Once this was firmly established, the next stage was ushered in, and he became God’s Messenger, with the task to make the right faith known to people and to call on them to believe in it and to bring their daily life in accordance with it. He was told:
You, wrapped in your cloak, arise and give warning. Glorify your Lord’s greatness; clean your garments; stay away from all filth; do not hold up what you give away, showing it to be much; but to your Lord turn in patience. (74: 1-7)
In the first revelation, God told him to read. Bearing in mind that Muhammad was unlettered, this meant recitation from memory: an action that initially had little bearing on others. However, he was then told to arise and give warning. This was no longer a passive action to be performed for and by himself. Rather, this required interaction with others, as he was to warn them that they needed to believe in God’s Oneness and abide by His commands. Muhammad (peace be upon him) henceforth known by his titles of the Prophet and God’s Messenger – accepted both tasks and went about performing them as best as he could, praying to God to help him and trusting in His support. Following Divine guidance, he began to approach people, explaining to them his role and message and calling on them to accept Islam: the new faith whose very name means total submission to God.
On God’s instructions the Prophet began his mission in private, speaking to individuals who were close to him and whom he could trust. A family unit of Muslims was soon formed which included Zayd ibn Ḥārithah, who was around thirty years of age, Khadījah, and ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, the Prophet’s young cousin whom he had taken into his home to ease his uncle’s burden as Makkah went through hard times. Abū Bakr, the Prophet’s close friend, also accepted Islam without hesitation. Other recruits soon followed, including the Prophet’s daughters, Abū Ṭālib’s wife Fāṭimah bint Asad, and Umm Ayman. Young men, such as Talḥah ibn ʿUbaydillah, al-Zubayr ibn al-ʿAwwām, Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ and Saʿīd ibn Zayd, came forward, as did ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir and his parents Yāsir and Sumayyah. A small Muslim community thus came into existence. Although the advocacy of the new faith continued in secret, the Quraysh elders noticed that something was going on. However, they did not bother to look into this, as they assumed it could represent no danger to their established social order.
Three years later, the Prophet was instructed to make his message public and to call on people to accept it. As he was to prove throughout his career, he never shrank from the fulfilment of a duty. Therefore, he addressed his immediate Hāshim clan, and invited them for a meal. He compassionately appealed to them to accept Islam, as this would save them from the social ills that plagued their materialistic way of life and give them a future life to look forward to. He also addressed all the clans of the Quraysh, standing on al-Ṣafā hill, near the Kaʿbah, and made it clear to them that God had entrusted him with a message that was applicable to all mankind in all generations. In both cases, he was met with hostile reception, particularly from his uncle Abū Lahab.
The confrontation did not result in much trouble at the beginning; but soon the Makkan chiefs realized that the message of Islam was steadily gaining recruits from the people who belonged to their various clans. The message heralded a fundamental change to the social order that, at the time, gave the chiefs their privileges and kept the slaves, the poor and the weak at their mercy, as Islam advocated an equitable distribution of wealth. Most importantly, it threatened the religious authority that the Quraysh exercised over the entire Arabian Peninsula. The Quraysh elders could not take the Prophet personally to task, because he was protected by his clan, and the elders did not want a feud to occur within their community. They tried to negotiate some arrangements that would silence the message of Islam, but Muhammad would accept no compromise, and the negotiations broke down more than once. Every time this occurred, the breakdown ushered in a period of persecution of the weaker elements, who became Muslims. The atmosphere in Makkah became much tenser: the threat of a bloody confrontation increased, as hardliners among the unbelievers became far more vocal, advocating the need to put an effective stop to the call to Islam. In 615 CE, two years after having gone public, the Prophet advised many of his followers to immigrate to Abyssinia, a country “ruled by a just king, where you may have a safe haven.”1
A total of eighty-three men and nineteen women immigrated to Abyssinia, where they were given asylum by Negus, its king. These represented about half the Muslim community in Makkah at the time. This immigration is often described by Muslim (and other) historians as a flight from persecution. However, a careful look at the names of the immigrants and their standing with their clans shows that they were not the target of the Quraysh campaign of persecution. They belonged to the most distinguished families and clans in Makkah and enjoyed the full protection of their clans. Thus, they could not come to any physical harm. Rather, those who bore the brunt of that campaign of persecution stayed in Makkah. The immigration was indeed a strategic measure, aiming at establishing a new base for Islam, where it could be advocated among the local population without fear of any harm. Some of those immigrants stayed in Abyssinia, on the Prophet’s orders, for fifteen years. They could have joined the Muslims in Madinah after the Prophet and his Companions settled there in 622 CE. Although some of them did, the more distinguished figures (including the Prophet’s own cousin, Jaʿfar ibn Abī Ṭālib) remained in Abyssinia until the Prophet finally recalled them in 629. When they returned, they brought with them a large delegation of Abyssinian Muslims, who visited Madinah and pledged loyalty to the Prophet.
This immigration to Abyssinia might have averted an immediate danger that might have engulfed the entire Muslim community in Makkah. The Makkan chiefs remained hostile to Islam. They were unwilling to listen to its message, and administered harsh treatment to its advocates. However, they no longer felt that Islam represented a threat to their established order. The Prophet understood that his message was addressed to all mankind, not merely the Makkan society. Hence, he needed to bring it to others. His immediate target was the rest of the Arabian tribes. This group was not difficult to reach, as Makkah was the centre of an annual pilgrimage, where contingents from all tribes came over to perform the pilgrimage rituals, to venerate the major idols and to offer worship at the Kaʿbah. The pilgrimage had continued to be the focus of the life of the people of Makkah ever since the Prophets Abraham and Ishmael built it many centuries earlier. However, the Quraysh had distorted most of its rituals and introduced some weird practices: such as walking around the Kaʿbah naked. The presence of people from various tribes afforded an opportunity for the Prophet to address them and explain the message of Islam to them. Moreover, people came to Makkah at all times to visit the holy place and worship there. Some brought with them some goods to sell.
The Prophet sought to meet any visitor to Makkah and explain Islam to them. The idea of God’s Oneness was generally acceptable to the Arabs, even though the concept of God had long been twisted and distorted. The idols they worshipped in addition to God did not have a clear status in the thinking of the Arabs: they thought of them as partners with God, or assistants to Him, and they assumed that the idols would bring people closer to God. Indeed, the very concept of God was blurred in their minds. He was distant and vague. Therefore, the clear Islamic concept of God’s Oneness and the rejection of all partners appealed to many. However, there were some constraints that made most people hesitate or refrain from accepting Islam.
During the pilgrimage season, the Prophet went to the camps of different tribes and explained his message to them. Generally speaking, their response was hostile. The Quraysh mounted a counteroffensive, sending some of its most eloquent speakers to address the different tribes and warn them against listening to Muhammad. They made it clear that the Quraysh would consider any positive response to Islam as a hostile action and threatened military retaliation against any tribe that offered Muhammad such response. The Quraysh speakers also harped on the idea that had strong appeal in tribal society: that as Muhammad was the son of the Quraysh and they knew him well, they would have embraced his idea without hesitation, had it been any good. In the tribal system of Arabia, the tribe was always the benefactor of any of its sons or daughters who had something good to offer. If they stood solidly against someone, that person’s chances of success were heavily curtailed. Therefore, most of those tribes were more willing to listen to the Quraysh speakers
