Muhammad (14 page)

She was right to be wary, because life in the mosque was not easy.
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The apartments of Muhammad’s wives were so tiny that it was almost impossible to stand upright inside them. Muhammad did not have a house of his own. He passed the night with each of his wives in turn and her hut became his official residence for the day. There was practically no privacy, as Muhammad was constantly surrounded by crowds of people. He had frequent visits from his daughters and grandchildren. He was devoted to Hasan and Husayn, the sons of ‘Ali and Fatimah, and was especially fond of his little granddaughter Umamah, whom he would carry into the mosque on his shoulders. He was constantly closeted with his closest companions: Abu Bakr, Zayd, ‘Ali, ‘Uthman, and—increasingly—‘Umar. As he became more widely respected in Arabia, he also received delegations from the Bedouin tribes, who crowded into the courtyard with their camels.

When he left the mosque after prayers, hordes of petitioners herded around their Prophet, pulling at his garments and yelling their questions and demands into his face.
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They would follow him into his wife’s hut, thronging round the table so tightly that it was sometimes impossible to pick up a morsel of food.
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This was stressful for Muhammad, who was shy, fastidious, and sensitive to unpleasant bodily odors and bad breath. He was also getting older. He still had only a few grey hairs and walked so energetically that his feet seemed scarcely to touch the ground, but he was nearly sixty—a not inconsiderable age in Arabia, he had been injured at Uhud, and the constant pressure was beginning to tell on him at a time when the whole of Medina was waiting in terror for the inevitable return of the Meccan army and the ummah was more divided than ever before.
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This internal dissension became apparent as soon as Umm Salamah took up residence in the mosque. ‘A’isha fiercely resented the arrival of this distinguished, superior woman, and a rift developed in the harem that reflected tensions within the ummah itself. Umm Salamah represented the more aristocratic Emigrants, while ‘A’isha and Hafsah, the daughters of Abu Bakr and ‘Umar, came from the more plebeian party in power. Each of Muhammad’s wives sided with one of these two rival factions. Umm Salamah often relied upon the support of a third group, the
ahl al-beit,
the “people of the household,” who were members of Muhammad’s immediate family. At the time of her marriage to Muhammad, these divisions were only in their infancy, but it would soon become clear that the ummah was not a monolithic group, and that the people who entered Islam had done so with very different expectations.

Umm Salamah quickly became the spokesperson for the women of Medina.
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Muhammad’s living arrangements, which had physically positioned his wives at the epicenter of the community, had given Muslim women a new vision of their role. ‘A’isha and Hafsah were still young girls, and were sometimes flighty and selfish, but Umm Salamah was a very different proposition. Shortly after her marriage, a deputation of women asked her why they were mentioned so rarely in the Qur’an. Umm Salamah brought their question to the Prophet, who, as usual, took time to reflect upon it seriously. A few days later, while she was combing her hair in her apartment, she heard Muhammad reciting a revolutionary new surah in the mosque:

Men and women who have surrendered,
Believing men and believing women
Obedient men and obedient women
Truthful men and truthful women
Enduring men and enduring women
Men and women who give in charity
Men who fast and women who fast,
Men and women who guard their private parts
Men and women who remember God oft—
For them God has prepared forgiveness
    And a mighty wage.
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In other words, there was to be complete sexual equality in Islam; both men and women had the same duties and responsibilities. When the women heard these verses, they were determined to make this vision a concrete reality in their daily lives.

God seemed to be on their side. Shortly afterwards, a whole surah was dedicated to women. Women were no longer to be bequeathed to male heirs as though they were camels or date palms. They could themselves inherit and compete with men for a share in an estate.
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No orphan girl should be married to her guardian against her will, as though she were simply moveable property.
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As had been customary during the pre-Islamic period, women retained the power to initiate divorce proceedings, though the husband could refuse to comply. In Arabia, the groom traditionally presented a dowry to his bride, but in practice this gift had belonged to her family. Now the dowry was to be given directly to the woman as her inalienable property, and in the event of divorce, a man could not reclaim it, so her security was assured.
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Qur’anic legislation insisted that the individual was free and sovereign—and that also applied to women.

In seventh century Arabia, this was a shocking innovation, and the men of the ummah were furious. God was taking away their privileges! They were ready to fight for him to the death, but now he was demanding sacrifice in their personal lives! The Medinese were particularly incensed; were they expected to divide their farms to give women a share? “How,” they asked, “can one give the right of inheritance to women and children, who do not work and do not earn their living? Are they now going to inherit just like men who have worked to earn that money?” And was the Prophet seriously telling them that even an ugly girl could inherit a fortune? “Yes, absolutely,” replied Muhammad.
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Some tried to find a loophole in the legislation, but the women complained to Muhammad and the Qur’an supported them.
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The women made another demand: since raiding was so crucial to the economy, why could they not bear arms, too? Once again, Umm Salamah brought their question to the Prophet.
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This went right to the heart of the ghazu economy. A woman who was taken prisoner during a raid was valuable booty; she could be sold, married, used for labor, or forced into prostitution. If women were allowed to fight instead of waiting passively to be taken prisoner, there would be a huge reduction of ghazu income. The controversy split the community and Muhammad was besieged by angry men who felt that Allah was emasculating them. ‘Umar especially could not understand the Prophet’s ridiculous leniency towards women. But Muhammad stood firm and insisted that God had made his will clear.

But the women had chosen the wrong moment to make their move. There was no way that the men would accept this at a time when the ummah faced extinction. The laws of inheritance and divorce remained in place, but Muhammad found that his enemies in Medina were making political capital out of this radical legislation and that he was opposed at this crucial juncture by some of his closest companions. Matters came to a head over the question of wife-beating.
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The Qur’an forbade Muslims to inflict violence upon one another, and the women began to complain to the Prophet when their husbands hit them, demanding that they be punished as the Qur’an prescribed. Some even started to refuse sex to their abusive husbands. Muhammad was revolted by the very idea of violence towards women. “The Prophet never raised his hand against one of his wives, or against a slave, nor against any person at all,” Ibn Sa‘d recalled. He “was always against the beating of women.”
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But he was ahead of his time. Men like ‘Umar, Ibn Ubayy, and even the gentle Abu Bakr beat their wives without giving the matter a second thought. Knowing that Abu Sufyan was mustering a massive army against Medina, Muhammad had to give way in order to retain the loyalty of his men. “Very well,” he told his indignant companions, “beat them, but only the worst of you will have recourse to such methods.”
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A revelation seemed to give husbands permission to beat their wives but Muhammad did not like it.
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“I cannot bear seeing a quick-tempered man beat his wife in a fit of anger,” he said.
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Yet again, the conflict with Mecca had compromised his vision and forced him to adopt a course of action that, in more normal circumstances, he would have preferred to avoid. The Qur’anic legislation about women is intertwined with verses about the war, which inevitably affected everything that happened in Medina at this time; Muhammad knew that he had no hope of surviving a Meccan onslaught with disaffected troops.

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In March 627, a massive army of ten thousand men—the Quraysh and their confederates—were on the march toward Medina.
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Muhammad could raise only a paltry three thousand warriors from Medina and his Bedouin allies. This time there was no stupid bravado; the Muslims barricaded themselves into the “city” in the center of the oasis. Surrounded on three sides by cliffs and plains of volcanic rock, Medina was not difficult to defend. It was most vulnerable from the north, but Muhammad adopted a stratagem suggested to him by Salman al-Farsi, a Persian convert. The Quraysh were in no hurry, making their way grandly and confidently in easy stages, so the Muslims had plenty of time. They gathered in the crops from the outlying fields, so that this time the Meccans would find no fodder, and then the entire community set to work digging a huge trench around the northern part of the oasis. This was nothing short of astonishing—even shocking—to Arab sensibilities. No self-respecting jahili warrior would dream of putting a barrier between himself and the enemy. He would consider it degrading to shovel earth like a slave. But Muhammad worked alongside his companions, laughing, joking, and singing with his men. Morale was high.

When the Quraysh arrived with their army, they stared blankly at the trench. The earth from the ditch had been used to build a high escarpment, which effectively shielded the Medinese in their camp and gave them a superior vantage point from which to hurl missiles. The Quraysh were bewildered. They had never seen anything so un-sporting in their lives!
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Their cavalry, which was their pride and joy, was useless. From time to time, one of their horsemen would try to lead a dashing charge towards the enemy lines, only to screech absurdly to a halt when he arrived at the dugout.

The siege lasted only a month, but it seemed endless. Feeding and supplying the allies of Medina as well as their own people put a great strain on the city’s resources. Ibn Ubayy and his party accused Muhammad of bringing ruin upon them
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and the Jewish tribe of Qurayzah openly supported the Quraysh. The Jews of Khaybar had contributed a large squadron to the Meccan army, which included many of the exiled tribe of Nadir. Before the arrival of the Meccan army, Huyay ibn Akhtab, chief of Nadir, had tried to persuade Qurayzah either to attack the Muslims from the rear or to smuggle two thousand Nadiris into the oasis to slaughter the women and children in the fortresses. Initially Qurayzah were hesitant, but when they saw the vast Meccan army filling the plain in front of the city as far as the eye could see, their chief agreed to help the confederacy and provide the Quraysh with weapons and supplies. When Muhammad heard of this treachery, he was visibly distressed. He sent Sa‘d ibn Mu‘adh, who had been Qurayzah’s chief Arab ally before the hijrah, to negotiate, but to no avail. At one point, the Qurayzah actually started to attack the fortresses on the southeast of the settlement, but the effort petered out. For about three weeks, it was quite unclear which way they would go.

Throughout the Battle of the Trench, as the siege became known, the Muslims were terrified. Faced with the prospect of extermination, some came close to despair. “Your eyes swerved and your hearts reached your throats,” the Qur’an recalled, “while you thought strange thoughts about God; here it was that the believers were tried and shaken most mightily.”
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But even as those inside the city trembled, on the other side of the ditch, the Quraysh were becoming exhausted. They had inadequate provisions and their inexperience in military affairs meant that they were easily demoralized by a sudden reversal. Their resolve finally snapped when a violent rainstorm devastated their camp. Abu Sufyan recognized defeat. Horses and camels were dying, the Qurayzah had failed to deliver, and his troops had no tents, fires, or cooking pots. “Be off,” he announced to his men, “for I am going.”
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When the Muslims peered over the escarpment the next morning, the plain was completely deserted.

But what was Muhammad to do about Qurayzah? The departure of the Quraysh had not weakened the bitter opposition to his leadership within Medina: His opponents were convinced that the Meccans would return in the not too distant future and wreak terrible vengeance for their humiliation, so they intensified their campaign against him. The settlement was on the brink of civil war and in this explosive climate, the Qurayzah could not remain unpunished. The day after the departure of the Meccan army, Muhammad’s troops surrounded the fortress of Qurayzah, who asked that they be permitted to leave on the same terms as Qaynuqa‘ and Nadir. But this time Muhammad refused: Nadir had proved to be just as dangerous to the ummah in exile. The elders of Qurayzah agreed to accept the arbitration of their former ally Sa‘d ibn Mu‘adh, who had been severely wounded during the siege and was carried to the Qurayzah village on a litter. Even though some of the other tribes asked him to be merciful, Sa‘d believed that the Qurayzah were an unacceptable security risk and made the conventional judgment: all seven hundred men of the tribe should be executed, their wives and children sold into slavery, and their property divided among the Muslims. When he heard the verdict, Muhammad is reported to have cried: “You have judged according to the ruling of Allah above the seven skies!”
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The next day, the sentence was carried out.