AL-MUG͟HNĪ (المغنى). “The Enricher.” One of the ninety-nine names or attributes of God. It is referred to in the Qurʾān, [Sūrah iv. 129]: “God can make both independent (lit. ‘enrich’) out of His abundance.”
MUḤĀDAS̤AH (محادثة). Lit. “Discoursing together.” A term used by the Ṣūfīs for the calling of a person by God through some outward means, as when, according to the Qurʾān, [Sūrah xxviii. 30], God spoke to Moses out of a tree. (ʿAbdu ʾr-Razzāq’s Dict. of Ṣūfī Terms.)
MUḤADDIS̤ (محدث). (1) The narrator of a Ḥadīs̤ or acts and words of Muḥammad. (2) One learned in the Traditions.
AL-MUHAIMIN (المهيمن). “The Protector.” One of the ninety-nine names or attributes of God. It occurs in the Qurʾān, [Sūrah lix. 23], “He is … the Protector.”
MUHĀJIR (مهاجر). From hijrah, “flight.” One who performs hijrah either by (1) leaving Makkah in company with the Prophet, or (2) leaving a country ruled by an infidel power, or (3) by fleeing from what God has forbidden.
MUHĀJIRŪN (مهاجرون). The pl. of Muhājir. The exiles or refugees. A term used for all those converts to Islām who fled with their Prophet from Makkah. Under the title are also included all who from time to time joined Muḥammad at al-Madīnah, either from Makkah or from any other quarter, up to the taking of Makkah in A.H. 8. They rank first in order amongst the Companions of the Prophet.
MUḤALLIL (محلل). Lit. “One who makes lawful.” The man who marries a divorced wife in order to make her lawful for her former husband if he wish to marry her. [[DIVORCE].]
MUḤAMMAD (محمد). Lit. “The Praised One.” Sometimes spelt Mohammed, Mohomed, or Mahomet.
Muḥammad, the founder of the religion generally known as Muḥammadanism, but called by its own adherents Islām [[ISLAM]], was the posthumous son of ʿAbdu ʾllāh, by his wife Āminah. ʿAbdu ʾllāh belonged to the family of Hāshim, which was the noblest tribe of the Quraish section of the Arabian race, and said to be directly descended from Ishmael. The father of ʿAbdu ʾllāh and the grandfather of Muḥammad, was ʿAbdu ʾl-Mut̤t̤alib, who held the high office of custodian of the Kaʿbah. [[KAʿBAH].] The same year which saw the destruction of the Abyssinian invader, and formed an epoch in the history of Arabia, known as the Era of the Elephant, on account of the vast array of elephants the invaders brought with them, witnessed the birth of Muḥammad. Muḥammad is said to have been born about fifty-nine days after the attack of Abrahah, or on the 12th day of the month Rabīʿu ʾl-Awwal of the first year of the Era of the Elephant, which M. Caussin de Perceval believes to have been the fortieth year of the reign of Chosroes the Great (Kasra Anushirwan), and calculates the date to have been August 20th, A.D. 570 (see vol. i. pp. 282, 283). According to Sprenger, it was April 20th, A.D. 571. (Das Leben und die Lehre des Mohammad, vol. i. p. 138.)
Muḥammad was born at Makkah. And immediately upon his birth, his mother, Āminah, sent a special messenger to inform ʿAbdu ʾl-Mut̤t̤alib of the news. The messenger reached the chief as he sat within the sacred enclosure of the Kaʿbah, in the midst of his sons and principal men, and he arose with joy and went to the house of Āminah. He then took the child in his arms, and went to the Kaʿbah, and gave thanks to God. The Quraish tribe begged the grandfather to name the child after some member of the family, but ʿAbdu ʾl-Mut̤t̤alib said, “I desire that the God who has created the child on earth may be glorified in heaven,” and he called him Muḥammad, “the praised one.”