500+ Words Essay on Prophet Muhammad
Abu al-Qasim Muhammad (briefly Muhammad) was a religious, political, and military leader from Mecca who unified Arabia into a single religious polity under Islam. The name, Muhammad, means ‘praiseworthy’. He is the last prophet sent by Allah for mankind.
Muhammad was born in the Arabian city of Mecca in about 570 CE. His father, Abdullah, died almost six months before Muhammad was born. According to some Islamic traditions, soon after Muhammad’s birth, he was sent to a Bedouin family in the desert, as it was considered healthier for infants. He stayed there with his foster mother and her husband for two years. Then he came back to his home, and at the age of six, he lost his own mother Amina and became fully orphaned. For the next two years, he was under the guardianship of his grandfather. When he was eight, his grandfather also died, and he came under the care of his uncle Abu Talib. While still in his teens, Muhammad accompanied his uncle on trading journeys to Syria.
During his later youth, he worked mostly as a merchant, as well as a shepherd. At the age of 25, he first married Khadijah, a 40-year-old widow, which was by all accounts a happy marriage. Subsequently, he had 12 other wives. He lived in Mecca for roughly the first 52 years of his life. This period is generally divided into two phases, before and after declaring the prophecy.
In the first phase, he was in the habit of periodically retreating to a cave on Mount Hira near Mecca for several nights of seclusion and prayer. He later reported that it was there, at age 40, he received his first revelation from God. During one of his visits to Mount Hira, the angel Gabriel appeared to him and commanded Muhammad to recite verses which would later be included in the Quran. Three years after this event, Muhammad started preaching these revelations publicly, proclaiming that ‘God is one’, that complete surrender to Him is the only way acceptable to God, and that he himself was a prophet and messenger of God. According to Muslim tradition, Muhammad’s wife Khadijah was the first to believe he was a prophet. But the opposition started when Muhammad delivered verses publicly condemning idol worship and the Meccan forefathers engaged in polytheism.
Islamic tradition relates that in 620 CE, Muhammad experienced the Isra and Mi’raj, a miraculous journey with the angel Gabriel in one night. The oldest Muslim tradition identified the journey as one travelled through the heavens from the sacred enclosure at Mecca to the celestial prototype of the Kaaba; but later tradition identified Muhammad’s journey as having been from Mecca to Jerusalem.
The Hijra is the migration of Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE. This event, the Hijra, marks the beginning of the Islamic Calendar, which is also known as the Hijri Calendar. In Medina, Muhammad united the tribes under the Constitution of Medina. After eight years of fighting with the Meccan tribes, he established a new polity.
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Soon after the conquest of Mecca, Muhammad defeated the Hawazin and Thaqif tribes in the Battle of Hunayn in Arabia. In 632, at the end of the 10th year after the migration to Medina, Muhammad carried out his only Islamic pilgrimage, thereby teaching his followers the rites of the annual great pilgrimage known as Hajj. After completing the pilgrimage, Muhammad delivered a famous speech, known as The Farewell Sermon at Mount Arafat, east of Mecca. In this sermon, Muhammad advised his followers to abolish all old blood feuds and disputes based on the former tribal system and asked for the creation of a new Islamic community. Commenting on the vulnerability of women in society, Muhammad asked his male followers to “be good to women, for they are powerless captives in your households…”. He told them that they were entitled to discipline their wives but should do so with kindness.
A few months after returning to Medina from the Farewell pilgrimage, Muhammad fell ill and suffered for several days with fever, head pain, and weakness. He died on 8 June 632 CE in Medina at the age of 62 or 63, in the house of his wife Aisha. He was buried where he died. During the reign of the Umayyad Caliph, the Mosque of the Prophet was expanded to include the site of Muhammad’s tomb. By the time of his death, he had united Arabia into a single Muslim religious polity and most of the Arabian Peninsula had converted to Islam.