The Life of Mohammad, the Prophet of Allah

by Etienne Dinet; Sliman Ben Ibrahim

"The Arab chronicles of Spain are full of stories of the same kind, proving how wide-spread were these knight-errant-like qualities; and a very religious learned man, Barthélemy St. Hilaire, admits most loyally how greatly European customs are indebted to them. In his book on the Qur'an, he says: "Through having intercourse with the Arabs and copying them, the boorish barons of the Middle Ages toned down their rough habits; and the knights, without lessening their bravery, became cognisant of more delicate, noble and humane sentiments. It is doubtful whether Christianism alone, despite its benevolence, would have inspired them with these feelings."

"The reader may perhaps ask why, under these conditions, the influence of the Arabs is so unappreciated in our day by learned men who, by their intellect, seem far above all religious prejudice. That is because independence of opinion is more apparent than real, and we are not at all free to think as we like about certain subjects. The hereditary prejudices professed by us against Islamism and its disciples have accumulated during too many centuries not to have become part and parcel of our organism....

"If we join thereto other prejudices also hereditary, and increased in each generation by our detestable classic education: that all sciences and literature of the past spring solely from Greeks and Romans, we can easily understand that the great influence of the Arabs in the history of European civilisation is generally slighted.

"In certain minds, it will always seem humiliating that it is owing to the Moslems that Christian Europe shook off barbarism...." (Dr. Gustave Le Bon, La Civilisation des Arabes.)

What caused Islam to fall so rapidly, after having, during the eight centuries of its domination in Spain, placed that country not only at the head of occidental civilisation, but also causing it to shine quite as brilliantly from Delhi and Bokhara, as far as Constantinople and Fez?

The first cause may be found in the non-observance of the strictly levelling principles that the Prophet had so much trouble to establish while he lived, and which were the motives of his successes and of those of the first Caliphs. One example will serve to show how rigorously these principles were applied in the beginning: "A rich, powerful, and proud monarch, Jabala, newly converted, struck violent blows in the face of a poor Bedouin, who had accidentally pushed against him while he was performing his devotions round the Ka'bah. Without bringing into account the rank of the delinquent, or the danger of estranging such an important personage, the Caliph Umar thought that, for the honour of the future of Islam, equality in the eyes of law and justice should override all other considerations, and he condemned King Jabala to undergo, at the hands of the humble Bedouin, the same chastisement as had been inflicted on him."

With such strict principles, no one could possibly be proud of anything but his personal merit; and emulation gave birth to miracles for the greater good of Islam. No men were chosen as chieftains except those who deserved that honour, and once elected, they were blindly obeyed because they were sincerely admired and respected.

Unfortunately, the complete observance of this master-thought of the Prophet turned out to be ephemeral, and already under the rule of Usman, the third Caliph, aristocratic prejudices began to regain their evil influence. In vain Mohammad had said to his beloved daughter, Fatimah-tuz-Zahra: 'Work, and reckon not that it sufficeth for thee to be the Prophet's daughter;' the sons of most unimportant people despised their Mussulman brothers of more lowly origin, and thought that their social rank exempted them from making those efforts without which no progress can be realised. Moreover, rivalry between folks more proud of their forbears than of their own works, gave rise again to fractricidal struggles, as ruthless as in the past; and with them, the disorganisation and general anarchy which had paralysed the Arabs of pre-Islamic times. Having lost all taste for study; separated and exhausted by incessant civil wars, the Moslems were only able to offer puny resistance to the Christians, who dreamt of revenge and had profited by these dissensions to organise themselves.

In the past as in the present, Islam might have avoided the greater part of its misfortunes if it always remembered this last adjuration of the Prophet in his sermon of the Valedictory Pilgrimage: 'Never forget that each Mussulman should be a true brother to every other Mussulman!'

The second cause of its decline arose from one of the primordial qualities of Islam. The conformity of its dogma, almost entirely devoid of supernaturalism, to the exigencies of reason, was at first inestimably advantageous for science which remained free from the hindrances of superstition. This suffices to explain the rapid rise of its civilisation. But the Moslem mind had gradually been lulled, being satisfied with the magnificent results attained by the enthusiasm reigning in the first centuries of the Hegira. Henceforth, it was at the mercy of animal passions and fetishism, in certain newly-conquered countries. The cult of Saints and Intercessors, "Awliya," or "Murabitun," borrowed from the Christians and so strictly forbidden by the Qur'an, took the place of the cult of Science and, by its gross superstitions, barred all progress. Philosophers like Averroes, tried to struggle, but it was too late; the evil was too deeply rooted among the masses who called these enlightened men ungodly, and demanded that they should be put out of favour....