Karen Armstrong Model

Review: Muhammad Prophet for Our Time by

Karen Armstrong

Ahmad AmmasSaeed

Preamble:

The captivating life story of Prophet Muhammad (peace be on him) has attracted the attention of an array of orientalists throughout the modern period. Among the catalogue of orientalists whose names are associated with the life story of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be on him) are: William Muir (1819– 1905), David Margoliouth (1858–1940) and William Montgomery

Watt (1909–2006); they were, as matter of interest, the subject of a contemporary scholar

Jabal Muhammad Buaben’s valuable study titled, Image of the Prophet Muhammad in the

West: A Study of Muir, Margoliouth and Watt (1996) .

For much of the modern period, the female scholarly voice was noticeably absent.

To advocate this idea, Karen Armstrong treated the following subjects: Mecca, Jahiliyyah, Hijrah, Jihad, and Salam.

The Meaning of Jahilliyah

Karen Armstrong defines “jahilliyah” (ignorance), as Muhammad (peace be upon him) called, the prevailing spirit of his time. It doesn’t mean the pre-Islamic period in Arabia. But, as recent research shows, Muhammad (peace be upon him) used the term jahilliyah to refer not to a historical era but to a state of mind that caused violence and terror in seventh century

Arabia. She would argue that jahilliyah is also much in evidence in the West today as in the

Muslim world.

I agree with Karen about the notion of jahilliyah. It’s not limited to pre-Islamic period in

Arabia. Jahilliyah exists whenever there are four aspects as the Qur’an determined: suspicion of the Ignorant, judgment of the Ignorant, adornment of the Ignorant, fanaticism of the

Ignorant.

Judging by jahiliyyah is the quick way to accuse people of unbelief, extremism and violence.

By this way, everyone is straying from the right path if he doesn’t adopt what I believe.

The Meaning of

I have already mentioned this point when the researcher considered the

Prophet peace be upon him as a man who was “convinced that social reform must be based on a new spiritual solution… he probably realized, at some deep level, that he had exceptional talent…” She also thought that Muhammad (peace be upon him) “rarely responded to a crisis immediately but took time to reflect until finally -sometimes pale and sweating with the effort – he would bring forth what seemed an inspired solution” .

These expressions render the Prophet (peace be upon him) as a man isolated from the heaven, relies in his movement on his intellectual endeavor. This conception deprives the prophethood of its meaning and its spirit.

The prophethood is a divine choice and providence of God. The Prophet (peace be upon him) is a human being whom Allah chooses among His people and teaches him through the Angel

Gabriel peace be upon him. Muhammad (peace be upon him), or other prophets, had no intervention in what he is telling about and no right to add or to cut something from what was revealed. Otherwise, what would be the function of the revelation? What would be