Guillaume--Life of Muhammad.pdf - Radical Truth

8 The Life of Muhammad
Or have you remembered youth?
And what a memory of youth and its times you have!
It was a young man's war
Such as gives him experience.
So ask 'Imriin or Asad,
When headlong' with the morning star came
AbU Karib with his great squadrons
Clad in long mail, of pungent smell.
They said, Whom shall we make for,
The Banii Auf or the Najjar?
Surely the Banii-I-Najjar,
For we seek revenge for our dead.
Then our swordsmen z went to meet them,
Their number as the drops of widely falling rain,
Among them 'Amr b. Talla
(God prolong his life for the welfare of his people).
A chief who i. on a level with kings but whoso
Would vie with him does not know his eminence.
This tribe of the An~ar claim that the Tubba' was enraged only against
this tribe of the Jews who were living among them and that it was only
his intention to destroy them, but they protected them until he went his
way. Therefore in his verse he said:
In rage against two Jewish tribes who live in Yathrib
Who ricWy deserve the punishment of a fateful day (25).'
Now the Tubba' and his people were idolaters. He set out for Meeca
which was on his way to the Yaman, and when he was between 'USlan and
IS Amaj'some men of the Hudhayl b. Mudrika b. Ilyiis b. MUdar b. Niza~ b.
Ma'add came to him saying, '0 King, may we not lead you to an anCIent
treasury which former kings have overlooked? It contains pearls: topaz,
rubies, gold, and silver.' Certainly, said he, and they added that ,t was a
temple in Mecca which its people worshipped and wherethey pray~d. But
the real intention of the Hudhaylis was to encompass his destructlOn, for
they knew that any king that treated it with disrespect, was sure to di~.
Having agreed to their proposal he sent to the two rabbiS and asked the,r
opinion. They told him that the sale object of the tribe was to. destroy
him and his army. 'We know of no other temple III the land wh'ch God
has chosen for Himself, said they, and if you do what they suggest you and
all your men will perish.' The king asked them what he should do .when
he got there, and they told him to do what the people of Mecca did: to
J Variant ghadwan 'at early dawn'. 2 Reading mwdyifatun.
J W:. text is preceded by another vene. Tab. hu preserved the full text which I have
imertcd at the end of this section in the context 88signed to it by Tab.
+ Authoritiea differ as to the .ite of the 'U,fAn. Amaj is the name of a town within reach
of.Medina and a1ao of. wadi running from the l;Iarra of the Banil Sulaym to the sea.
The Life of Muhammad 9
circumambulate the temple, to venerate and honour it, to shave his head,
and to behave with all humility until he had left its precincts.
The king asked why they too should not do likewise. They replied that
it was indeed the temple of their father Abraham, but the idols witich the
inhabitants had set up round it, and the blood which they shed there,
presented an insuperable obstacle. They are unclean polytheists, said they
--{)r words to that effect.
Recognizing the soundness and truth of their words the king summoned
the men from the Hudhayl and cut off their hands and feet, and continued
his journey to Mecca. He went round the Ka'ba, sacrificed, and shaved
his head, staying there six days (so they say) sacrificing animals which he
distributed to the people and giving them honey to drink.
It was revealed to him in a dream that he should cover the temple, so
he covered it with woven palm branches; a later vision showed him that he
must do better so he covered it with Yamani cloth; a third vision induced
him to clothe it with fine striped Yaman cloth. People say that the Tubba'
was the first man to cover the temple in this way. He ordered its Jurhumi
guardians to keep it clean and not to allow blood, dead bodies, or menstruous
cloths to come near it, and he made a door and a key for it.
Subay'a d. al-Al,labb b. Zabina b. Jadhima b. 'Auf b. N"'!r b. Mu'awiya 16
b. Bakr b. Hawiizin b. Man~iir b. 'Ikrima b. Kh",!afa b. Qays b. 'Ayliin
was the wife of 'Abdu Manaf b. Ka'b b. Sa'd b. Taym b. Murra b. Ka'b
b. Lu'ay b. Ghiilib b. Fihr b. Malik b. Nadr b. Kiniina. She had by him
a son called Khalid; and in impressing on him the sanctity of Mecca and
forbidding him to commit grievous sin there, she reminded him of Tubba'
and ·his humility towards it and his work there, in the following lines:
o my son, oppress neither the mean nor the great in Mecca.
Preserve its sanctity and be not led away. I
He who does evil in Mecca will meet the worst misfortune.
His face will be smitten and his cheeks will burn with fire.
I know from certain knowledge that the evildoer there will perish.
God has made it inviolate though no castles are built in its court.
God has made its birds inviolate and the wild goats on Thabir' are safe.
Tubba' came against it, but covered its building with embroidered
cloth.
God humbled his sovereignty there so he fulfilled his vows,
Walking barefoot to it with two thousand camels in its courtyard.
Its people he fed with the flesh of Mahri camels.
Gave them to drink strained honey and pure barley-water.
(God) destroyed the army of the elephant,
They were pelted with great stones, 3
J A reminiscence of Slira 31.33 and 35.5.
2 A mountain above Mecca. 'U,m could mean 'wild birds'.
J Either the poem has suffered interpolation or it is the product of a later age because the
ltary of the Elephant belongs to the expedition of Abraham the Abyssinian mentioned on