The Islam of Mohamed

Reprinted from the Hindustan Review , September and October 1909.
By Mr. Salahuddin Khuda Bukhsh, M.A., B.C.L., Bar-at-Law.
I do not desire to explain the importance and significance of Islam among the religious systems of the world; nor am I to fix and ascertain the exact position of Mohamed as a religious teacher among the world’s great teachers of religions. My effort in this paper is simpler and yet not altogether free from bewildering perplexities. I desire to explain what Islam is and what its teachings are: Islam as preached and delivered by the prophet of Arabia; Islam stripped of the accretions of ages of theological disputes and controversies; in other words to sketch out, to the best of my light and leading, Islam of the prophet Mohamed. Difficult though this task is, it is not indeed a hopeless venture for one who has kept himself clear and free from narrow sectarianism.
To fully appreciate the message of Mohamed, it is essential that I should say something about the condition of Arabia before Islam. I must readily admit that so far as the Pagan Arabia is concerned, we are in great dearth of authorities. Our information is shadowy, fitful, and fragmentary and the industry of European scholars (such as Caussin De Perceval, Krehl, Wellhausen, Robertson Smith and Sir Charles Lyall) has succeeded but in lifting the veil merely at its fringe. But however partial and unsatisfactory as the account is, of the Pagan days; we can yet form an idea of the life that the Pagan Arabs led and the thoughts that swayed and animated their conduct and their deeds. I will, therefore, describe “The Pre-Islamic Arabia” as briefly as I can.
In a soil, apparently so uncongenial, how did Islam strike its root? This is an interesting and fascinating question and we must try to solve it here. The solution of this question is to be found in the existence of Judaism and Christianity, on the one hand, and in the commercial activity of the Arabs, on the other. By commerce the Arabs acquired an extended knowledge of foreign nations and their civilisation. Frequent contact with the outer world widened their intellectual horizon and awakened in them higher and more spiritual thoughts. They learnt new ideas, acquired new habits and, what was most valuable of all, they learnt to think for themselves. But not merely did travel in foreign countries and intercourse with foreign people exercise a disruptive influence, but there were forces, alike subversive and destructive, nearer home. In Arabia itself the two streams of Christianity and Judaism flowed, side by side, with the Arab Heathenism.