!' he declared, and urging his mule forward, went to throw himself in the thick of the fight. Abu Bakr rushed in front of the animal and, seizing the bridle, held it back. To try and rally his troops, Mohammad ordered Abbas to shout: 'O Ansars and Mohadjirun, my companions! O ye who took their oath over there!' (at Al-Hudaibiyah). When, from the top of a rock, his stentorian voice carried the Prophet's cry to the fugitives, they were covered with great confusion. Regaining their self-control, they replied: 'We are here at thy service!'

But what was to be done to stem such a torrent of fleeing men and beasts, crowded together between the two vertical sides of the ravine?

The Faithful did their best to lash the camels, twisting their necks by pulling the bridle contrariwise. With great strides, the frightened animals kept on in their flight.... It was then that the warriors of Allah slung their shields round their necks and jumped out of the saddle, leaving their camels to go on alone. Unsheathing their swords, the soldiers turned back to begin fighting again.

The Prophet, standing up in his stirrups, saw with joy that the situation was changed, and when his gaze fell upon the countless warriors rushing into the brazier of the battle, he cried out: 'The furnace is alight!'

Ali, accompanied by an Ansar, resolved to put a stop to the exploits of the Bedouin of the Hawazin, proudly waving his spear adorned with the black flag. With one blow of his scimitar, Ali hamstrung the camel, and at the same moment, the Ansar brought down the Infidel by slicing his leg from the knee to the heel, putting an end to his misery as soon as he was flattened out on the ground.

Mad terror seized the idolaters when thinking they had crushed the Mussulmans, they resumed the offensive. It was now the Infidels' turn to give way.... Mohammad ordered his mule to lie down. The animal bent its knees until its belly rested on the ground. Then taking up a handful of dust, the Prophet, as he had done at Badr, threw it towards his enemies whose flight became a mad rout. It seemed as if they had been blinded by this dust and that their soldiers were dispersed exactly the same as these impalpable atoms....

"_Now hath Allah helped you in many battle-fields, and, on the day of Hunain, when ye prided yourselves on your numbers; but it availed you nothing; and the earth, with all its breadth, became too strait for you: then turned ye your backs in flight. * Then did Allah send down a spirit of tranquillity upon His Apostle, and upon the Faithful; and He sent down hosts which ye saw not and punished the Infidels._" (THE QUR'AN, IX, 25, 26.)

Harried by the sword during their retreat, Malik and the remains of his army managed to find safety in the fortified town of Taif.

Less lucky, Durayd, the Infidels' second leader, was unable to escape his fate. Ninety years of age and blind, he was unable to direct his camel when abandoned by his panic-stricken fellow-countrymen, and he fell into the hands of a mere lad, Rabi'a ibn Rafia. When he saw the litter in which reclined this celebrated warrior, paralysed by the infirmities of great age, the youth thought he had captured a woman.

He made the camel kneel, parted the hangings and was petrified at only finding an old man. Vexed and disappointed, he dealt Durayd a sabre-cut, but the aged fighter did not even seem to know that he had been struck. 'What sort of weapon hath thy mother placed in thy hands, O little vagabond?' he asked in accents of supreme scorn. 'Take my sabre, hanging from my camel's saddle. Lift the blade aloft and hit between the vertebrae of the back and those of the head. That was how I used to strike men down.'

Abashed at his first failure, Rabi'a followed this piece of advice and the famous warrior rolled dead in the dust.

Urged on by the spur of victory, the Prophet pursued the fugitives to the foot of the ramparts of Taif and tried to take the town. After a useless siege of twenty days, he preferred to give up all ideas of an attack in favour of other means, slower but more sure, and instead of invoking the wrath of the Divinity against the inhabitants, he said: 'O Allah! enlighten the people of Taif and inspire them with a desire to come to Thy Apostle of their own free will!'

Despite the disappointment of his troops, he retook the road to Makkah, camping at Al-Ji'rana where all the prisoners were collected, as well as all the booty to be divided.

When the Prophet arrived, a female captive, Ash-Shayma, of the Banu Sad, which was a fraction of the Hawazin, was struggling to escape from the brutality of the soldiery. On perceiving Mohammad, she cried out: 'O Prophet of Allah, I am thy foster-sister!'--'Prove it!'--'See the scar on my shoulder where thou didst bite me when I carried thee, a baby boy, on my back.'

The Prophet recognised the cicatrice. Much moved, he shed tears, spread his mantle on the ground, and asked Ash-Shayma to sit down on it. 'According to thy wish,' he said, 'thou wilt find generous friendship by my side; or thou canst return to thy tribe with all the gifts I'll lavish on thee.'--'Send me back to my people in the desert, O Prophet! Such is my sole desire.' Mohammad set her free, after having loaded her with presents.

A deputation of the Hawazin was presented to the Prophet, and Abu Sorada, an old man belonging to the division of the Banu Sa's, spoke in their name: 'O Prophet! among thy prisoners are thine aunts, sisters of the wet-nurses who suckled thee. As for the male captives, they were the companions of thy childhood--almost of thy race! In the great misfortune which crusheth us, we implore thee in the name of Allah! If, for the same reasons, we were forced to implore Al-Harith ibn Abi Chammar, or Nu'man ibnu'l Mundhir, they would surely take pity on us! Now thou art the best of nurslings!'--'Which do ye prefer: your families or your property?' asked Mohammad, scarcely able to hide his tender feelings.--' O Prophet! give our wives and children back to us.

We love them quite otherwise to our property.'--'I restore to you all male and female captives belonging to the Banui Muttalib,' declared Mohammad loudly.--'But those who are ours belong to the Apostle of Allah!' cried the Mohadjirun and the Ansars immediately. Thus all the prisoners, numbering about six thousand, were given up to the delegates of the Hawazin.

The family of Malik ibn Awf formed an exception to this ruling.

Mohammad, however, charged those he had just liberated to make him the following proposal: 'If Malik cometh to me and becometh a convert to Islam, I will give him back his property. Nay, more--I will make him a present of a hundred camels.'

Malik accepted. He left Taif secretly, and when converted, gave such tokens of sincerity, that the Prophet appointed him as commander over all the Mussulmans of the country. It was the best way to curb the resistance of the inhabitants of Taif.

And so it turned out indeed, for this able leader, proud of the invest.i.ture, at the head of troops stirred by faith, continued to war against the Saquifs. By pitilessly raiding their flocks and caravans, blocking them by hunger behind the ramparts of their city, he soon compelled them to come in their turn and implore the Prophet's mercy, when they were converted to Islam. The booty was considerable, consisting of about twenty-four thousand camels and forty thousand sheep. After the emotions of the affair of the prisoners, Mohammad resolved to postpone the division of the plunder until another day, and he mounted his she-camel. But his soldiers were so impatient to share the spoils that they followed and importuned him. By accident, they pushed his animal against a th.o.r.n.y shrub, and its branches tore the mantle of Allah's Chosen One. 'Now, you men, give me back my mantle!' he told them, and yielding to their entreaties, he returned to see the booty shared among them.

He tried, above all, to ingratiate himself definitively with the n.o.bles of the city, by favouring them in all ways; and afterwards, they were called "Al-mu'allafa qulubuhum," "those whose hearts have been won over." Abu Sufyan and Mu'awiya his son; Hakim ibn Hizam, An-Nadr ibn Al-Harith, Suhayl, Ikrimah Uyayna, Al-Ajra, and Safwan, all received fifty camels each. This difference of treatment gave rise to protestations. Ibn Mirdas manifested his dissatisfaction in a piece of poetry: 'My share of the booty and that of Al-Ubayd have been distributed to Oyama and Al-Ajra. And yet their fathers, Al-Hasan and Al-Habis, never took precedence of my father in any a.s.sembly whatsoever!'

The Prophet sent for him and asked: 'Hast thou composed these rhymes: "My share of the booty and that of Al-Ubayd have been distributed to Al-Ajra and Oyama?" changing the order of the two last names mentioned; without noticing that he had thus broken the metre. In the Qur'an, Allah says: "_We have not taught him (Mohammad) poetry._"

(x.x.xVI, 59.)

Abu Bakr pointed this out to him. 'No matter,' he replied. 'The meaning remaineth the same.' And he gave orders to "cut the poet's tongue" by granting him all he claimed.

An Arab of the Tamim tribe, Dhu'l Khuwaysira, dared to say to Allah's Messenger: 'Thou wert unjust in thy division.' Umar started up. 'I'll cut the throat of that insolent churl!' he shouted.--'Nay! let him go his own road,' was Mohammad's simple reply.

The Prophet was obliged to resort to most skilful political measures in order to spare all kinds of feelings during the division of these riches; and to prevent dangerous jealousy arising among his disciples.

All the spoils, nevertheless, were nearly all allotted and he seemed to have forgotten his devoted Ansars who, naturally, expected to rank among the first to be rewarded. With ever-increasing surprise, they saw no share offered to them and the rich bounty flowing into the hands of the Quraish and the Bedouins.

At last there was no more left to give away and the Ansars exchanged bitter remarks: 'By Allah, the Prophet thinketh only of his own people. Now that, thanks to us, he hath returned victorious to his birthplace, we are forgotten and neglected.'

Sa'd ibn Ubada, having heard these complaints, went and told Mohammad, who said: 'Good! Call the Ansars together!'

When they were mustered, the Prophet came before them. 'O a.s.sembly of the Ansars!' he said; 'I have been told about your talk and the sadness of your souls. Did I not seek you out when ye had been led astray? Hath not Allah led you all into the right path? Ye were unfortunate: hath not Allah made you happy? Each man was his brother's enemy: hath not Allah reconciled your hearts?'--'Truly!' they answered unanimously. 'Allah and His Apostle are the most compa.s.sionate and generous!'--'And on your part,' he added, 'did ye not welcome me with compa.s.sion and generosity when I was a homeless wanderer? Have ye not the right to say to me: "Thou wert branded as an impostor and we put faith in thee; thou wert east down and we helped thee to be victorious; thou wert poverty-stricken and we made thee rich?"'--'Nay, nay!' protested every man of the a.s.sembly. 'We are indebted to thee for everything and thou dost owe us nothing!'--'In that case,' he went on, 'O Ansar comrades! how could you let the least feeling of affection arise in your hearts concerning the fleeting riches of this world, with which I have endowed certain persons in order to strengthen their vacillating faith, whilst I knew that you were unshaken. Know ye not that these people will return to their homesteads with camels and sheep only, whilst ye will take the Prophet of Allah back with you to your dwellings?... By Him who holdeth Mohammad's soul in His hands, I swear that if the Arab tribes retired into one valley and the Ansars into another, I would follow into the valley of the Ansars. For me, the Ansars are as a shirt on the skin; and for me, the other tribes are as the mantle outside everything. O Allah, show mercy to the Ansars; to the sons of the Ansars; and to the children of their children!'

These words, which the Prophet was unable to utter without betraying intense emotion, mollified the entire a.s.sembly. Tears of grat.i.tude flowed from the eyes of the Ansars so abundantly that their beards were wetted. All cried out, sobs causing them to falter: 'Aye, verily, we accept our share of the booty, for the most beautiful portion is ours!'

[Ill.u.s.tration: (Calligraphy) _Now hath Allah helped you in many battle-fields, and, on the day of Hunain, when ye prided yourselves on your numbers; but it availed you nothing._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: (Ornamental page) CHAPTER THE EIGHTH]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _"Ad-da'wah" or the Invocation_]

[Ill.u.s.tration: (Calligraphy) _Accomplish the Pilgrimage and the Visitation of the Holy Places in honour of Allah._]

CHAPTER THE EIGHTH

[Sidenote: AYISHAH SLANDERED]

Quoth Ayishah: "During my return from the Mustaliq expedition, pressing need compelled me to alight from my Hawdaj, (a kind of litter carried on a camel's back). I found a lonely spot and stopped behind, waiting until all the soldiers had marched past. But seeing my camel halted, and thinking I was inside the hawdaj, they drove the animal forward to ensure it remaining in line with the rest.

"When I came back and found my camel gone, I shouted despairingly; but all in vain, until overcome by fatigue, I dropped down and fell asleep. One of the rearguards, Safwan Ibnu'l-Mu'attal, catching sight of me, recognised me and cried out: 'To Allah we belong and to Him shall we return!' Having awakened me by this exclamation, he brought up his camel, helping me into the saddle, and he led the animal by the bridle until we rejoined the Prophet."

Scandalmongers got hold of the story and ascribed shameful motives to this chance meeting. Despite the accused woman's protestations of innocence, Mohammad felt suspicion gnawing at his heart, and he kept Ayishah at a distance, greatly to the confusion of his father-in-law, Abu Bakr.