Moral Pattern Par-Excellence (Part 5)

                                                                       Al-Amin who honoured treaty obligations at all costs

We get a glimpse of this when the scene was shifted from Makkah to Madinah, where the Prophet ﷺ, along with his handful of followers settled down. The Hijra opened a new chapter in the fortunes of Islam. The small Muslim-fraternity daily gained in strength by the addition of more and more converts: The rapidly growing power of Islam filled the Makkans with apprehensions. They made repeated attacks on Medina to nip the growing menace in the bud. Every time, however, they suffered reverses at the hands of Muslims. Even their last combined attack, known as the Ahzab, ended in a miserable rout. Thinking that the Makkans anti-Islamic fury had spent itself, the Prophet ﷺ thought of performing the pilgrimage to the House of Kaaba. This was a privilege which from times immemorial was not denied even to the worst of enemies. Indeed, all warfare was taboo during the months of the pilgrimage. There could be no reason, thought the Prophet ﷺ, why the Makkans should obstruct him in the performance of this religious duty. So along with 1400 of his followers he set out on the pilgrimage to Makkah. To disarm all possible misgivings as to his peaceful intentions he saw to it that the Muslim carried no arms, except swords which were to be kept sheathed. The Prophet’s hopes were, however, soon belied. When the Muslim caravan reached the vicinity of Makkah, news was brought that the Makkans with their allies had mustered strong to offer opposition. A messenger was forthwith despatched to explain that they had no hostile intentions that they were there to perform the Haj. As a further guarantee of their peaceful intentions, an offer was made to the Makkans to conclude a truce for a number of years. The Quraish elders welcomed the offer. They had by now grown wise enough to realise that they could not crush Islam by force. They deputed one of their wisest men, Urwah bin Masud by name, to negotiate terms with the Muslims. The Muslims were encamped at Hudaibiya, place at a day´s journey from Makkah.

Urwah came to the Muslim camp to discuss terms with the Prophet ﷺ. The negotiations failed on which the Prophet ﷺ deputed another leading Muslim to go to Makkah and bring round the Quraish to agree to the truce terms. The envoy was however, ill-treated. His camel was killed. Besides, a detachment of the Makkans fell upon the Muslims by surprise but was itself taken prisoner. To promote his peace mission however, the Prophet ﷺ, rather than punish this act of treachery, set the whole party free. And to push forward his truce plan, he deputed a man of the high social standing of Usman, who had considerable influence at Makkah, as his envoy to discuss terms with the Quraish. Usman also was not properly treated. He was kept under a strict watch which led to the rumour that he had been killed. When the rumour reached the Prophet ﷺ, he realised that the Makkans were bent on mischief. He had no alternative left to him except to strike a blow in self-defence in case the worst came to the worst. It was a most critical situation. The Prophet’s ﷺ following was but a handful of men with no better equipment than swords. His unbounded faith in the righteousness of his cause however, made for the lack of numbers and arms. He called upon his men to take a fresh path of allegiance that in the event of a Makkans attack, they would stand by him till the last man, and the last drop of blood. This allegiance goes in the history of Islam by the name of Bait-i-Ridwan. When the news of the Muslims desperate resolve to fight to the bitter end reached the Makkans it put them in a chastened mood. To obviate another disaster, they considered discretion the better part of valour, and sent one Suhail by name with truce terms of their own. Suhail’s terms amounted to treating the Muslims as a defeated party. Among others, one term was especially distasteful to the Muslims. If any of the Mekkans should abscond and join the Muslim camp at Medina, it laid down, he was to be repatriated to them, but if any of the Muslims should desert Islam and make common cause with the Makkans, the latter were not bound to hand him over to the Muslims. The term placed the Muslims at a great disadvantage. But the Prophet ﷺ was anxious to maintain peace at any cost and wanted to accept even conditions so humiliating. This caused a great deal of murmuring among the Companions. The Prophet ﷺ however, sacrificed the sentiments of his associates to the cause of peace, so dear to his heart. And the treaty known as the Truce of Hudaibiya with all the disability it imposed on Islam, was put in black and white.

The ink of the Treaty had hardly dried up when it was put to the most acid test ever recorded in the annals of international code. It so happened that one Abu Jandal who had recently joined Islam, was caught hold by the Makkans. Day after day, he was mercilessly beaten by them to make him recant the Faith, but to no avail. Every refusal on his part was followed by worse torture. Hearing that the Prophet ﷺ was encamped at Hudaibiya, Abu Jandal was on the lookout for an opportunity to make good his escape. Once he was in the camp of Islam, he thought he would be safe. Finding his opportunity one day, he gave a slip to his captor, and made a desperate dash for Hudaibiya. After a tiresome run along unfrequented routes, he at last reached the Muslim camp. The Makkans, however, demanded his repatriation under terms of the treaty that had only just been signed. This was a most difficult situation. There stood Abu Jandal, the very picture of misery, tortured for accepting Islam, pleading with his fellow Muslims for asylum. There were the Makkan delegates demanding that the Treaty must be honoured, and the fugitive handed over to them. Abu Jandal uncovered his bleeding back to let the Muslims see the hell of torture he had been going through if the Prophet ﷺ went ahead and bowed down to the Makkans demand. For the Prophet ﷺ himself who was mercy personified even for his foes, it was a most excruciating moment. But an agreement, once signed, was something sacrosanct for a Muslim. It could not be just thrown away as a scrap of paper. Islam lays the greatest possible stress on the honest fulfilment of all agreements. The Prophet ﷺ was faced with a most difficult choice. Apart from the fact that Abu Jandal had been tortured for the Faith of Islam, on mere humanitarian grounds, his was a very strong case for being given asylum. There was the strong current of the Muslim gathering’s feelings on the question. In the midst of this internal conflict that the Prophet ﷺ went through, however, there came ringing the clarion call of the Quran:

وَأَوْفُوا۟ بِعَهْدِ ٱللَّهِ إِذَا عَـٰهَدتُّمْ وَلَا تَنقُضُوا۟ ٱلْأَيْمَـٰنَ بَعْدَ تَوْكِيدِهَا وَقَدْ جَعَلْتُمُ ٱللَّهَ عَلَيْكُمْ كَفِيلًا إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ يَعْلَمُ مَا تَفْعَلُونَ

And be true to your bond with God whenever you bind yourselves by a pledge, and do not break [your] oaths after having [freely] confirmed them and having called upon God to be witness to your good faith:  behold, God knows all that you do.

(An-Nahl (The Bee) 16:91)

The Prophet’s ﷺ choice was made. The Treaty must prevail. Abu Jandal must go back with his persecutors. And in the midst of scenes of the deepest pathos, he was allowed to be snatched away, so that the high standard of integrity Islam demands in all relationship was not lowered.

Soon after the Prophet ﷺ arrived back in Medina, there came up another similar case. Another convert to Islam, Utbah by name, tortured no less mercilessly by the Quraish followed the example of Abu Jandal and reached Medina. Two of the Quraish followed close upon his heels and demanded his repatriation under the provisions of the Treaty of Hudaibiya. Like Abu Jandal he was also told to go back with the Makkans. “Do you force me back to idol-worship”? remonstrated Utbah. A trying situation for the Prophet ﷺ again, Utbah pleading for asylum in the name of religion and the Quraish insisting on their pound of flesh! But word once pledged must be honoured whatever the cost.

“Utbah” – said the Prophet ﷺ, “we cannot but hand you over back to the Makkans. It may be, that Allah may provide another way out for you”. And Utbah like a true Muslim bowed before the Prophet’s ﷺ decree. And a way out was not providentially thrown open before him. On his way to Makkah, in the custody of the two Makkans it strikes him to make a bid for freedom on his own. At the first opportunity, finding the men off their guard, he strikes down one, while the other takes to his heels. Utbah is now a free man. But the door of Medina is still blocked on him by the Treaty. Consequently, he selects a neutral zone, a place called “Is” on the Red Sea coast, falling neither under the jurisdiction of the Quraish nor of the Muslims and takes up his abode there. As the news reached Makkah, other persecuted Muslims also flocked there, so that it soon grew up into a Muslim settlement free from the inhibitions of the Treaty of Hudaibiya. This new stronghold Muslims became a new threat to the Makkans trade with Syria. The only way to liquidate this centre was to open the gates of Medina on converts to Islam. So, they came to the Prophet ﷺ offering to abrogate the Treaty terms banning entry into Medina on new converts to which the Prophet ﷺ readily agreed.

By

M. Y. K.

(The Light – November 24, 1958)