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TheReligionofPeace.com Presents:
Muhammad was a Forgiving Man The Truth: Muhammad did forgive, but his grace was conspicuously limited to those who accepted Islam (often under duress). Modern-day apologists are prone to “forgetting” this as they attempt to make the case that their prophet was a sort of Christ-like figure. Obscure details are cherry-picked from Muhammad’s early life and divorced from context even as more numerous and less ambiguous mitigating events are conveniently excluded. Consider this little gem from CAIR’s Ibrahim
Hooper:
When he returned to Mecca after years of exile and personal attacks, he did not take revenge on the people of the city, but instead offered a general amnesty.” (source) Hooper’s definition of “general amnesty” is amazingly tenuous. Muhammad’s biographer lists at least ten Meccans whom the prophet of Islam personally ordered put to death for personal insults or for apostasy (leaving Islam). If the fact that an entire city wasn’t put to the sword after being conquered by a man against whom it did not want to fight is proof of forgiveness, then we would have to say that the bar is being set quite low. In fact, we have noted elsewhere at least five good reasons to believe that Muhammad was not a forgiving man.
It was Muhammad’s unwillingness to forgive the people of Mecca for rejecting him that drove him to attack them at every opportunity, even though they were not bothering him at Medina. Though given ample opportunity to move on, he refused. Instead the prophet of Islam incited his followers with verses ‘from Allah’ that demanded they “drive out” the Meccans from their own city – purely out of revenge, personal superiority and entitlement. Those who were spared at Mecca, following its capture by an army of 10,000 Muslims, were allowed to live because they either had nothing to do with the former harassment of Muhammad or because they accepted Islam (the Qur’an says that those who refused to convert to Islam were to be captured and killed). The sworn allegiance of these new Muslims was immediately pressed into service by Muhammad to expand his political authority over the surrounding tribes on the battlefield. One of the neighboring towns that Muhammad opportunistically attacked at this time was Taif. This is somewhat ironic because Muhammad’s earlier brush with the people of that town is actually noted by contemporary apologists as an example of his forgiving character! Here, again, is Ibrahim Hooper’s version: In another tradition, the prophet was offered the opportunity to have God punish the people of a town near Mecca who refused the message of Islam and attacked him with stones. Again, the prophet did not choose to respond in kind to the abuse. (source) It bears mentioning that neither the accounts of Muhammad's "stoning" nor Allah’s "offer" to Muhammad are recorded by the earliest and most reliable accounts of the episode. Instead, they show that Muhammad was chased away from the city with verbal insults after showing up uninvited and abusing the local religion with insults. (Ibn Ishaq 279-281). Hooper is certainly right about Muhammad not responding in kind, however, since that would have meant insulting the residents and rejecting their religion (as they had done to him). Instead, the prophet of Islam returned with an army ten years later and laid siege to the town, killing the defenders. His biographers provide no compelling reason for this other than their earlier rejection of him (and a Muslim foot soldier’s desire to capture a girl from Taif and impregnate her – Ibn Ishaq 874). The fact that Muhammad returned with an army casts serious doubt on the later tradition that Hooper cites. If Muhammad rejected the opportunity to call down Allah’s wrath on the town, then why did he return with military force as soon as he was able to do so? The only thing that had changed in the interim was his position of power. Even if the later (and more questionable) account is taken at face value, it relies solely on Muhammad’s word. Just as with the rest of his communication with Allah, no one else was there to witness the conversation. Is it really credible that Muhammad actually had the power to call down divine punishment on a town? Why then was a later siege necessary – particularly since it cost Muslim lives (Ibn Ishaq 876)? The suspect narrative, half-truth and outright deception on which apologists like CAIR's Hooper rely to convince the rest of us that their prophet was a man of forgiveness are evidence enough that this is not the case. Episodes of violent retaliation from Muhammad’s life further confirm this. |
