Volume 8 Surah 9 - Enjoy Islam

Al-Tawbah (The Repentance) | PROLOGUEan even more intensive scale, of all the symptoms experienced after the resoundingvictory the Muslims achieved in the Battle of Badr. The Muslim community hadalmost managed to rid itself of those, thanks to the seven-year-long educationprocess it had enjoyed after that battle. The rapid geographical expansion of Islam inArabia could have had some serious negative effects, had it not been for the fact thatMadinah had become, in its entirety, the solid base of Islam. It was God Almightywho looked after the new faith and charted its course. He had prepared the first coreof believers, the Muhājirīn and the Anşār, to be the first solid base of Islam after therelatively important expansion that followed the victory at Badr. He also made thewhole of Madinah the solid base which would withstand the great expansionbrought about by the splendid triumph achieved when Makkah was won over toIslam. God certainly knows what forces to mobilize in support of His message.The first symptom of the new dangers appeared on the day of the Battle ofĤunayn, mentioned in this sūrah: “God has granted you His support on many abattlefield, and also in the Battle of Ĥunayn, when you took pride in your numerical strength,but it availed you nothing. For all its vastness, the earth seemed too narrow for you, and youturned back in flight. God then bestowed from on high an air of inner peace on His Messengerand on the believers, and He sent down forces whom you could not see, and punished thosewho disbelieved. Such is the reward for the unbelievers.” (Verses 25-26)One of the apparent reasons for the defeat at the beginning of the battle was that2,000 of those the Prophet had pardoned in Makkah, and who embraced Islam afterthe fall of that city, had joined the 10,000-strong army which originally travelled fromMadinah to subdue the Quraysh in Makkah. The presence of those 2,000 menalongside the others who came from Madinah was a cause of imbalance in theMuslim ranks. There was also the fact that the Hawāzin took the Muslims bysurprise. What that meant was that the army did not wholly belong to the solid, wellknitbase which had been nurtured over the several years separating the Battle ofBadr and the conquest of Makkah.Similarly, the negative symptoms that appeared at the time of the TabūkExpedition were a natural result of this rapid expansion and the great influx of newMuslims with varying standards of faith. These symptoms are discussed fully in thissūrah in a long exposition with varied styles and methods of treatment.We now go on to review the historical events in the Muslim community withintwo years of the fall of Makkah. When the Prophet passed away, most parts ofArabia abandoned Islam. Only the Muslim society in Madinah, the solid base ofIslam, remained steadfast. Now we can easily explain this phenomenon. Two yearswere not sufficient to allow the truth of Islam to settle in the hearts of the greatmultitude of people who declared their acceptance of Islam after the fall of Makkah.With different levels of faith, the Prophet’s death sent a shock wave throughout14