Muhammad (PBUH) is dead

Ron Webb wrote: AhmadJoyia wrote: Probably you may like to specifically read No un-Believer will intervene in favour of a Quraysh, (because the Quraysh having declared war are the enemy) . Looking at this source, hopefully you would not miss specifically the names of all the participating tribes. With this background, the purpose of ghazu specifically against Meccans becomes fairly clear. The Constitution of Medina makes no mention of ghazu. It's fairly clear that Muhammad considered the Quraysh his enemy, but that's not news. No doubt his hatred of the Quraysh was a factor, but I still think Karen Armstrong was right that his primary motivation was very simple: he needed the income.

The constitution clearly specifies their one common enemy as Quraysh. The Battle against this enemy was only termed by Karen as 'Ghazu'. War booty was considered legal.

Ron Webb wrote: P.S.: hey, wait a sec! When did the Quraysh declare war (before or after the Constitution of Medina?), and against whom (the Muslims or Medina as a whole)? And how do we know?

What type of proof would you need to know that Quraysh kicked Muslims out of Mecca, if you just don't want to read?

Airmano When your country did everything that was needed to get rid of Abdus Salam (pbuh), did he go and rob other Pakistanis during his exile ? Ahmad: Thanks for reminding about this great hero of our nation. I admit that such isolated incidents are not rare, however, our fight is still on against the terrorists in our country.

As you can see, truly great men don't go just out and rob, even if they are treated unjustly.

So why did your prophet not behave this way ?


Airmano

Edited by airmano - 01 February 2016 at 5:53am

airmano wrote: Airmano When your country did everything that was needed to get rid of Abdus Salam (pbuh), did he go and rob other Pakistanis during his exile ? Ahmad: Thanks for reminding about this great hero of our nation. I admit that such isolated incidents are not rare, however, our fight is still on against the terrorists in our country. As you can see, truly great men don't go just out and rob, even if they are treated unjustly. So why did your prophet not behave this way ? Airmano

Again your analogy is all messed up. While Abdus Salam had to leave due to few fanatics against an individual or in some isolated cases and is in contrast to en mass killing and then forcefully eviction of Muslims by the Quresh as a threat of genocide.

AhmadJoyia wrote: Yes, we agree that the Quraysh were their main enemy. As far as I know, the term "ghazu" was not coined by Karen Armstrong, and it applied to robbery, not war. Of course Karen didn't coin it but she only tried to linked their battles' tactics as 'ghazu'. As for war booty, it was only considered "legal" to rob another tribe, not your own. Any proof of this understanding?

To both of these points I can only say that I am relying on Karen Armstrong, who was your preferred source. If you are now questioning her use of the word "ghazu" or claiming that she didn't properly understand its conventions, then it almost seems that you are arguing against yourself. Personally I find her to be pretty reliable, on the whole. I assumed you did, too.

Don't you think Ghazu of those times were anything but Chaos and lawlessness? Secondly, the robbers making Ghazu usually din't live in settled towns/cities but lived a nomadic life with no firm traces of their home addresses. This was stark in contrast to the Muslims living in a very well known place to be targeted, if considered illegal by the surrounding communities.

My understanding (again, from Karen Armstrong) is that ghazu was normally an intertribal activity, not the work of a band of outlaws. I'm not sure why it matters though. Highway robbery is highway robbery, regardless of the robber's place of residence.

It may well be that the Quraysh kicked him out. What I'm asking is whether and when they declared war, and against whom? War against another tribe is an entirely different thing from banishment of an individual. The constitution of Medina, if you happen to read it, shall set you free from all these queries, where the Quraysh were declared a common enemy.

The Constitution of Medina doesn't even mention war. The only thing it says about the Quraysh (other than Muhammad's own followers), is that no one is to offer them refuge or protection. It may imply that the Muslims have declared war against the Quraysh, but it says nothing about the Quraysh declaring war on the Muslims.

I'm not even sure that the Quraysh recognized Muhammad as a legitimate authority against whom war could be declared (which is why I asked about this). My impression is that once the Meccans kicked him out, they were done with him. It was Muhammad who eventually forced them to respond to his numerous ghazu raids.