Islam's Reformers .pdf

his age six, his blessed mother, Âmina Khâtûn, took him toMedîna to see his maternal uncles. After having stayed there fora month, she passed away on the way back, near the placenamed Abwâ, when she was twenty. He came to Mecca withUmm Ayman, a jâriya, whom he had inherited from his blessedfather, ’Abdullah, and stayed with his blessed grandfather, ’Abdal-Muttalib. When he was eight, his grandfather passed awayand he stayed with his eldest paternal uncle, Abû Tâlib.He was amongst those who went to Damascus once withAbû Tâlib when he was nine or twelve years old, once with AbûBakr (radiy Allâhu ’anh) at his twenty, and once with Khadîja’s(radiy-Allâhu ’anhâ) caravan at his twenty-five. In all these threeexpeditions, when they came to a place named Busrâ, [1] thepriests of the local church, Bahîra and then Nastûra, saw in himthe signs of the Last Prophet (’alaihi ’s-salâm), whom they readabout in the Injîl, and they said, “Don’t go to Damascus! Jews inDamascus will recognize and kill this boy.” So, they traded thereand returned. When he was fourteen or seventeen years old,his uncle Zubair, who was going to Yemen, took him along sothat his trade be blessed. After twenty years of age, he beganto live on tending sheep. There is not any dependableinformation about his going to Bahrein; nor has anyone, besidesthose who disbelieve his prophethood, thought of his havingtravelled to Ethiopia. Those who say, “He was heard speakEthiopian language. This makes one think that he may havegone to Ethiopia,” are wrong. For, he answered the foreignerswho came to him in their own dialects of Arabic, which wasmore difficult than speaking foreign languages. This speaking ofhis was one of the innumerable mu’jizas which Allâhu ta’âlâbestowed upon him. None of the three or four expeditionsmentioned above did he join out of personal concerns; he wastaken in order to get blessed with his honourable existence. Inthe last expedition to Damascus, Maisara, leader of thecaravan, wanted to send him to Khadîja (radiy-Allâhu ’anhâ) togive her the good news. But Abû Jahl, who was in the caravan,said, “Muhammad is young yet. He is inexperienced. He hasnever travelled to any place. He may lose his way. Sendsomeone else.” This indicates that Hamidullah’s mentality is[1]Busrâ is located 90 km southeast of Damascus and 130 kmnortheast of Jerusalem.- 296 -