Page 136 - The Miracles of Our Prophet (saas)
P. 136
The Miracles of our Prophet (saas)
They wish that you would con cil i ate with them, then they
too would be con cil i at ing. (Surat al-Qalam: 9)
In spite of all of fers, ma te ri al and oth er wise, our Prophet
(saas) per se vered and ig nored the many threats he re ceived. In
Musnad, Ibn Abi Shaybah re lates Utbah's un seem ly of fer to our
Prophet (saas): "If you want mon ey, we will col lect enough mon ey
for you so that you will be the rich est of us. If you want lead er ship, we
will take you as our lead er and nev er de cide on any mat ter with out
your ap prov al. If you want a king dom, we will crown you king over
us..." 43
Our Prophet (saas) put win ning Allah's ap prov al above
ev ery thing else; the on ly re ward he want ed was Allah's mer cy
and to at tain Paradise. No world ly of fer of wealth or po si tion
could de ter him. Allah had al ready grant ed him vic to ry and
abun dant pos ses sions in this world, and there was no doubt
that the re ward wait ing for him in Paradise would be even
great er. Many prom i nent un be liev ers tried to per suade him to
aban don his mis sion; when they fail ed, they re sort ed to treach -
ery and plans in volv ing his ex ile, ar rest, and even mur der.
Islamic sour ces re late these events:
According to Ibn Ishaq, the Qurayshi lead ers met and con sult ed
each oth er: "You know what de gree this in di vid u al has come to." At
this they be gan dis cuss ing. One of them said: "Let's im pris on him
some where, let ting him speak to no body, and let's keep him there
un til he dies! Let's give him just enough food to keep him alive!…"
But there were ob jec tions to this pro pos al. Such an in i ti a tive could
lead to cha os. One of them said: "Let's not im pris on him; let's re -
move him from Mecca." But this was al so re gard ed as in ap pro pri -
ate, be cause "Muhammad (saas) would go to any Arab tribe, bind
them to him with fair words, cause them to fol low him and have
134