Muhammad at Medina

Extract

This book is intended to be read both by the specialist and by the more enterprising general reader. From the point of view of the specialist it reviews and makes new use of familiar material and also exploits the field of social anthropology in an experimental way. At the same time it is written clearly and readably and, together with the same author’s Muhammad at Mecca, constitutes a very full guide both to the life of Muhammad and to his social, political and religious background, for any reader who is already interested in, or is at least not put off by, themes and settings outside the European tradition.

In Muhammad at Mecca Dr Watt presented the prophetic call as a response to the individualism of the tribal system in decay. In his new book he shows himself particularly aware of two aspects of the Prophet’s reforms: of the individualistic trend of the legislation, and of the institution of the religious community. It is the sense of this community which has always been so characteristic of Islam, and this aspect appears especially clearly in the chapters on the ‘Unifying of the Arabs’ and on the ‘Character of the Islamic State’. Dr Watt expressly sees the whole of Muhammad’s work as a ‘building on religious foundations’, equally when it is political, social or economic. The early unifying of the tribes under Muhammad prefigures and leads onwards to the later unity of the Islamic world under the Caliphs. The section on the character of the ummah is one of very great interest. The community (ummah) to which a prophet is sent, and which may reject him, develops as the Qur’anic revelation continues into the ummah which is itself the religious community.