The Importance of Studying the Biography of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ
In the 19th century, numerous approaches to writing history emerged alongside the objective method, also known as the scientific school. Most of these other approaches converge under what is termed the “subjective method”. Sigmund Freud, the Austrian psychologist, psychoanalyst and neurologist of Jewish descent, is considered one of the most prominent proponents and enthusiasts of this approach.
Proponents of this school see no harm in a historian incorporating their own personal perspective, their ideological, religious, or political leanings, into the interpretation and analysis of events, or into the judgments made about the figures involved in those events. On the contrary, they argue that this is an essential duty of the historian, which extends well beyond the mere description of events or the collection of raw facts.
This approach reduces the writing of history to a purely decorative endeavor, precluding it from being regarded as a rigorous scientific undertaking.
While it is not our intention here to discuss or critique various schools of historiography, we must express our concern that such an approach continues to find advocates and adherents even in this age of scientific progress. This is because such a school, driven by imagination, base desires and fanaticism, is virtually guaranteed to distort facts and events. How many facts have been misrepresented, events misconstrued, the legacies of noble figures erased and innocent people wronged under the sway of this illusory and unjust form of judgment?
The origins of this school can be traced back to the period of the British occupation of Egypt, a time when, as we know, Egypt was considered the centre of the Islamic world. People turned their minds toward it whenever they sought to learn something about Islam, just as they turned their faces toward the Kaaba whenever they wished to perform the Hajj or offer prayers.
The enduring resonance of this magnificent voice, coupled with the unwavering obedience of the Islamic world, denied the British occupation any opportunity to settle in and establish a permanent foothold. No matter how ruthlessly Britain sought to subjugate the territory through fire and steel, such control remained both temporary and precarious as long as Al-Azhar University continued to provide living, active leadership. Consequently, the British occupation felt compelled to pursue one of two strategies: either sever the bond between Al-Azhar and the Muslim community, thereby stripping the institution of its authority, or infiltrate the leadership of Al-Azhar itself, steering its direction to serve the interests of the occupiers and paving the way for a state of calm and stability.
Britain did not hesitate to choose the second approach, as it was easier to execute and far more difficult to detect or trace. The only viable path to infiltrating the scholarly and intellectual leadership within Al-Azhar was to exploit a profound vulnerability that afflicted the Muslim community at large, and in Egypt in particular: a deep-seated anxiety among Muslims regarding the losses, backwardness and fragmentation they had suffered, a situation made starker by their observation of the West’s remarkable ascent across the intellectual, scientific, and cultural spheres.
Undoubtedly, Muslims eagerly awaited the day they would be freed from the burdens that had held them back, allowing them to join others on a journey toward civilisation, culture, and modern science.
In this context, the incitements and schemes of the colonialists took root in the minds of certain intellectual leaders in Egypt. The core of these suggestions was that the West had only broken free from its shackles by subjecting religion to the criteria of science. Religion and science, they argued, are distinct realms; harmony between them is possible only if the former is subordinated to the latter. Consequently, if the Muslim world truly aspires to liberation, it must inevitably follow the same path: interpreting Islam in the same way the Christian West interprets its own religion. This, they claimed, could only be achieved if Islamic ideology shed its belief in the “unseen”, that which lies beyond the scope of modern science and its established criteria.
Before long, those who were deeply impressed by the rise of modern Europe succumbed to these ideas. These were individuals whose hearts lacked a firm, rooted faith in Allah ﷻ, and who failed to grasp the true nature of modern science and its underlying principles. They began to urge one another to abandon any belief in the “unseen”, that which has not been reached by modern scientific discovery and which cannot be subjected to experimentation or human observation.
These individuals embarked on what would later be termed “religious reforms”. This endeavor necessitated several shifts, including a new approach to documenting and interpreting the life of the Prophet ﷺ, as well as the application of novel methods in analyzing his biography.
The subjective method of writing history was the best cover for them, helping them achieve their goals. Books and records of the biography of the Prophet ﷺ began to appear, replacing the scales of authenticity of the message’s transmission, the chain of its transmitters and the rules and conditions of its transmission with the method of personal inference, the scales of self-satisfaction and the deductive method, which is governed only by the motivation, hidden goals of the writer and his ideological affiliation with a particular school.
Relying on this method, writers began to consider improbable that which does not correspond to the usual order of things, such as the miracles and unusual phenomena mentioned in the biography of the Messenger of God ﷺ. They began to spread claims that the Prophet ﷺ possessed only the qualities of a genius, a great man, a hero and the like. Thus, distracting the reader from the qualities that could lead them to believe in prophecy and revelation, which constitute the most important values in the personality of the Prophet ﷺ.
Husayn Heikal’s “The Life of Muhammad” is considered the most striking example of this school of thought in writing about the Prophet’s ﷺ life. Its author openly and proudly declares this approach, writing, “I did not use what is written in books on the life of the Prophet ﷺ or books on hadith, as I preferred to follow a scientific path in this research.”
Thus, the leaders of this new school, following a subjective method in writing history, found ample scope, allowing them to discard all those facts from the life of the Prophet ﷺ that they disliked, despite the irrefutable evidence with which they are supported, making their personal aspirations, desires and distant goals the absolute judge of historical facts.
We have seen, for example, how any unusual phenomenon, indicated by a hadith transmitted by a large number of narrators, or explicitly mentioned in the Koran, is interpreted, even if done in a forced and contrived manner, in a way that fits the normal order of things and serves the intended purpose.
Flocks of birds (tayrun ababil) are interpreted, despite the clear verse, as smallpox. The Night Journey (al-Isra’), clearly mentioned in the Koran, is interpreted as the soul’s journey into the world of dreams. The angels with whom Allah ﷻ supported the Muslims in the Battle of Badr are interpreted as moral support provided by the Almighty God.
And finally: the prophethood of the Messenger of God ﷺ, the Companions’ faith in him, and the Muslim conquests in general are interpreted as if all of this was a revolution of the left against the right, driven by economic impulses, the search for food and territorial expansion. This revolution was sparked by the opposition of the poor to the rich and feudal lords of the time.
To be continued…
