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Muhammad: The Man and the Prophet

This post is part of our ongoing series featuring the works of Professor LeBoeuf 's students in her Introduction to Religions of Asia course at Whittier College!

The man Muhammad himself was born into a family that was higher up in the social status than most people. However, the man himself was born as an orphan and was raised by his uncle and aunt. He lived with them in their house, however like most of the people of the time was also never taught to read and write. They were illiterate, and that was just life in the area that they lived in.

At about the age of 25 years old, he got married to the women who was his first wife. And he started he progressed in his business. As Muhammad grew up he found himself getting away and going to meditate and pray in the Hira mountains and caves. This is the place of his revelations, and where he was very first started getting these dreams, and some call them visions. They would come true and he began to grow slightly curious as to what this meant. This revelation would become true and evident that it was a sign from Allah because, one night he was in the cave and was visited by a presence or such as the angel Gabriel. The angel told him to RECITE the scripture that he was out holding. Muhammad growing up the way he did not know how to read. And so the angel told him once more to recite it and Muhammad did so. There was no way to deny that he was being spoken to or trying to be used by Allah.

He was scared to tell anyone of what happened or what had been happening so he kept these things to himself for a while. As he continued to pray and meditate, he received more revelations. After many different, encounters with the divine he eventually got his word out to the public and over many months he began to grow followers. At this time, he was in Mecca and his followers were staying around him. At this time the leader from one of the sides of the civil war of Yathrib called upon Muhammad to come and help the two sides. After a lot of talking and mediating between the two sides, the two sides signed a treaty and came together. This was renamed the city of Medina the holy city in the honor of Muhammad. He spent the next six years here in the city building his own faith as well as growing his followers and showing them the way of life that he was being told by Allah to live.

Eventually after his death the way of life that was started to be lived was the 5 pillars of Islam. These 5 pillars that he taught about were the one, faith, two, prayer, three, almsgiving, for, fasting during Ramadan, five, hajj, which is the pilgrimage to mecca. This was one of the biggest events to happen in religion. Faith was supposed to be declared with the words of the people, they had to speak the words and say a prayer that committed them to the faith. The second pillar of prayer, Muhammad taught that they needed to pray 5 times a day, and this was a sacrifice and a way to show the love and the faith and devotion to God. The third almsgiving was the way that the people were giving back to the people, this means that people would need to give a portion of their yearly income to their mosque and help by sharing and giving their food to the poor. Giving back to the community was definitely the way to go because sharing faith was good to their beliefs. Fourth was Ramadan that was holy holiday that celebrates neglecting the body and showing that the faith was more important than anything. The dedication is there to the faith and the way that there was showing it. They do not need the food to be content for their God is enough to help them. Fifth is the huge trip to Mecca and this was the way to fully show faith. This step is about 9 to 10 days in the making and they would complete a series of tasks.

Muhammad’s last days were spent a lot of his time with his family and with his favorite wife writing the scriptures that many of the people now known as the Qur’an. The end of his life he travelled one last time to mecca for a prayer session, and upon his return he died. Muhammad did not appoint anyone to take his place are the successor. There was no one and hence the giant schism that happened among the believers. Muhammad was never and still being not regarded to as a deity in the religion, he is only the messenger of Allah and is honored as being used and have communicated with God.

About Daniel

Daniel Diaz is19 years old sophomore. His declared major is biology, and he hopes to pursue a career in the medical field. He enjoys running and playing soccer to get away from the stresses of school and work.

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