§ 42. LIFE AND CHAKACTER OF MOHAMMED. 165
The revelations continued from time to time for more than twenty years. When asked how they were delivered to him, he replied (as reported by Ayesha) : " Sometimes like the sound of a bell — a kind of communication which was very severe for me ; and when the sounds ceased, I found myself aware of the instructions. And sometimes the angel would come in the form of a man, and converse with me, and all his words I remem bered."
After his call, Mohammed labored first for three years among his family and friends, under great discouragements, making about forty converts, of whom his wife Chadijah was the first, his father-in-law, Abu Bakr, and the young, energetic Omar the most important. His daughter Fatima, his adopted son All, and his slave Zayd likewise believed in his divine mission. Then he publicly announced his determination to assume by command of God the office of prophet and lawgiver, preached to the pilgrims flocking to Mecca, attacked Meccan idolatry, reasoned with his opponents, answered their demand for mira cles by producing the Koran " leaf by leaf," as occasion de manded, and provoked persecution and civil commotion. lie was forced in the year 622 to ilee for his life with his followers from Mecca to Medina (El-Medina an-Nabi, the City of the Pro phet), a distance of two hundred and fifty miles North, or ten days' journey over the sands and rocks of the desert.
This flight or emigration, called Ilegira or Ilidxlira, marks the beginning of his wonderful success, and of the Mohammedan era (July 15, 622). He was recognized in Medina as prophet and lawgiver. At first he proclaimed toleration: "Let there be no compulsion in religion;" but afterwards he revealed the opposite principle that all unbelievers must be summoned to Islam, tribute, or the sword. With an increasing army of his enthusiastic followers, he took the field against his enemies, gained in 624 his first victory over the Koreish with an army of 305 (mostly citizens of Medina) against a force twice as large, conquered several Jewish and Christian tribes, ordered
166 FOURTH PEKIOD. A. D. 590-1049.
and watched in person the massacre of six hundred Jews in one day,1 while their wives and children were sold into slavery (627), triumphantly entered Mecca (630), demolished the three hundred and sixty idols of the Kaaba, and became master of Arabia. The Koreish were overawed by his success, and now shouted : " There is but one God, and Mohammed is his prophet." The various tribes were melted into a nation, and their old hereditary feuds changed into a common fanatical hatred of the infidels, as the followers of all other religions were called. The last chapter of the Koran commands the remorseless extermina tion of all idolaters in Arabia, unless they submit within four months.
In the tenth year of the Hegira, the prophet made his last pilgrimage to Mecca at the head of forty thousand Moslems, instructed them in all important ordinances, and exhorted them to protect the weak, the poor, and the women, and to abstain from usury. He planned a large campaign against the Greeks.
But soon after his return to Medina, he died of a violent fever in the house and the arms of Ayesha, June 8, 632, in the sixtythird year of his age, and was buried on the spot where he died, which is now enclosed by a mosque. He suffered great pain, cried and wailed, turned on his couch in despair, and said to his wives when they expressed their surprise at his conduct: "Do ye not know that prophets have to suffer more than all others? One was eaten up by vermin; another died so poor that he had nothing but rags to cover his shame; but their reward will be all the greater in the life beyond." Among his last utterances were : "The Lord destroy the Jews and Christians! Let his anger be kindled against those that turn the tombs of their prophets into places of worship! O Lord, let not my tomb be an object of worship ! Let there not remain any faith but that of Islam throughout the whole of Arabia. . . . Gabriel, come close to me! Lord, grant me pardon and join
1 So Sprenger, III. 221. Others give seven hundred and ninety as the num ber of Jews who were beheaded in a ditch.