In Search of the Real Muhammad – Part 1 of 4

[Order a copy of Robert Spencer’s forthcoming book, Muhammad: A Critical Biography, by clicking here.]

He is one of the most enduringly influential men who ever lived. To this day, multitudes of people the world over strive to follow his example. For some, this takes the form of unspeakably violent and savage acts, and yet he is widely revered as the greatest man who ever walked on planet earth. Many take his words and deeds not just as justifications for barbarism, but as a battle plan for the conquest and subjugation of those who do not believe in him.

That’s why it’s of cardinal importance for Americans, and all free people, to be familiar with the life and words of Muhammad, the prophet of Islam.

Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, is without any doubt one of the most significant personalities in history. He is revered as a prophet by well over a billion people today. Those who are devoted to his teachings insist that they regard him as a mere human being. Yet they accord Muhammad a status that no other human being has ever enjoyed: he is even not to be pictured, as the mere depiction of so wondrous a man could tempt lesser human beings to idolatry. The religion he founded has now spread to every corner of the globe and is aggressively and confidently expanding in a confused and demoralized post-Christian West. Even some who do not accept that he was the last and greatest prophet of the one true God readily avow that he was an extraordinary individual.

Islamic scholars state that the reason for this is simple: Muhammad and his Qur’an shine forth with such magnificence and wisdom that any unbiased observer will notice their radiance. The contemporary Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan states that “the Prophet came to humankind with a message of faith, ethics, and hope…. Though Muhammad came with this message, throughout his life he kept listening to women, children, men, slaves, rich, and poor, as well as outcasts. He listened to, welcomed, and comforted them.”

Another modern-day scholar of Muhammad, Yahiya Emerick, says that “regardless of whether one agrees with the applicability of Islam in politics or society, Muhammad did transform the warring Arab tribes into a new kind of civilization, one based on faith in God and the essential brotherhood of all people.”

It is easy to find non-Muslims who have shared in this admiration. The nineteenth-century American writer Washington Irving, who gave us Rip Van Winkle and Ichabod Crane, was not uncritical of Muhammad, but he did assert that “his intellectual qualities were undoubtedly of an extraordinary kind. He had a quick apprehension, a retentive memory, a vivid imagination, and an inventive genius. Owing but little to education, he had quickened and informed his mind by close observation, andstored it with a great variety of knowledge concerning the systems of religion current in his day, or handed down by tradition from antiquity. His ordinary discourse was grave and sententious, abounding with those aphorisms and apologues so popular among the Arabs; at times he was excited and eloquent, and his eloquence was aided by a voice musical and sonorous.” Irving is not alone in making this assessment based upon Muhammad as he is depicted in early Islamic sources and presenting it as if it were simple historical fact.

In a similar vein, the twentieth-century English historian W. Montgomery Watt rejects the possibility that Muhammad was fabricating his claim to prophethood and asserts that there is “a good case to be made out for believing in Muhammad’s sincerity. His readiness to undergo persecutions for his beliefs, the high moral character of the men who believed in him and looked up to him as leader, and the greatness of his ultimate achievement—all argue his fundamental integrity. To suppose Muhammad an impostor raises more problems than it solves. Moreover, none of the great figures of history is so poorly appreciated in the West as Muhammad.”

Early in the twenty-first century, the ex-nun and Islamic apologist Karen Armstrong asserted that the jihad attacks of September 11, 2001, in New York and Washington would have horrified Muhammad, for he “spent most of his life trying to stop that kind of indiscriminate slaughter.” She even claimed that Muhammad “eventually abjured violence and pursued a daring, inspired policy of non-violence that was worthy of Gandhi.”

Respected for his message, admired for his integrity, revered for his connection to the divine: Muhammad is all that and more. And in mainstream academic circles, few entertain any serious doubts about the historical reliability of the early Islamic accounts of his life. It was in 1851 that the French historian Ernest Renan made his oft-quoted assertion that Islam “was born in the full light of history,” yet nearly two centuries later, most historians still take that view for granted, albeit without examining in any depth the issues involved.

Much more recently, the novelist Salman Rushdie, who spent years in hiding and ultimately was critically injured for the crime of mocking Muhammad, likewise confidently asserted that “for the life of Muhammad, we know everything more or less. We know where he lived, what his economic situation was, who he fell in love with.” Rushdie’s statement would have been more accurate if he had said that there are Islamic sources that claim to give us all this information about Muhammad.

Renan’s claim, likewise, would be closer to the truth had he said that “the earliest Islamic sources purport to show us Islam being born in the full light of history.” Yet that light was not, in fact, switched on until well over a century after Muhammad lived. There was a tremendous proliferation of material about his life in the ninth century, but that was fully two centuries after the traditionally accepted date of his death.

Whether for fear of incurring a death fatwa and a life-threatening attack like Rushdie or the opprobrium of their peers for being “Islamophobic,” however, Western academics have been hesitant to examine the historicity of Muhammad or the reliability of the Islamic accounts of Islam’s origins.

The question of who Muhammad really was, if he was anyone at all, and what he really said and did, has enormous implications for Muslims and non-Muslims worldwide. If he did not say and do what he is depicted as saying and doing in the Islamic literature, the entire jihad against the U.S. and the West is based on false pretenses. Hamas, Hizballah, Iran and the rest are trying to destroy Israel based on what they think are divine commands, but which actually have no foundation. Millions of women put up with oppression in fidelity to a god who isn’t there.

This question has never been explored in depth. Until now.  

The material in this article is adapted from the book Muhammad: A Critical Biography, in which you can find out a great deal more about the search for the real Muhammad.