Muhammad (Paperback)

This is by far the best book in the english language, based on original sources, about the life of Muhammad.

Now to specifics:

A look on page 349 of his "Muhammad..." gives us his "Key to References". These are his "earliest sources". They are:

1. Ibn Ishaq's "Sirat Rasul Allah", as edited by Ibn Hisham. 2. M. ibn Sa'd's "Kitab at-Tabaqat al-Kabir 3. Waqidi's "Kitab al-Maghazi"

All of these Lings correctly dates to "the eighth and ninth centuries". That is, 100-200 years after Muhammad died.

He also lists as minor references:

al-Azraqi: "Akhabar Makkah (A history of Mecca) al-Tabari: "Ta'rikh al-Rusulwa l-Muluk (The History of the Messenger and the Kings); and his "Tafsir" (a commentary on the Qur'an) as-Suhayli: "as-Rawd al-unuf (a commentary on ibn Ishaq)

Also: various eighth and ninth century collections of Hadiths

Also, the "11th century traditionists":

al-Bayhaqi "Kitab as-unan al-Kubra" al-Bagwahi "Miskat al-Masabih"

The earliest of these sources is that of ibn-Ishaq. He wrote in the middle 700's, meaning about 120 years after Muhammad died. Ibn-Ishaq's work is lost, but we have ibn-Hisham's edited version of it. Ibn-Hisham died in 833, about 200 years after Muhammad.

So, what are the "earliest sources"? They are materials that include not one eye-witness. They include no artifacts or written documents from the time of Muhammad. They instead date to 100 years *and much more* after Muhammad died, leaving plenty of time for the creation of legend and hyperbole in the oral histories that were their source materials.

An example of this legend-building is given in Michael Cook's highly recommended little book "Muhammad" (Oxford U. Press, 1996, Oxford). He shows that the earlier authors such as ibn-Ishaq say that the death of Muhammad's father Abdallah is shrouded in uncertainty. Waqidi, however, writing 50 years after ibn-Hisham, knows just where Abdallah was going at the time of his death, what he was doing, his age, and just exactly where Abdallah was buried. Cook points out that Waqidi is similarly exact and specific in many other aspects of Muhammad's life where earlier authors register uncertainty.

So, we have later authors full of details where early authors were full of ambiguity. How could Waqidi have known in AH 190 (820 CE) what ibn-Ishaq did *not* know in AH 120 (740, CE), with ibn-Ishaq a full 80 years closer to the events they both relate? Waqidi knew because those 80 intervening years saw the invention of additional specious "history".

Cook writes (p. 65) that "false ascription was rife in eighth century authors ... [and] ... numerous traditions on questions of dogma and law were provided with spurious claims of authorities by those who put them into circulation."

The conclusion? That the traditions on which ibn-Ishaq's biography of Muhammad were based were oral not written, they were corrupted with manufactured and tendentious stories of Muhammad's life, and that manufacture gives evidence of having continued right up to the time of Waqidi.

So, the "earliest sources" were not particularly early and are not particularly trustworthy. As a further indication of the ambiguity in this matter, the earliest non-Muslim documents, which date to 12 AH (634 CE) speak of Mohammed as still alive - two years after the 100-year-later Muslim traditions have him as dead. These sorts of contradictory evidences do not bode well for a conclusion of accurate history. Many large grains of salt are necessary for the swallowing of this.

What of Martin Lings? I found two more of his books in my unavailing search for a biographical note. Those books are "Ancient Beliefs and Modern Superstitions" (Unwin, 1980, London) and "The Eleventh Hour" (Quinta Essentia, 1987, Cambridge).

In "Ancient Beliefs...", Appendix 1 shows him to be a young-Earth creationist. He rejects biological evolution and, defending a world-wide Noachic Flood, asserts that geology is "hostile to the theory of evolution". This assertion is a gigantic and misconceived inversion of fact.

These two other books reveal Lings to be an ardent anti-science religionist. It doesn't appear to be important what religion you believe so long as you believe passionately and with a concomitant rejection of all that is rational. He explicitly describes urban society to be the source of contemporary evil, with purity of life embedded in nomadic pastoralism. He describes the invention of agriculture as the first long step into the degrading evils of rational thought, city life, sin and non-belief.

Does a man of these views seem to you a credible source for a proper historical treatment of the life of Muhammad? Neither the sources nor the author provide any confidence at all that what we get in "Muhammad: his life..." is in any way factual.