Why has He not told you what answer you should give us or what He will do to us since we have rejected your message?”
Apparently, the meeting degenerated at this point into complete chaos, with each one of those chiefs saying whatever occurred to him without discipline and with a total lack of coherence. Everyone shouted as loud as he could in order to emphasize his opposition to the Prophet. One of them said: “We shall not believe in you until you have brought us God and the angels marshalled in ranks.” Another said: “We worship the angels, who are God’s daughters.” A third said: “We have heard that all this you have been preaching has been taught you by a man from Yamāmah called Raḥmān. We will never believe in this Raḥmān, whatever happens.” Yet another said: “By God, we shall not leave you alone after you have done all this to us. We shall fight you until we have destroyed you or you have destroyed us.” More voices were heard, a greater lack of coherence, more chaos. The Prophet stood up and walked away, sad and overwhelmed with grief that his people deliberately rejected what they knew to be the truth.
As the Prophet walked away, a cousin of his (the son of his paternal aunt), ʿAbdullāh ibn Abī Umayyah walked by his side, not to console him but to express thoughts that proved that he was an unrivalled lunatic and an uncompromising fool. He said to the Prophet:
Muhammad, your people made you practical proposals, but you refused them. They asked you to bring them some favours by which they would recognize your high position with God as you claim, but you refused. You even refused to take for yourself things that would prove that you enjoy a position of favour with God. By God, I shall never believe in you until you have stretched a ladder to the sky and climbed up that ladder in front of my eyes until you have reached the sky. You then come back here with four angels testifying to the truthfulness of what you say. By God, even if you do all this, I do not think that I will believe in you.
Absurdity knows no limits. A man specifies his own conditions but then says that he would not budge even if his conditions were met.
Was this truly an attempt to achieve compromise or an attempt to force the Prophet into a corner which offered no escape except by admission of defeat? One sees in the offers of the Quraysh only a series of demands which would prove nothing even if they were met. What difference would it have made had the Prophet been given palaces, gardens and enormous wealth, or had the valley of Makkah been transformed into a fertile expanse overnight? The real question was one of faith, which could be based only on conviction. Had the chiefs of Makkah really wanted to know whether Muhammad was a messenger of God, they only needed to look at what he was preaching and study it objectively. That would have been sufficient to reassure them that what he said could not have been invented by a human being. The Prophet tried to persuade them to do that by sticking to his argument that no worldly offer or demand was worth consideration: he was simply a messenger conveying God’s message to people. Any person, in whatever station he is, should have the chance to make up his mind whether to accept or reject it.
An Opportunity for Escalation
When the discussion degenerated into the sort of chaos related, the hardliners seized their opportunity with both hands. Abū Jahl, who had said nothing throughout the exchange, tried to capitalize on the anger that was widespread among the chiefs of Makkah. He put to them the solution for which he had longed:
People of Quraysh! You realize that Muhammad has refused to change his way of ridiculing our religion, insulting our forefathers and abusing our deities. I pledge to the Supreme Deity that I will wait for him tomorrow with a heavy rock which I can hardly carry. When he prostrates himself in his prayer, I will throw that rock over his head. It is up to you then to give me up to his clan or to protect me. Let the people of ʿAbd Manāf then do what they will.12
Considering the mood of gloom which prevailed over the meeting, Abū Jahl’s suggestion held the prospect of an end to the conflict. Even those who would have argued against assassination in normal circumstances could not raise any objection. The chiefs of Makkah gave Abū Jahl the firm pledge of protection, encouraging him to carry out his plan.
The following day, Abū Jahl sat in ambush to carry out his assassination plot. He had his big rock with him. The Prophet came to the Kaʿbah to offer his prayers, as was his custom. Many disbelievers also came to the Kaʿbah and took up their usual positions, chatting as they habitually did but with a spreading air of expectation.
When the Prophet was fully occupied with his prayers and had prostrated himself, putting his forehead on the ground, Abū Jahl drew near with his rock. As he poised over the Prophet’s head, his colour changed and his hands were struck motionless. He walked back, absolutely terrified, and threw his rock to the ground. His friends went up to him and asked what was the matter. He said: “You saw me going up to him, resolved to carry out my plan which I explained to you yesterday. When I drew near him, I saw a huge camel standing between me and him. Never in my life had I seen such a camel with such a big head and such big sharp teeth. Had I moved one step nearer, he would have eaten me.”13
Thus the assassination attempt was foiled and Muhammad was protected by God from the schemes of his enemies. He was guaranteed this protection so that he would be able to convey God’s final message to mankind in its entirety. God says in the Qur’ān: “Prophet, announce what is revealed to you from your Lord. If you do not, you will surely have failed to convey His message. God will protect you from all men.” (5: 67) It was therefore essential that Muhammad should enjoy such protection. This did not give the Prophet any status apart from the fact that he was God’s Messenger and had a role to fulfil. It is God alone who determines how to provide this protection.
Whether the camel Abū Jahl saw was a real camel, or an angel in the shape of a camel, and how it came there and how it then disappeared if it was a real camel are matters of secondary importance. The incident gives us an example of how God accomplishes what He wills in His own way, without interference from anyone. When the Prophet was told of what Abū Jahl said, he commented: “That was Gabriel (peace be to him). Had he drawn nearer, he would have taken him away.”14
The clouds of despair thickened over the Quraysh as they saw all their attempts to contain the message of Islam rendered futile. No temptation was strong enough to make Muhammad moderate his stand, and no threats could be used against him. Moreover, the Quraysh recognized that they would not be able to assassinate Muhammad, even if they attempted to do so time after time. At no time did the moderates or hardliners of the Quraysh ask themselves what motivated Muhammad into his unshakeable resolve to carry on with his message, or why he should prefer the hard option to that of compromise, with all its promise of wealth, power and pleasure. The only question to which the Quraysh wanted an immediate answer was: how can we prevent Muhammad from exploiting our failure to win new recruits to his religion? That was the main preoccupation of the Quraysh chiefs. To achieve their purpose, they adopted a dual strategy.
More Pressure, More Torture
The Quraysh lost no time in escalating its ruthless campaign of repression. As always, the slaves, the allies and those who lacked influential support among their clans had to bear the brunt of this wicked campaign. The rest of the Muslims were not immune. Even the strongest among them were subjected to great pressure, both physical and mental. In addition, torture of intense severity was inflicted on the weak and the vulnerable.
ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbbās, the Prophet’s cousin who achieved high scholarly renown, was once asked: “Did disbelievers in Makkah inflict on the companions of the Prophet torture intense enough to justify the latter’s turning away from Islam?’ He answered:
Yes, indeed. They used to beat their victims very badly, and allow them nothing to eat or drink, until they could not even sit up. They inflicted so much pain that the victim would give or say anything he was asked just to win a short rest. The situation of some of those victims was so bad that they would answer
