to challenge the Believers to single combat, and they were Utbah with
his son, Al Walid, and his brother, Shaibah. Hamzah, Ali, and Obaidah
were chosen by the Prophet to oppose them. Stalwart Hamzah and
impetuous Ali soon rid themselves of their adversaries, stretching
them bleeding and lifeless on the sand, but Obaidah and Utbah had no
sooner crossed swords than they both wounded each other grievously.
Obaidah, one leg so deeply gashed that the marrow dripped from the
bone, was on his back, at his enemy's mercy, when Ali and Hamzah came
to the rescue and freed him by killing Utbah. They then lifted up
their wounded comrade and carried him to the Prophet, who supported
his head lovingly on his knee, consoling him by the glad tidings of
the reward awaiting him in Paradise. Obaidah soon breathed his last
sigh and was thus the first martyr struck down in the Holy War.
After these single combats causing the hearts of all the lookers-on to
palpitate with warlike ardour, the shock of the forces could no longer
be postponed. The Prophet had drawn up his warriors in line, shoulder
to shoulder, in serried ranks, like stone blocks cemented to form a
wall, and it was all he could do to restrain the impatience of many
who, outstripping their brothers-in-arms, would have run to face
certain and useless slaughter.
Such an one, Sad ibn Quzai, was far in advance of the post assigned to
him. So as to make him take his proper place, Mohammad struck him on
the breast with the shaft of an arrow he held in his hand. 'Thou didst
hurt me, O prophet!' cried Sad. 'As a messenger from Allah, sent to
bring about the triumph of Right and Justice, thou dost owe me
reparation on thine own body.'--'Satisfy thyself!'--'Thou art clothed,
whereas my flesh was naked.' The Prophet laid bare his breast, saying:
'Give me as good as I gave, O Sad!'
Profiting by the permission, Sad threw himself on Mohammad, took him
in his arms and pressed his lips to his body. 'Why do thou this
thing?' asked the Prophet.--'O Messenger of Allah! death faceth me and
I desired that for my last farewell, my flesh should touch thy flesh!'
Moved by such fierce devotion, Mohammad called down the blessing of
the Most High on Sad. Then, having ordered his men to wait without
flinching for the enemy's attack, he went back with Abu Bakr to the
_arish_, of which the entrance was guarded by Sad ibn Muaz, sword in
hand. The Prophet prayed: 'O Allah, remember Thy promise! If this day,
Thou dost let the army of the soldiers of the faith be exterminated,
no one will be left on earth to adore Thee!'
Uneasy at the great disparity of numbers, Mohammad renewed his
supplicating prostrations. His mantle slipped from his shoulders. Abu
Bakr picked it up and threw it over him again, saying: 'Rest easy, O
Prophet! Allah will surely do what He promised!'
Overwrought by excess of fatigue and anxiety, the Prophet lost his
senses, and his eyes closed for a second, only to reopen almost
immediately. A smile lit up his features. 'Good news, O Abu Bakr!' he
cried. 'The angel Jibra'il flieth to our assistance. I see the sand
rising in a whirlwind under his horse's hoofs!
Leaving the "arish" abruptly, he called out to his army: 'Our enemies
are routed! Already I see their backs turned in wild flight! I swear
by Him who holdeth Mohammad's soul in the hollow of His hand, that any
Believer killing a foe hath the right to his spoils; and any Believer
killed face to the enemy will be immediately welcomed by Allah in the
gardens of Paradise.'
Amir ibn Hammam, listening to these promises, held a handful of dates,
and was about to lift them to his mouth, when he threw them on the
ground with a sudden gesture of disdain, and shouted in tones of
joyous exaltation: 'Bakhr! Bakhr! Considering that between me and my
entry into Paradise there is only the slight barrier of death at the
hands of the men over there'. Without finishing the sentence, he drew
his sword and fell on the idolaters, digging a bloody road through
their ranks, until be succumbed outnumbered.
Another among the Faithful having heard the Prophet declare that Allah
would consider the martyr fighting with no armour than that of his
faith to be more deserving than any, threw off his breastplate and
followed Amir's footsteps until he, too, fell cut to pieces, but not
until he had sent many Unbelievers to the infernal regions.
From that moment, it was impossible to restrain the Believers. The
Apostle scraped up a handful of dust, throwing it in the direction of
the Quraish. 'May their faces be covered with confusion!' he cried.
'Forward! O Believers! Forward!'
The Faithful, like a human hurricane, threw themselves on the
Unbelievers and frightful noises rent the air. The clashing of
weapons, cries of despair and triumph, reverberating again and again
by reason of the echoes of the valley, were accompanied by a strange
uproar, sounding jerkily, like the beating a of a drum.
Quoth an Arab idolater of the Banu Ghifar: "I went with one of my
cousins to the top of a hill overlooking the battlefield, so as to
find out which side was victorious, meaning to join the conquerors and
plunder the vanquished.
"All of a sudden, at the very moment when the warriors of Islam
attacked, I saw rising up behind them, from the depths of the valley,
a great pillar of sand approaching with marvellous velocity. In its
tawny spirals that threatened the clouds, fantastic and terrifying
visions appeared and faded. It was like a gigantic combat of the Earth
rebelling against the Heavens!
"Sounds quite as strange escaped from the whirlwind, freezing my blood
with horror. There was the neighing and trampling of galloping steeds;
the beating of great wings; the roll of loud drums and, dominating the
tumult, an imperious voice shouting: 'Forward, Haizum!'
"In less than the twinkling of an eye, the whirlwind overtook the
Believers, falling with them on to the ranks of the idol-worshippers.
It soon reached us as well, smothering us in its yellow darkness. I
lost sight of my companion, and was nigh fainting with fear. Powerful
gusts of wind drove me hither and thither, and I had to cling to
projecting rocks so as not to be swept away like a wisp of straw. My
ears were deafened by atrocious clamours. The curses and the groans of
the wounded; the blasphemy of the vanquished, mingled now with the
rumbling of thunder. In the yellow, foggy obscurity, flashes of
lightning gleamed; swords and spears glittered.
"At last, when the whirlwind passed away, I saw my comrade prone on
the ground, his breast torn open, showing the membrane of his heart
and, like trees uprooted by a hurricane, countless dead bodies strewed
the bed of the Wadi; and in the distance, lit up by a ray of sunlight,
the soldiers of Islam pursued the enemy in flight."
This whirlwind was the track of Jibra'il riding his horse, Haizum,
that Mohammad had seen at the head of three thousand angels flying to
his aid. The whirlwind of sand, uplifted by the tempestuous wind,
allied itself to the human whirlwind swept along by the stormy breeze
of faith and both, at one bound, rushed upon Allah's foes. The shock
was irresistible. The furious billows of the raging sands struck the
idolaters straight in the face, blistering the flesh, filling mouths
and nostrils, blinding eyes, so that they knew not where to strike,
nor where to turn to defend themselves.
The Believers, on the contrary, felt their impetuosity increased by
the pushing of the hurricane, and their eyes, freely open, enabled
them to avoid their adversaries' attack, and cut them down to a
certainty. Better still: unknown, supernatural strength increased the
strength of their arms tenfold, to such an extent that they fancied
they struck at empty air, because they felt no resistance to the
impact of their weapons. "Scarcely did I threaten a head with the edge
of my blade," one of the conquerors narrated later, "than I saw it fly
off my adversary's shoulders and roll on the ground, even before my
weapon touched it." "_So it was not ye who slew them, but Allah slew
them._" (THE QUR'AN, VIII, 17). Seventy idolaters bit the dust; and,
among them, all the conspirators who tried to assassinate the Prophet
at Makkah. Twenty-four of the dead belonged to the highest
aristocracy: Utbah, Al Walid, Shaibah, Umaiyah ibn Khalaf, Abu
Bukhtari, Hanzalah, Abu Sufyan's son, etc., and, most important of
all, the chief of the expedition, the famous Abu Jahal.
Knowing that the latter was the life and soul of the plots weaved
against the Prophet, the Faithful sought for the arch-conspirator
everywhere in the fight. One of them, Muaz ibn Amr, having succeeded
in falling across him, pierced his thigh with a furious lunge.
Ikrimah, Abu Jahal's son, rushed to his father's assistance and, with
a scimitar, avenged him by hacking the left arm of Muaz. It hung from
his shoulder by a strip of flesh. His movements hampered by the
useless, swinging limb, Muaz stooped, and placing his foot on it, tore
it off by roughly standing erect again. He threw it far from him and
went on fighting.
Two young Ansars, sons of Afrah, coming to the rescue, dragged Abu
Jahal out of the saddle and left him for dead, riddled with wounds.
The Prophet's mind was more engrossed with the fate of Abu Jahal than
with that of any other of his foes. Ibn-i-Masud went out to search,
and found him at last, in the midst of a pile of corpses. The chief of
the idolaters was still breathing. Ibn-i-Masud placed his foot on the
dying man's neck, even as one stamps on a viper, but just as he leant
over, Abu Jahal, to brave him, seized him by the beard, and gazing at
his conqueror, with a mad look of impotent rage, he shouted, the
death-rattle sounding in his throat: 'Hast ever seen such a noble
fellow as I, murdered by such vile ploughmen?'
To put an end to the infidel's insults, Ibn-i-Masud cut off his head
and brought it to the Prophet. At the sight of the blood-stained face
of his enemy, Mohammad exclaimed: 'Verily, this man was the detestable
Pharaoh of his nation!'
Corpses soon became decomposed, exposed to the sun's torrid rays; the
tumefied faces of the dead took on the colour of pitch. This
phenomenon proved to the Believers that the infidels had been struck
down by celestial warriors, for were they not already carbonised by
the flames of hell? Mohammad scoured the whole of the battlefield,
ordering all the dead bodies he came across to be buried at once, no
matter of which creed. Huzaifah, one of the early Islamic adepts,
accompanying Mohammad, suddenly came upon the remains of Utbah ibn
Rabiyah, his father. The son's features became distorted and blanched
with mortal pallor. 'Hast thy father's death shattered thy soul?'
asked the Prophet.--'No, by Allah! but I knew my father was endowed
with intelligence, goodness and generosity. I had hopes that he would
have trodden the path of salvation. His death depriveth me of that
hope. Hence my grief!'
The Prophet, impressed by the reply of this stoical Mussulman, called
down the blessings of the Lord on his head. Mohammad then had his
she-camel led to him and, mounting, rode to a dried-up well in which
he ordered twenty-four of his best-known enemies to be buried. He
stopped his she-camel in front of the mouth of this well and called on
the dead by name:
'O such an one, son of such an one! And thou, such an one, son of such
an one! Would ye not have preferred this day to have obeyed Allah and
His Messenger? Of a surety, we have found that which Our Lord promised
us; but you--have ye found that which your divinities promised
you?--'O Apostle!' said Ura, 'why dost thou speak to soulless
bodies?'--'By Him who holdeth in His hands the soul of Mohammad!' he
replied, 'I swear that thou dost not hear my words as distinctly as
they!'
By this he meant to inform Ura that these infidels, now dwelling in
hell, were compelled to acknowledge the truth of words that he had
ofttimes repeated to them when they were in the land of the living.
Thus does a "hadis" of Ayishah explain this scene, for it is said in
the Qur'an: "_Verily then, thou canst make the dead to bear._" (XXX,
51). The Believers only lost fourteen men, six Mohadjirun and eight
Ansars, winning eternal glory as the first fallen in the Holy War.
[Sidenote: THE SOJOURN AT BADR AND THE RETURN TO AL-MADINAH]
The Prophet remained three days on the field of battle to bury the
dead and gather together the booty which he left to be guarded by the
family of the Najjar. He then got ready to go back to Al-Madinah.
Two couriers, Zayd, his adopted son, and Ibn-i-Ruhah, sent on to carry
the glad tidings, reached there before him. They arrived at the moment
when the situation of the Believers in the city was becoming critical.
Gravediggers had not finished cleansing their hands from the earth
with which they had just covered the last resting-place of Roghaid,
Mohammad's daughter, married to Usman. She had been carried off by
painful illness. "Hypocrites" and Jews put the most alarming rumours
in circulation concerning the Prophet's fate and they were getting
ready to attack his supporters....
The good news spread all over the town with lightning-like rapidity;
causing confusion in the haunts of "Hypocrites" and Jews; reassuring
the Faithful and causing great enthusiasm in their ranks. All of
them--a vast crowd of men, women and children--went forth to acclaim
the conqueror, the procession marching to the cadence of drums. They
sang in chorus the chant with which he had been welcomed when he first
arrived: "The full moon hath risen above our head--Emerging from the
Sanniyat-ul-Wida;--Numerous are the thanksgivings we must offer up to
Allah--With the purest fervour of our supplications.--O thou His
Messenger among us--The orders thou dost bring us shall be piously
executed!"
Ever since this battle, for ever memorable, which by its results
eventually changed the whole face of the world, although only fought
out by a small number of men, the Wadi of Badr is visited yearly by
thousands of pilgrims.
It is written by the traveller Abul Hosain ibn Zubair. "A small
market-town, surrounded by ramparts, stands now upon its site ... What
was once the well where the Unbelievers were buried, is now a clump of
palm-trees, and a little farther off are the tombs of the martyrs.
"To the left of the road leading from Safra, is the Mountain of
Mercy--Ar Rahman--by which the Angels descended from Heaven.
"The "arish," the shelter where Mohammad stood, is said to have been
erected on the slope of a sandhill, called Jabl-ul-Tabl, the Mountain
of the Drum, because the roll of supernatural drums is frequently
heard there by pilgrims; this mysterious martial music celebrating the
remembrance of the first victory of Islam."
There were as many prisoners as dead: three score and ten, mostly
belonging to the best families among the idolaters.
Two of them, Aqbah and An Nazir, whose insults to the Prophet were
beyond all measure, suffered the death penalty after condemnation.
Abbas, Mohammad's uncle, compelled by his pecuniary interests to
remain behind in Makkah, had not yet made up his mind to embrace the
Islamic faith. He had gone to the aid of the caravan in danger, and
was taken prisoner. His commanding stature and bodily vigour stood him
not in good stead, for he was captured by the weakest warrior among
the Ansars and remained petrified with surprise. The ropes that bound
him cut cruelly into his flesh. He sighed heavily in pain. One of the
Faithful, recollecting the captive's handsome behaviour and that he
was a relative of the Prophet, loosened his bonds most charitably.
Hearing of this and not admitting that a member of his family should
be favoured, Mohammad ordered the bonds of all the other prisoners to
be loosened in the same way.
It now remained to decide the fate of the captives. Abu Bakr,
pretexting the ties of blood uniting victors and vanquished, was of
opinion that a ransom should be accepted. Fierce Umar, recalling the
fact that all the prisoners had made themselves conspicuous by their
persecution of the Mussulmans and were responsible for the Prophet's
banishment, proposed that they should be pitilessly exterminated. Both
opinions rallied an equal number of partisans.
The Prophet sided with Abu Bakr. He gave orders to respect luckless
valour and to treat the captives with the greatest humanity. He caused
them to be freed from their bonds and had them guarded by all the
Mussulmans in turn who, faithfully obeying his commands, deprived
themselves of bread in favour of their prisoners; the Believers being
content with dried dates.
The ransom was fixed according to each prisoner's wealth. Abbas,
Mohammad's uncle, had to give the largest amount; the others were
liberated without paying anything. Nevertheless, Mohammad required
that before being set free, each captive knowing how to read and
write, should give lessons to two children of the Ansars.
Among the prisoners was Abul' As ibn Rabiyah, a rich man in high
repute. He had married Zainab, the daughter of the Prophet, before the
Revelation, and was still an idolater. For the ransom of her husband,
Zainab sent from Makkah a sum of money and a necklace, a wedding-gift
from her mother Khadijah. The Prophet, recognising this piece of
jewellery which he had ofttimes seen round the neck of his beloved and
regretted Khadijah, was unable to repress his emotion and put this
question to his disciples: 'If ye do not oppose me, I will send her
husband back to Zainab, and renounce all claims to ransom.' No
objection being raised, Mohammad told his prisoner that he was free.
'But only on one condition. Restore my daughter to my arms, for a
woman of the Mussulmans cannot remain in the power of an idolater.'
The captive accepted most reluctantly, and as soon as he was again in
Makkah, he kept his word.
The Quraish, however, hearing of Zainab's departure, started off in
pursuit of her, and one of them, Hibar, struck her so brutally with
the shaft of his spear, that he threw her out of her "hawdaj," (a kind
of litter), and she dropped from the back of her camel to the ground.
Shortly after her arrival at Al-Madinah, the poor woman, not having
recovered from her fall, and being pregnant, died from the effects of
the ill-treatment she had thus undergone.
Under the influence of grief and despair, the Prophet gave orders that
anyone putting his hand on the villain Hibar was to burn him alive.
But it was not long before Mohammad cancelled this cruel command,
declaring: 'The Master of the Worlds alone hath the right to inflict
the torture of Fire!' This was in allusion to the flames of Hell.
As for Abul'As, retaken by the Mussulmans while conducting a caravan
back from Syria-, he was again liberated by the Prophet and became a
convert to Islam.
Mohammad thus let no opportunity escape to prove his generosity to the
prisoners, his own fellow-countrymen. The Prophet's clemency resulted
immediately in the conversion of no small number of Makkans,
marvelling at the tales told by the captives who, upon regaining the
bosom of their families, bore witness to the kindness with which they
had been treated.
Perhaps the fact of such compassion towards the enemies of Islam
constituted peril in the future? So said a Revelation to the Prophet,
blaming him at the same time. Mohammad was overwhelmed with profound
sadness, at the thought that his generosity would cause the death of
many Believers, as he dared not hope that goodness would sweep away
all feeling of enmity.
As soon as the victory was won, the division of the booty was near to
causing serious quarrels among the Faithful. Each man desired to keep
to himself all he had plundered. Those who had fought without thinking
of stripping the dead, put in a claim, saying to their comrades who
wanted to keep that which they had taken: 'Had it not been for us, ye
would have been unable to seize any booty at all.' Finally, the men of
the rear-guard also complained: 'If we had not considered the
Prophet's safety above all things, we should have fought with you and
pillaged as ye did.' The debate seemed to be turning out badly when a
Revelation put an end to the dispute: "_They will question Thee about
the spoils. Say: The spoils are Allah's and The Apostle's._" (THE
QUR'AN, VIII, 1.)
Back again in Al-Madinah, Mohammad divided the booty with the most
scrupulous fairness, and gave out that not only the rearguard should
receive their share, but also a few of the Faithful who had remained
in the city to uphold the cause of Islam during the absence of their
chief.
Thus did Mohammad succeed in contenting everybody. So far as he was
concerned, he only took the same share as a common soldier; but it was
settled that in future the fifth part of the booty "_should belong to
Allah and to the Apostle and to the near of kin and to orphans, and to
the poor and to the wayfarer_." (THE QUR'AN, VIII, 42.)
The Makkans were joyfully celebrating the return of the great caravan
that had caused them such immense anxiety, when the remains of the
routed army began to straggle back.
At first, the citizens refused to believe such dire disaster, so great
had been their confidence in the superiority of the numbers and
equipment of their soldiers. The fugitives were considered to be
cowards deserting before the battle had begun.
But when doubt was no longer possible, profound consternation overtook
Allah's enemies. The fury of Abu Lahab, the real organiser of the
expedition, was inconceivable. In his presence, one of the fugitives
told of the miracles he had witnessed and which, in his opinion, were
an excuse for the defeat. 'The Mussulmans, assuredly, were granted
supernatural succour, for I saw, with my own eyes, in the whirling
tempest, many warriors gifted with superhuman strength, wearing white
tunics, mounted on dapple-grey horses, and fighting side by side with
our enemies.'--'By Allah! verily, they were angels!' exclaimed one of
those present, Abu Rafiah, a servant of Abbas, Mohammad's uncle.
Abu Lahab, enraged at the impression of terror produced by this story
and the remarks that had followed, hurled himself on Abu-Rafiah, threw
him down and beat him unmercifully in the most savage fashion. 'Art
thou not ashamed thus to profit by the master's absence to strike his
serving-man?' the wife of Abbas, revolted at the sight, shouted to Abu
Lahab. Catching up a spear, she struck him in the face with it, and
drew blood. The punishment was so well deserved that no one protested.
Abu Lahab, humiliated in the eyes of all, hastened to hide his shame
and rage in the most secluded part of his dwelling. Not being in the
best of health just then, he could not master the exasperation he
felt. His blood was turned; the whole of his body broke out in reddish
pustules, known as "adsah", and he was carried off in less than a
week.
As for Abu Sufyan and his wife, Hind, in despair at the death of their
son, Hanzalah, and debased by the defeat, they showed themselves
conspicuously as being athirst for vengeance. Abu Sufyan exercised his
authority by prohibiting all show of grief. 'Weep not for your dead,'
he proclaimed. 'Do not give way to the usual funereal lamentations.
Let poets be careful not to compose elegies. O Makkans! avoid causing
the joy of our foes by the sight of your sadness. Let only one thought
absorb your minds--that of vengeance!'
He took a solemn oath to abstain from going near his wife or making
use of his perfumes until the day when striking revenge should bring
balm to his heart.
The effect of the Prophet's victory spread far and wide among all the
tribes of Arabia. The tidings crossed the seas; the Prophet having
despatched an emissary to the Najashi of Abyssinia, to announce the
result of the battle and to inform all the Believers, who had taken
refuge at this monarch's court, that they would be in safety behind
the walls of Al-Madinah, at Mohammad's side.
[Illustration: Calligraphy (end chapter 5) _Believers! when ye
confront a troop, stand firm and make frequent mention of the name of
Allah; haply it shall fare well with you._]
[Illustration: (Ornamental page) CHAPTER THE SIXTH]
[Illustration: _"As Sidjah", or Prostration._]
[Illustration: (Calligraphy) _And be not faint-hearted, and be not
sorrowful; For ye shall gain the upper hand if ye be believers._]
CHAPTER THE SIXTH
[Sidenote: ALI'S MARRIAGE]