help them. He felt that he could not do much on his own. He needed to work out a plan which could foil any attempt by Abū Jahl to continue with the boycott.
So he went to Zuhayr ibn Abī Umayyah who belonged to the Makhzūm clan, to which Abū Jahl also belonged. Zuhayr’s mother was the Prophet’s own aunt. Hishām’s approach was to arouse Zuhayr’s feelings of loyalty. He said:
Are you happy to sit back, enjoying your food, wearing whatever clothes you fancy, able to marry as you wish, while your uncles are confined in their quarters: no one buys from them or sells anything to them, and no one accepts any marriage contracts with them. I swear by God that had they been the uncles of Abū al-Ḥakam ibn Hishām [Abū Jahl’s original name] and you made an approach to him to boycott them in the same way as he asked you to boycott your own uncles, he would never have consented to join in.
Zuhayr was overwhelmed by the strength of the argument, but said: “What can I do on my own, Hishām? If I have one man to support me, I would do all I can until I see that covenant of boycott abrogated.” Hishām assured him of his own support but Zuhayr suggested that they should first try to get another man to support them.
Hishām then went to al-Muṭʿim ibn ʿAdiy, who belonged to the clan of ʿAbd Manāf from which the Hāshimites branched out. Al-Muṭʿim was a man who enjoyed a position of honour and respect among the Quraysh. Hishām appealed to his values of justice and integrity: “Are you happy to see two clans [Hāshim and ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib] of ʿAbd Manāf starve to death before your own eyes? Do you not realize that if you remain quiet, the rest of the Quraysh will press on and get away with it?”
Al-Muṭʿim also protested his inability to do much on his own. Hishām told him of the support he could offer along with Zuhayr. Al-Muṭʿim suggested that yet more support was required. Hishām then secured the support of two others, Abū al-Bakhtarī ibn Hishām and Zamʿah ibn al-Aswad.
The five met and agreed their plan of action. The following morning, at the appointed time, Zuhayr came to the Kaʿbah wearing one of his best garments. He walked round the Kaʿbah seven times, performing the ṭawāf, before addressing the people there in these words: “Fellow Makkans! Are we to go on enjoying our food, and wearing the best clothes, while the Hāshimites are starving; no one dare buy from them or sell to them? By God, I shall not sit until this oppressive covenant of boycott is torn to pieces.” Abū Jahl, who was sitting in a corner, said: “You are a liar. By God, no one will touch it.” Zamʿah then said to Abū Jahl: “You are a worse liar! We did not approve of it when it was written.” Abū al-Bakhtarī then came to his support, saying: “Zamʿah is right. We do not sanction its terms.”
Further support came from al-Muṭʿim, who said: “You are right and whoever disputes what you say is a liar. We disclaim it in front of God.” Hishām, who engineered the whole plan, also declared his support.
Abū Jahl was confounded. He simply said: “This has been planned somewhere else. It could not have come on the spur of the moment.”
Al-Muṭʿim then rose and went to the Kaʿbah to pull the covenant out and tear it. He found that nothing of its writing remained, with the exception of the expression: ‘In Your name, Our Lord.’19
Thus ended a period of excessive hardship which the Prophet and his companions endured with patience, confident that their cause would come out of it much stronger.
By now Muhammad had been preaching the message of Islam for close on ten years, but the overall situation could not be described as promising. The Quraysh were successful in the attempt to confine Islam to Makkah itself. Even in Makkah, Muslims were still a minority. Apart from the distant base in Abyssinia, Islam was virtually unknown outside Makkah. There seemed to be no great prospect for the final Divine message. But God accomplishes His purposes through a variety of methods some of which may be totally unexpected by human beings.
NOTES
1. Ibn Hishām, al-Sīrah al-Nabawiyyah, Dār al-Qalam, Beirut, Vol. 1, pp. 367-370.
2. Ibid., pp. 370-371.
3. Ibid., p. 375.
4. Ibid., pp. 373-374.
5. Ibn Sayyid al-Nās, ʿUyūn al-Athar, Dār al-Turāth, Madinah, 1996, p. 197.
6. Ibn Hishām, op.cit., pp. 315-316.
7. Ibid., p. 316.
8. Although Quṣayy was an ancestor of the Prophet, a seventh generation grandfather, he was in the same relationship to many of the Prophet’s interlocutors. He was the one who established the Quraysh’s position in Makkah.
9. Ibn Hishām, op.cit., p. 316.
10. Ibid., pp. 316-317.
11. Ibid., pp. 317-318.
12. Ibid., pp. 318-319.
13. Ibid., pp. 319-320.
14. Ibid., p. 320.
15. Ibid., pp. 342-343.
16. Ibid., p. 320.
17. Ibid., pp. 321-323.
18. The Kaʿbah has always had cloth coverings, normally black. If one goes underneath this covering, that is, its robes, one’s action signifies a more earnest supplication. The practice is not Islamic. A person in fear may hold the robes of the Kaʿbah to imply that he earnestly seeks God’s protection.
19. Ibn Hishām, op.cit., pp. 375-380. Also, Ibn Sayyid al-Nās, op.cit., pp. 222-225.
ALTHOUGH THE PERIOD of boycott, which lasted for three years, meant that a large section of the Makkan population endured great hardship, it was not without some benefit to Islam. For one thing, it ensured that newcomers would belong only to that breed of people who support the truth regardless of what they may have to endure as a result. Despite the boycott, new recruits to Islam continued to trickle through, albeit on a very limited scale. They were, however, of the calibre no ideology can do without.
Another benefit of the boycott could be seen in the way it was ended. The suffering of the Hāshimites moved the kind hearted among the unbelievers to take action in defiance of the hard-liners like Abū Jahl. This caused disarray in the ranks of the unbelievers. Moreover, the hard-liners appeared in a bad light, since they opposed an act of kindness to their kinsfolk.
Furthermore, the boycott was a period of relative lull in the conflict between the Muslims and the unbelievers. There was little contact between the two parties. Therefore, many of the Quraysh personalities had time to reflect on Islam, the message of the Prophet contained in the Qur’ān. To them, the Qur’ān was something wonderful. It spoke so powerfully that they could not turn away when it was recited. The hardliners who continued to hold sway felt that they must do something to stop the general public listening to the Qur’ān. Everyone was told that they should not listen to the Qur’ān when they heard it. Instead, they should raise their voices so as not to hear it. This is not much different from dictatorial regimes jamming other nations’ radio stations to keep their populations ignorant of what is taking place elsewhere, or indeed
