to this period through the study of its isnāds. Yet one should recognize just how meager these results are, particularly given the amount of effort involved. Even if all the methodological questions regarding such an isnād-critical approach to the sīra traditions are placed to the side, the resultant biography of Muhammad is disappointingly minimal. Motzki himself ultimately expresses some doubt whether “the outcome will justify the time and energy needed for such an enterprise,” and he forecasts that “the historical biography which will be the outcome of all these source-critical efforts will be only a very small one.”68
Perhaps even more important is the failure so far of this arduous method to reveal anything particularly new about the historical Muhammad that could not already be determined using simpler approaches. For instance, there can be little doubt that the early Muslims believed that Muhammad had been the recipient of divine revelation, and its representation as a vision of light and auditions merely reflects a well-established biblical pattern.69 Moreover, dating according to the hijra is attested by early documentary sources, signaling the importance of a tradition of Muhammad’s “flight” for the early Muslims.70 The accusations against ʿĀʾisha are also credibly early, inasmuch as they reflect negatively on a figure who later came to be revered as the “mother of the faithful,” and one would thus imagine that the story had begun to circulate before ʿĀʾisha had attained this status in Sunni piety.71 Even if one were to accept the more problematic arguments presented on behalf of the traditions of al-Ḥudaybiya and Ibn Abī l-Ḥuqayq’s murder, ultimately very little is added to our portrait of Muhammad. It is certainly believable that Muhammad may have concluded an unfavorable treaty regarding fugitives or ordered the assassination of an opponent, as reported in these accounts. But these traditions reveal almost nothing about the nature of Muhammad’s religious movement and its early history. In these areas the sīra traditions remain not only unproven but suspect, leaving modern scholars with the difficult choice of either taking these biographies more or less at face value or looking elsewhere for more reliable evidence of primitive Islam. Such are the circumstances one must face in evaluating the early Islamic traditions of the end of Muhammad’s life.72
Ibn Isḥāq’s Account of Muhammad’s Death and Burial
Taking Ibn Isḥāq’s early biography as a basis, we gain a clear sense of how the Muslims of the mid-eighth century imagined the death and burial of their founding prophet and what they thought was important to “remember” about these events.73 The story begins just as a band of soldiers under Usāma b. Zayd’s leadership is dispatched to attack Syria, more specifically the region of Transjordan and the coastal plain of Palestine, in a report given without attribution according to Ibn Hishām’s transmission.74 Then, suddenly Muhammad became ill after returning home from Medina’s graveyard, where he had offered prayers for the dead, an act that foreshadows the prayers offered over his own grave after his burial.75 According to one account, Muhammad was posed with a choice at the cemetery, presumably by God, who offered him either “the keys of the treasuries of this world and long life here followed by Paradise,”76 or the chance to meet the Lord in Paradise at once. As Ibn Isḥāq later explains, Muhammad often said that “God never takes a prophet to Himself without giving him the choice.” Deciding for the latter option, Muhammad returned home to ʿĀʾisha, and then while making rounds among his wives, he suddenly fell ill in the house of Maymūna. Muhammad asked his wives for their permission to return to ʿĀʾisha’s house and be cared for there by her, and when they agreed he was taken to ʿĀʾisha and spent his final days with her. At Muhammad’s request, she placed him in a tub, and together with al-Faḍl b. al-ʿAbbās and ʿAlī, she poured “seven skins of water from different wells” over him until he cried “Enough, enough!” As ʿAlī left Muhammad’s house, al-ʿAbbās warned him that Muhammad would soon die, and ʿAlī would find himself “a slave.” Al-ʿAbbās suggested that they should go to Muhammad and ask him either to declare them as his successors or, if he had chosen someone else, “to enjoin the people to treat us well.” Thereafter Muhammad went and “sat in the pulpit,” revealing the choice that he was offered as well as his decision. Abū Bakr expressed alarm at the news, but Muhammad reassured him and underscored their unique bond of friendship, directing that all the doors to the mosque should be closed except for the one from Abū Bakr’s house. According to Ibn Hishām (but not al-Ṭabarī), Muhammad also took the occasion to encourage the people to join in Usāma’s expedition to Palestine, ordering that it be dispatched immediately.
When Muhammad returned home, his illness intensified, and he lost consciousness. His wives agreed to administer a medicine that had been brought from Ethiopia, and once Muhammad awoke, he was irritated and demanded to know who had forced the medicine upon him. They explained that they were afraid that he would develop pleurisy without the medicine. Muhammad protested that God would never afflict him with such a shameful disorder, and as punishment, he forced each of his wives to take the medicine themselves. Ibn Hishām then relates several stories in which Muhammad declares his preference that Abū Bakr should lead the community in prayers in his stead, some of which insist quite deliberately that Abū Bakr, rather than ʿUmar, was to fill this role. Although al-Ṭabarī also reports two similar traditions, he fails to do so on Ibn Isḥāq’s authority, raising the question of whether these endorsements of Abū Bakr appeared in Ibn Isḥāq biography.77 Nevertheless, the appearance of one of these traditions in al-Balādhurī’s Ansāb al-ashrāf on Ibn Isḥāq’s authority perhaps confirms its place in his Maghāzī.78 A pair of related traditions further note that Muhammad peeked into the mosque while Abū Bakr was leading the prayers and was seen by the people one last time: according to one tradition Muhammad sat beside Abū Bakr as he led the prayers, concluding with an admonition to adhere strictly to the Qurʾān and to it alone, laying nothing to his charge. Abū Bakr and Muhammad returned to their houses, and Muhammad laid his head on ʿĀʾisha’s bosom. When someone from Abū Bakr’s family brought a toothpick (siwāk), ʿĀʾisha offered it to Muhammad and “chewed it for him to soften it and gave it to him. He rubbed his teeth with it more energetically than [she] had ever seen him rub before.” Then, after this final act of oral hygiene, Muhammad cried out, “Nay, the most Exalted Companion is of Paradise,” signaling his resolve to depart from this world, and he expired in ʿĀʾisha’s arms. A rather peculiar story then follows, in which ʿUmar refuses to believe that Muhammad has died, insisting that, like Moses, he had ascended to God only temporarily and would soon return. Although more will be said about this intriguing episode especially in the following chapter, Abū Bakr arrives from his house and silences ʿUmar by citing a Qurʾānic verse predicting Muhammad’s death. Astonishingly, however, Ibn Isḥāq reports that no one had ever heard that verse before Abū Bakr recited it at that very moment.
Muhammad’s burial is then deferred by the ensuing struggle over who was to succeed him as the community’s new leader. In a gathering at the hall (saqīfa) of the Banū Saʿīda, the prominent men of the community jockeyed with one another to determine Muhammad’s successor, ultimately choosing Abū Bakr, who served as the first caliph. In the transition then to Muhammad’s burial, ʿUmar twice offers apologies for his frenzied denials of Muhammad’s death, one given immediately after the saqīfa meetings and a second ascribed to ʿUmar during the time of his own caliphate. In both accounts ʿUmar explains his behavior as a result of his firm belief that Muhammad would remain alive and leading his people until the arrival of the eschatological Hour. ʿAlī, it would appear, remained behind while Abū Bakr and the others contended over the caliphate, attending to Muhammad’s body and preparing it for the grave. Assisted by al-ʿAbbās and his sons al-Faḍl and Qutham, as well as Usāma b. Zayd and Shuqrān, one of Muhammad’s freedmen, ʿAlī washed Muhammad’s body. When they could not decide whether or not to remove Muhammad’s clothing before washing his corpse, divine intervention made clear that he should remain clothed. Following the washing, Muhammad’s body was wrapped in three garments, and two gravediggers, a Meccan emigrant and a Medinan, prepared his grave in the characteristic Medinan style, with a distinctive niche. A dispute arose over Muhammad’s place of burial that was resolved by Abū Bakr, who recalled Muhammad
