You can’t be a feminist and support islam, christianity or any other patriarchal cult. You simply can’t. I mean, you can convince yourself you are THE BEST feminist and say nothing about the girls who get their vaginas mutilated thanks to religion, but that doesn’t mean you actually ARE.
Some Islamic schools in the UK are deadass teaching this book to their female students and telling them that they’ll go to hell for not covering themselves. V empowering tho! (The whole
thing is available online if you want to learn how to avoid the flames of jahannam!)
Some Islamic schools in the UK are deadass teaching this book to their female students and telling them that they’ll go to hell for not covering themselves. V empowering tho! (The whole
thing is available online if you want to learn how to avoid the flames of jahannam!)
Today we’re going to talk about the early Muslim days in Mecca. Like certain other religions, Islam has a permanent martyr complex, and so Muslim children have, for generations, been taught that the early Muslims were victims of evil persecutors. What’s unique about Islam is that early Islamic sources actually exist detailing the treatment of Muslims during this period and they are… completely out-of-step with modern-day perceptions.
At the time of Mohammed’s birth, Mecca was a prosperous center of trade. It’s located here, for those who don’t know, in the Hijaz region of what is now Saudi Arabia, close to the Red Sea. Because much of the region is barren land unable to be used for agriculture, trade was the lifeblood of the entire area. Caravans would go to and from Mecca as part of a trade route, traveling all the way north to the Syria region, enabling interaction with all sorts of religious and ethnic groups, namely the Byzantines to the northwest, the Persians to the northeast, and the lands of both empires’ Arab vassal states to the immediate north. Other routes included a southern coastal route that went into Yemen and a western route across the sea to East African coastal cities. Different caravans and different families specialized in different goods; Abu Bakr’s family, for example, specialized as cloth merchants.
What is known about Mohammed’s early life mostly comes from the ahadith and biographies. Mohammed and most of his early followers were born in Mecca. He, Abu Bakr, Ali, Umar, and several prominent others were born into clans of the Quraysh tribe, which controlled Mecca and the surrounding area. While members of all religions were allowed in Mecca and made pilgrimage to the Kaaba, the
Quraysh practiced traditional Arabian polytheism, an old tradition based largely around rocks and stones (thus the Kaaba and many of the traditions of the hajj). Like most polytheistic systems, there were many gods, some of whom were worshiped more than others; Allah (simply meaning “god”) was a father-god figure. Mecca had temples devoted to various gods, and the Kaaba itself housed idols of hundreds of gods.
Because Mohammed’s parents both died when he was young (his father actually died before he was born), he was raised first by his grandfather and then by his uncle Abu Talib, who was the leader of Mohammed’s clan, the Banu Hashim. Abu Talib was known for his poetry and catered to pilgrims visiting Mecca; he was also, like most prominent Meccans, a trader who traveled as part of a caravan. Mohammed accompanied his uncle on his travels as a young boy and remained in the trading industry thereafter.
When he was in his 20s, Mohammed was employed by a wealthy business owner named Khadija, who was over a decade his senior. Khadija was very respected in Mecca; she had inherited her deceased husband’s business, which was not profitable at the time, and turned it into a large and well-known caravan. Mohammed was successful as her employee and returned a higher profit than expected, and she asked him to marry her. He said yes and they remained married for over 20 years; Mohammed began to preach and practice polygamy only after her death. They had several children, though it’s unclear exactly how many. At least four daughters survived into adulthood, but all died fairly young, in their 20s or 30s. No sons survived. (Some sects of Islam believe that Fatima was their only biological daughter, with the other three being adopted, but there is nothing to support this.)
Mohammed continued his life as a trader until the year 610 AD, at which point he became a “prophet”. During the first year or two, “Muslims” basically meant Mohammed’s close family and friends. Three or four years after his first “revelations”, he went public and began openly declaring the terms of his new religion and seeking converts from the population. This long intro brings us to the actual topic of this history lesson, namely the status of early Muslims in Mecca. Hagiographies, especially later ones, tend to present them as persecuted victims living in fear of their lives. Reality is a bit less saint-like.
As we have already seen and will continue to see, Mohammed’s preaching was not what might be called subtle or tolerant. Mecca was a religiously pluralistic
society dominated by polytheists; Mohammed yelled about how everyone who didn’t believe him was going to be burned in a fire forever. The
Meccans were not amused, though–let the record show–this did not mean they were violent. They were simply irritated and sometimes mocked Mohammed’s ridiculous “revelations”, especially as he began to attack their beliefs more and more frequently. Ibn Ishaq’s 8th century biography of Mohammed has an interesting little tale regarding that:
[Meccan
leaders] went to Abu Talib and said: “You know your
rank with us and now that you are at the point of death we are deeply
concerned on your account. You know the trouble that exists between us
and your nephew, so call him and let us make an agreement that he will
leave us alone and we will leave him alone; let him have his religion
and we will have ours.”
After being told this, Mohammed’s response to the Meccans was to demand:
“You must say ‘There is no God but Allah’ and you must repudiate what you worship beside him.”
The Meccans realized Mohammed was a lost cause and left.
Then
they said to one another, “This fellow is not going to give you
anything you want, so go on and continue with the religion of your
fathers until God judge between us.” So saying they departed.
Again: this one of the most respected early biographies of Mohammed. Mohammed is supposed to come across as good here.
Anyway,
the Meccans were greatly annoyed with Mohammed, who insulted them and demanded they convert in exchange for communal peace and tolerance. But they didn’t do anything to him–in fact they really couldn’t do anything to him, as his family (courtesy of both Khadija and Abu Talib) was too respected for anyone to attack him. The worst incident of physical aggression recorded against Mohammed in Mecca is someone grabbing his clothes once.
But after some years of Mohammed’s tedious “you’re all going to hell” sermons,
things began to get physical. The same biography as the above states
that the “first blood to be shed in Islam” came from Saad, one of
Mohammed’s early followers, who beat up a polytheist with a camel’s bone
(…lol) for being rude; it later describes another early follower,
Hamza, as striking a man named Abu Jahl with his bow for no reason other
than Abu Jahl was calling Mohammed a lunatic.
Later
Islamic histories invented many tales of persecution and martyrdom of
Muslims by the Meccans, based largely on Mohammed sending some of his followers to a “safe haven” in Ethiopia (where they lived comfortably) for a short period. Ethiopia was chosen because it was the nearest non-polytheist territory. Those late historians, and many modern-day Muslims, believed that this demonstrates that Muslims lived in fear and were being threatened with death. Often this period is described as “exile”; in reality, Mohammed was the one who told them to leave, not the Meccans, and Muslims (including Mohammed and his entire family) continued to live in Mecca without losing their lives throughout this period. While scuffles and minor fights between individuals did occur, usually because Mohammed and his followers were openly being horrible dicks, they were not even remotely deadly. Living abroad for short periods of time was not seen as unusual at the time, and many Meccan men spent years away from home (the vast majority of those who had moved to Ethiopia were men). The circumstances of the “exile” were not exactly as desperate as some modern-day writers like to pretend.
In reality there is only one Muslim who
even plausibly died of Meccan persecution in the entire 13 years of
Muslim presence there. This would be Sumayyah, a slave woman, mentioned again in Ibn Ishaq’s biography. While later sources coalesced around a shocking story of how she was speared in the groin by Abu Jahl, more reputable sources imply she simply died from dehydration or exhaustion, as she was made to stand in the sun for extended periods of time. (The spearing story is almost assuredly false propaganda against Abu Jahl, who was later a military enemy of the Muslims; the idea that one of Mohammed’s followers was murdered in such a brutal way and he never even mentioned her is simply illogical. Moreover, even in his worst Medinan suwar, Mohammed never accused the Meccans of killing any Muslims, only of “persecuting” them by not allowing them to perform the hajj, etc. To me, these facts–combined with the absence of her death from the ahadith–suggest that she was not killed at all.) Later sources invented a story about how her husband Yasir also died in a similar manner, though no early sources say this and it is certainly an invention. Sumayyah is thus the only Muslim who even possibly died in Mecca of any form of persecution. Her death is not mentioned in the two most reputable ahadith collections and some histories say she never died at all and remarried after her husband’s death, so it is unclear whether this entire story is made up or not, but it is nonetheless within the realm of possibility. Beyond this one woman, absolutely zero Muslims died of persecution at the hands of the evil, intolerant Meccans in any way.
Why, then, did the Muslims pack up and move to Medina, if they weren’t terrified and fleeing for their lives?
Problems began around the year 619 AD, when both Abu Talib and Khadija died of disease within a month of one another. Mohammed was still a member of an influential
Quraysh clan, but his protectors were now gone, and he had made a whole lot of people angry over the past decade. Al-Tabari preserves a hadith in which the leaders of Mecca state:
He has derided our traditional values, abused our forefathers, reviled our religion, caused division among us, and insulted our gods.
The same account has Mohammed stating the following and the Meccans getting a bit worried:
Hear, men of Quraysh. By Him in whose hand
Muhammad’s soul rests, I have brought you slaughter.
Clearly there was no love lost between Mohammed and the polytheists. Tensions were at their highest point yet in this period, between 619 and 622. By this point, dozens of people from other central Arabian cities (mostly Medina/Yathrib) had converted to Islam, and some had traveled to Mecca to meet him. At such a gathering Mohammed asked his followers to swear allegiance to him. The pledge included a declaration that they would fight for him.
You are in fact avowing that you will fight against all and sundry.
The Meccans were naturally furious after they heard rumors of this and demanded answers from the leaders of Medina. The Medinans, though, being mostly polytheists, had absolutely no idea that this incident happened and swore that they would never support any such thing. The Muslims of Medina tried to hide the pledge, but it was eventually discovered, and the Meccans arrested a few of their leaders–reluctantly releasing them later to preserve peaceful tribal relations.
This was the last straw. Mohammed was effectively amassing outside followers sworn to his side in battle and in the Meccans’ eyes had become not just a lunatic but a dangerous lunatic. With the prospect of a surprise attack carried out by Mohammed’s Medinan followers now a legitimate possibility, the leaders of Mecca called a council to order. It was decided that Mohammed simply had to be dealt with. Though popular Muslim imagination has long held that this meant his death, mostly because it just makes a better and more dramatic story, there is nothing really to suggest this–they wanted to arrest and exile him. Early histories state quite plainly that they just wanted Mohammed gone and were happy once he left. (Popular imagination further dramatizes the story by inventing tales, with no basis in any historical account, of the Meccans sending secret hit squads to hunt down Mohammed or planning a raid to kill him in Medina. In reality there was absolutely no movement by the Meccans towards Medina at all until years after Mohammed’s arrival there, after the raid leading to Badr and after Badr itself.)
Notably, the decision to kick Mohammed out of Mecca did not extend to all Muslims. Mohammed’s followers chose to leave with him.
Those who wanted to leave were allowed to do so with zero violence or threats, with Mohammed’s
son-in-law Ali and daughter Fatima remaining in Mecca after Mohammed
left in order to settle some business accounts. From al-Tabari:
Ali stayed in Makkah for three days after the migration of the Prophet and during this period he returned to their owners the things which they had entrusted (to the Prophet)
Others stayed. One of Mohammed’s own daughters remained in Mecca with her non-Muslim husband, as did several other Muslims, who appear to have lived in peace with the Meccans.
In fact, even after the raid that eventually led to the Battle of Badr
(and the multiple raids before that), Muslims were still living just fine in Mecca, with zero accounts of any Muslims dying of persecution or even being harmed during this period. Ibn Kathir states that far from hiding their faith, they were openly known to be Muslims and even defended their brothers-in-religion (with bullshit, but that’s not the point!):
The Quraysh said that Muhammad and his Companions violated the sanctity of the Sacred Month and shed blood, confiscated property and took prisoners during it. Those who refuted them among the Muslims who remained in Makkah replied that the Muslims had done that during the month of Sha`ban (which is not a sacred month).
The Muslims of Mecca felt fully comfortable saying “yeah okay the Muslims in Medina killed a trader from Mecca and stole his shit but it wasn’t actually during a truce month so it’s not that bad.” It doesn’t even say they faced any repercussions or suspicions for this! And as we’ve already seen, the Quran even complains that some fought with the Meccans against Mohammed’s followers after the latter’s caravan-raiding shenanigans that we’ve talked about, and Mohammed/Allah plainly does not buy any excuses about them being persecuted or forced into doing so. (Also stay tuned for a certain treaty that we’ll talk about in surah 9, which Mohammed breaks while the damn ink is still drying, and the Meccans still don’t do anything.)
In short, Mohammed was correctly perceived to be setting himself up as a warlord, gathering followers sworn to his side in battle, and was kicked out of Mecca out of fear that he would use these followers to take over the city… as eventually happened, of course. Once he left, the Meccans not only did not attack him or his followers in his new base of power, but also did not attack his followers still within Mecca, since they were being peaceful and not causing trouble. Armed conflict only came after Mohammed’s people acted in a blatantly criminal and murderous way, and only after the Meccans heard Mohammed defend this in person. And note that the first battle, Badr, occurred only after Mohammed readied an army to raid another caravan. The Meccan’s army was defending their own goods (which, as I’ve said before, absolutely were not “stolen” from the Muslims according to any reputable sources, despite later stories claiming as much).
When read without one’s hellfire-colored glasses on, the Meccans really get the shit end of the stick in modern-day Islamic histories and the Quran itself. Their behavior as a whole was reasonable and surprisingly tolerant. The society they had established was far more sophisticated and educated than depicted in Islamic propagandist accounts. They were not idiot barbarians longing for a good murderin’ and persecutin’ party–in fact they were not the aggressors in this conflict at all. We can say with full confidence that polytheists were more tolerant of Muslims than vice versa (given that Mohammed banned them from the site after conquering Mecca) and that more unarmed Meccan polytheists were put to death in Mohammed’s first week of controlling Mecca (including a young woman whose crime was… making fun of Islam in songs, who we’ll talk about later) than Meccan Muslims were put to death in the entire era between Mohammed becoming a “prophet” and Mohammed’s people taking control of Mecca.
But they lost the war, and the Muslims won, and so the Muslims got to write the history books and turn their erstwhile enemies into monsters. The Evil Quraysh narrative persists to this day among the majority of Muslims, historicity be damned. With that in mind, let’s dive into surah six, the first long Meccan surah we’ve seen so far.
Today we’re going to talk about the early Muslim days in Mecca. Like certain other religions, Islam has a permanent martyr complex, and so Muslim children have, for generations, been taught that the early Muslims were victims of evil persecutors. What’s unique about Islam is that early Islamic sources actually exist detailing the treatment of Muslims during this period and they are… completely out-of-step with modern-day perceptions.
At the time of Mohammed’s birth, Mecca was a prosperous center of trade. It’s located here, for those who don’t know, in the Hijaz region of what is now Saudi Arabia, close to the Red Sea. Because much of the region is barren land unable to be used for agriculture, trade was the lifeblood of the entire area. Caravans would go to and from Mecca as part of a trade route, traveling all the way north to the Syria region, enabling interaction with all sorts of religious and ethnic groups, namely the Byzantines to the northwest, the Persians to the northeast, and the lands of both empires’ Arab vassal states to the immediate north. Other routes included a southern coastal route that went into Yemen and a western route across the sea to East African coastal cities. Different caravans and different families specialized in different goods; Abu Bakr’s family, for example, specialized as cloth merchants.
What is known about Mohammed’s early life mostly comes from the ahadith and biographies. Mohammed and most of his early followers were born in Mecca. He, Abu Bakr, Ali, Umar, and several prominent others were born into clans of the Quraysh tribe, which controlled Mecca and the surrounding area. While members of all religions were allowed in Mecca and made pilgrimage to the Kaaba, the
Quraysh practiced traditional Arabian polytheism, an old tradition based largely around rocks and stones (thus the Kaaba and many of the traditions of the hajj). Like most polytheistic systems, there were many gods, some of whom were worshiped more than others; Allah (simply meaning “god”) was a father-god figure. Mecca had temples devoted to various gods, and the Kaaba itself housed idols of hundreds of gods.
Because Mohammed’s parents both died when he was young (his father actually died before he was born), he was raised first by his grandfather and then by his uncle Abu Talib, who was the leader of Mohammed’s clan, the Banu Hashim. Abu Talib was known for his poetry and catered to pilgrims visiting Mecca; he was also, like most prominent Meccans, a trader who traveled as part of a caravan. Mohammed accompanied his uncle on his travels as a young boy and remained in the trading industry thereafter.
When he was in his 20s, Mohammed was employed by a wealthy business owner named Khadija, who was over a decade his senior. Khadija was very respected in Mecca; she had inherited her deceased husband’s business, which was not profitable at the time, and turned it into a large and well-known caravan. Mohammed was successful as her employee and returned a higher profit than expected, and she asked him to marry her. He said yes and they remained married for over 20 years; Mohammed began to preach and practice polygamy only after her death. They had several children, though it’s unclear exactly how many. At least four daughters survived into adulthood, but all died fairly young, in their 20s or 30s. No sons survived. (Some sects of Islam believe that Fatima was their only biological daughter, with the other three being adopted, but there is nothing to support this.)
Mohammed continued his life as a trader until the year 610 AD, at which point he became a “prophet”. During the first year or two, “Muslims” basically meant Mohammed’s close family and friends. Three or four years after his first “revelations”, he went public and began openly declaring the terms of his new religion and seeking converts from the population. This long intro brings us to the actual topic of this history lesson, namely the status of early Muslims in Mecca. Hagiographies, especially later ones, tend to present them as persecuted victims living in fear of their lives. Reality is a bit less saint-like.
As we have already seen and will continue to see, Mohammed’s preaching was not what might be called subtle or tolerant. Mecca was a religiously pluralistic
society dominated by polytheists; Mohammed yelled about how everyone who didn’t believe him was going to be burned in a fire forever. The
Meccans were not amused, though–let the record show–this did not mean they were violent. They were simply irritated and sometimes mocked Mohammed’s ridiculous “revelations”, especially as he began to attack their beliefs more and more frequently. Ibn Ishaq’s 8th century biography of Mohammed has an interesting little tale regarding that:
[Meccan
leaders] went to Abu Talib and said: “You know your
rank with us and now that you are at the point of death we are deeply
concerned on your account. You know the trouble that exists between us
and your nephew, so call him and let us make an agreement that he will
leave us alone and we will leave him alone; let him have his religion
and we will have ours.”
After being told this, Mohammed’s response to the Meccans was to demand:
“You must say ‘There is no God but Allah’ and you must repudiate what you worship beside him.”
The Meccans realized Mohammed was a lost cause and left.
Then
they said to one another, “This fellow is not going to give you
anything you want, so go on and continue with the religion of your
fathers until God judge between us.” So saying they departed.
Again: this one of the most respected early biographies of Mohammed. Mohammed is supposed to come across as good here.
Anyway,
the Meccans were greatly annoyed with Mohammed, who insulted them and demanded they convert in exchange for communal peace and tolerance. But they didn’t do anything to him–in fact they really couldn’t do anything to him, as his family (courtesy of both Khadija and Abu Talib) was too respected for anyone to attack him. The worst incident of physical aggression recorded against Mohammed in Mecca is someone grabbing his clothes once.
But after some years of Mohammed’s tedious “you’re all going to hell” sermons,
things began to get physical. The same biography as the above states
that the “first blood to be shed in Islam” came from Saad, one of
Mohammed’s early followers, who beat up a polytheist with a camel’s bone
(…lol) for being rude; it later describes another early follower,
Hamza, as striking a man named Abu Jahl with his bow for no reason other
than Abu Jahl was calling Mohammed a lunatic.
Later
Islamic histories invented many tales of persecution and martyrdom of
Muslims by the Meccans, based largely on Mohammed sending some of his followers to a “safe haven” in Ethiopia (where they lived comfortably) for a short period. Ethiopia was chosen because it was the nearest non-polytheist territory. Those late historians, and many modern-day Muslims, believed that this demonstrates that Muslims lived in fear and were being threatened with death. Often this period is described as “exile”; in reality, Mohammed was the one who told them to leave, not the Meccans, and Muslims (including Mohammed and his entire family) continued to live in Mecca without losing their lives throughout this period. While scuffles and minor fights between individuals did occur, usually because Mohammed and his followers were openly being horrible dicks, they were not even remotely deadly. Living abroad for short periods of time was not seen as unusual at the time, and many Meccan men spent years away from home (the vast majority of those who had moved to Ethiopia were men). The circumstances of the “exile” were not exactly as desperate as some modern-day writers like to pretend.
In reality there is only one Muslim who
even plausibly died of Meccan persecution in the entire 13 years of
Muslim presence there. This would be Sumayyah, a slave woman, mentioned again in Ibn Ishaq’s biography. While later sources coalesced around a shocking story of how she was speared in the groin by Abu Jahl, more reputable sources imply she simply died from dehydration or exhaustion, as she was made to stand in the sun for extended periods of time. (The spearing story is almost assuredly false propaganda against Abu Jahl, who was later a military enemy of the Muslims; the idea that one of Mohammed’s followers was murdered in such a brutal way and he never even mentioned her is simply illogical. Moreover, even in his worst Medinan suwar, Mohammed never accused the Meccans of killing any Muslims, only of “persecuting” them by not allowing them to perform the hajj, etc. To me, these facts–combined with the absence of her death from the ahadith–suggest that she was not killed at all.) Later sources invented a story about how her husband Yasir also died in a similar manner, though no early sources say this and it is certainly an invention. Sumayyah is thus the only Muslim who even possibly died in Mecca of any form of persecution. Her death is not mentioned in the two most reputable ahadith collections and some histories say she never died at all and remarried after her husband’s death, so it is unclear whether this entire story is made up or not, but it is nonetheless within the realm of possibility. Beyond this one woman, absolutely zero Muslims died of persecution at the hands of the evil, intolerant Meccans in any way.
Why, then, did the Muslims pack up and move to Medina, if they weren’t terrified and fleeing for their lives?
Problems began around the year 619 AD, when both Abu Talib and Khadija died of disease within a month of one another. Mohammed was still a member of an influential
Quraysh clan, but his protectors were now gone, and he had made a whole lot of people angry over the past decade. Al-Tabari preserves a hadith in which the leaders of Mecca state:
He has derided our traditional values, abused our forefathers, reviled our religion, caused division among us, and insulted our gods.
The same account has Mohammed stating the following and the Meccans getting a bit worried:
Hear, men of Quraysh. By Him in whose hand
Muhammad’s soul rests, I have brought you slaughter.
Clearly there was no love lost between Mohammed and the polytheists. Tensions were at their highest point yet in this period, between 619 and 622. By this point, dozens of people from other central Arabian cities (mostly Medina/Yathrib) had converted to Islam, and some had traveled to Mecca to meet him. At such a gathering Mohammed asked his followers to swear allegiance to him. The pledge included a declaration that they would fight for him.
You are in fact avowing that you will fight against all and sundry.
The Meccans were naturally furious after they heard rumors of this and demanded answers from the leaders of Medina. The Medinans, though, being mostly polytheists, had absolutely no idea that this incident happened and swore that they would never support any such thing. The Muslims of Medina tried to hide the pledge, but it was eventually discovered, and the Meccans arrested a few of their leaders–reluctantly releasing them later to preserve peaceful tribal relations.
This was the last straw. Mohammed was effectively amassing outside followers sworn to his side in battle and in the Meccans’ eyes had become not just a lunatic but a dangerous lunatic. With the prospect of a surprise attack carried out by Mohammed’s Medinan followers now a legitimate possibility, the leaders of Mecca called a council to order. It was decided that Mohammed simply had to be dealt with. Though popular Muslim imagination has long held that this meant his death, mostly because it just makes a better and more dramatic story, there is nothing really to suggest this–they wanted to arrest and exile him. Early histories state quite plainly that they just wanted Mohammed gone and were happy once he left. (Popular imagination further dramatizes the story by inventing tales, with no basis in any historical account, of the Meccans sending secret hit squads to hunt down Mohammed or planning a raid to kill him in Medina. In reality there was absolutely no movement by the Meccans towards Medina at all until years after Mohammed’s arrival there, after the raid leading to Badr and after Badr itself.)
Notably, the decision to kick Mohammed out of Mecca did not extend to all Muslims. Mohammed’s followers chose to leave with him.
Those who wanted to leave were allowed to do so with zero violence or threats, with Mohammed’s
son-in-law Ali and daughter Fatima remaining in Mecca after Mohammed
left in order to settle some business accounts. From al-Tabari:
Ali stayed in Makkah for three days after the migration of the Prophet and during this period he returned to their owners the things which they had entrusted (to the Prophet)
Others stayed. One of Mohammed’s own daughters remained in Mecca with her non-Muslim husband, as did several other Muslims, who appear to have lived in peace with the Meccans.
In fact, even after the raid that eventually led to the Battle of Badr
(and the multiple raids before that), Muslims were still living just fine in Mecca, with zero accounts of any Muslims dying of persecution or even being harmed during this period. Ibn Kathir states that far from hiding their faith, they were openly known to be Muslims and even defended their brothers-in-religion (with bullshit, but that’s not the point!):
The Quraysh said that Muhammad and his Companions violated the sanctity of the Sacred Month and shed blood, confiscated property and took prisoners during it. Those who refuted them among the Muslims who remained in Makkah replied that the Muslims had done that during the month of Sha`ban (which is not a sacred month).
The Muslims of Mecca felt fully comfortable saying “yeah okay the Muslims in Medina killed a trader from Mecca and stole his shit but it wasn’t actually during a truce month so it’s not that bad.” It doesn’t even say they faced any repercussions or suspicions for this! And as we’ve already seen, the Quran even complains that some fought with the Meccans against Mohammed’s followers after the latter’s caravan-raiding shenanigans that we’ve talked about, and Mohammed/Allah plainly does not buy any excuses about them being persecuted or forced into doing so. (Also stay tuned for a certain treaty that we’ll talk about in surah 9, which Mohammed breaks while the damn ink is still drying, and the Meccans still don’t do anything.)
In short, Mohammed was correctly perceived to be setting himself up as a warlord, gathering followers sworn to his side in battle, and was kicked out of Mecca out of fear that he would use these followers to take over the city… as eventually happened, of course. Once he left, the Meccans not only did not attack him or his followers in his new base of power, but also did not attack his followers still within Mecca, since they were being peaceful and not causing trouble. Armed conflict only came after Mohammed’s people acted in a blatantly criminal and murderous way, and only after the Meccans heard Mohammed defend this in person. And note that the first battle, Badr, occurred only after Mohammed readied an army to raid another caravan. The Meccan’s army was defending their own goods (which, as I’ve said before, absolutely were not “stolen” from the Muslims according to any reputable sources, despite later stories claiming as much).
When read without one’s hellfire-colored glasses on, the Meccans really get the shit end of the stick in modern-day Islamic histories and the Quran itself. Their behavior as a whole was reasonable and surprisingly tolerant. The society they had established was far more sophisticated and educated than depicted in Islamic propagandist accounts. They were not idiot barbarians longing for a good murderin’ and persecutin’ party–in fact they were not the aggressors in this conflict at all. We can say with full confidence that polytheists were more tolerant of Muslims than vice versa (given that Mohammed banned them from the site after conquering Mecca) and that more unarmed Meccan polytheists were put to death in Mohammed’s first week of controlling Mecca (including a young woman whose crime was… making fun of Islam in songs, who we’ll talk about later) than Meccan Muslims were put to death in the entire era between Mohammed becoming a “prophet” and Mohammed’s people taking control of Mecca.
But they lost the war, and the Muslims won, and so the Muslims got to write the history books and turn their erstwhile enemies into monsters. The Evil Quraysh narrative persists to this day among the majority of Muslims, historicity be damned. With that in mind, let’s dive into surah six, the first long Meccan surah we’ve seen so far.
To call Sharia Law “feminist” is one of the most privileged things I have ever seen. To call a system that encourages husbands to beat their wives if they aren’t subservient to them, permits men to marry and rape pre pubescent girls, and grants women less rights than men, to call that all “feminist” is just beyond me. If you call Sharia Law “feminist”, or even try to minimize how horribly Sharia Law treats women, you are showing that you really don’t care about the women and girls who are actively being oppressed by this system. You are literally advocating for a patriarchal system, and yet you claim that patriarchy is what you are against. If you call Sharia Law “feminist”, then you’re a hypocrite and most definitely not the feminist you claim to be.
To call Sharia Law “feminist” is one of the most privileged things I have ever seen. To call a system that encourages husbands to beat their wives if they aren’t subservient to them, permits men to marry and rape pre pubescent girls, and grants women less rights than men, to call that all “feminist” is just beyond me. If you call Sharia Law “feminist”, or even try to minimize how horribly Sharia Law treats women, you are showing that you really don’t care about the women and girls who are actively being oppressed by this system. You are literally advocating for a patriarchal system, and yet you claim that patriarchy is what you are against. If you call Sharia Law “feminist”, then you’re a hypocrite and most definitely not the feminist you claim to be.
This is the Saudi sisters’ message as of yesterday.
Short recap: they tried to flee saudi and their abusive family, they were stopped in turkey because their family accused them of terrorism. Femen Turkey provided them with a lawyer but the police prevented them from meeting and allegedly beat them. Now they face extradition to saudi arabia, and possible imprisonment and death.
PLEASE HELP SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT THE INHUMANE TREATMENT OF WOMEN IN SAUDI ARABIA.
Celtyradfem 