Historicity of Muhammad
Encyclopedia
The earliest source of information for the life of Muhammad
(ca. 570/571 – June 8, 632 AD) is the Qur'an
, which gives very little information, and is of questioned historicity itself. Next in importance is the sīra literature
and Hadith
, which survive in the historical works by writers of third and fourth century of the Muslim era (900−1000 AD). There are also a few non-Muslim sources which are valuable both in themselves and for comparison with the statements in the first two sources.
states:
The main source on Muhammad's life are Muslim sources written in Arabic, which include the Qur'an
and accounts of Muhammad's life written down by later Muslims, based on oral tradition
s. These sources are known as sīra
and hadith
.
There are also non-Muslim sources written in Greek
, Syriac, Armenian
, and Hebrew by the Jewish and Christian communities. These non-Muslim written sources go back to about 636 AD and many of the interesting ones date to within some decades later. One, attributed to a 7th century Armenian scholar Sebeos
, states that Muhammad was a merchant and that his preaching revolved around the figure of Abraham
. There are also confirmations of Muhammad's migration
from Mecca to Medina in them. However, they also contain some essential differences with regard to Muslim sources and in particular about chronology and about Muhammad's attitude towards the Jews and Palestine
.
The Qur'an itself has some, though very few, incidental allusions to Muhammad's life. However, the "Qur'an responds constantly and often candidly to Muhammad's changing historical circumstances and contains a wealth of hidden data that are relevant to the task of the quest for the historical Muhammad."
In the sīra literature
, the most important extant biography are the two recensions of Ibn Ishaq
's (d. 768), now known as Sīrat Rasūl Allah ("Biography/Life of the Messenger/Apostle of Allah"), which survive in the works of his editors, most notably Ibn Hisham
(d. 834) and Yunus b. Bukayr (d.814-815), although not in its original form. According to Ibn Hisham, Ibn Ishaq wrote his biography some 120 to 130 years after Muhammad's death. Many, but not all, scholars accept the accuracy of these biographies, though their accuracy is unascertainable. After Ibn Ishaq, there are a number of shorter accounts (some of which are earlier than Ibn Ishaq) recorded in different forms (see List of earliest writers of sīra). Another biography of Muhammad is that of al-Waqidi's
(d. 822) and then Ibn Sa'd's (d.844-5). Al-Waqidi is often criticized by early Muslim historians who state that the author is unreliable. These biographies are hardly biographies in the modern sense. The writers did not wish to record the life of Muhammad, but rather to describe Muhammad's military expeditions and to preserve stories about Muhammad, his sayings and the reasons of revelations
and interpretations of verses in the Qur'an. In addition to sīra, the biographical dictionaries of Ali ibn al-Athir
and Ibn Hajar
provide much detail about the contemporaries of Muhammad
but add little to our information about Muhammad himself.
Lastly, there are the hadith
collections, which include traditional, hagiographic
accounts of the verbal and physical traditions
of Muhammad. These date two to three hundred years after after the death of Muhammad. The main feature of hadith is that of Isnad (chains of transmission). The majority of Western academics view the hadith collections with caution as accurate historical sources. However, other Western historians have also defended hadith and the general authenticity of Isnad.
All or most of the Qur'an was (according to traditional Islamic scholarship) written down by Muhammad's companions while he was alive, but it was primarily an orally related document. The written compilation of the whole Qur'an in its definite form as we have it now was not completed until many years after the death of Muhammad.
The Qur'an is widely regarded by Muslims to be that which issued from Muhammad's mouth from AD 610-632. F.E. Peters states, "Few have failed to be convinced that what is in our copy of the Quran is, in fact, what Muhammad taught, and is expressed in his own words... To sum this up: the Quran is convincingly the words of Muhammad, perhaps even dictated by him after their recitation". Peters argues that "The search for variants in the partial versions extant before the Caliph Uthman’s alleged recension in the 640s (what can be called the 'sources' behind our text) has not yielded any differences of great significance." .
Patricia Crone
and Michael Cook
challenge the traditional account of how the Qur'an was compiled, and the historicity of Muhammad himself, writing that "there is no hard evidence for the existence of the Koran (or Muhammad) in any form before the last decade of the seventh century." They also question the accuracy of some the Qur'an's historical accounts. It is generally acknowledged that the work of Crone and Cook was a fresh approach in its reconstruction of early Islamic history
, but their alternative account of early Islam has been almost universally rejected. Van Ess has dismissed it stating that "a refutation is perhaps unnecessary since the authors make no effort to prove it in detail...Where they are only giving a new interpretation of well-known facts, this is not decisive. But where the accepted facts are consciously put upside down, their approach is disastrous." R. B. Sergeant states: "Hagarism [the thesis of Crone and Cook]…is not only bitterly anti-Islamic in tone, but anti-Arabian. Its superficial fancies are so ridiculous that at first one wonders if it is just a ‘leg pull’, pure ’spoof’." However, it has attracted praise as well as criticism, although it has been so poorly received by Muslims, that, in an attempt to at least superficially vindicate the traditional hagiographic historiography of early Islam and Muhammad, that a hoax has circulated since 2006, relating a supposed phone conversation the originator of the hoax had with Ms Crone, wherein she was claimed to have retracted the work.
Gerd R. Puin's
initial study of ancient Qur'an manuscripts found in Yemen led him to conclude that the Qur'an is a "cocktail of texts", some of which may have been existent a hundred years before Muhammad. He later stated that "these Yemeni Qur'anic fragments do not differ from those found in museums and libraries elsewhere, with the exception of details that do not touch the Qur'an itself, but are rather differences in the way words are spelled." Karl-Heinz Ohlig
comes to the conclusion that the person of Muhammed was not central to early Islam at all, and that at this very early stage Islam was in fact an Arabic Christian sect (likely Ebionite, Arian
and/or Nestorian, based on the recorded Ebionite faith of Khadija, Muhammad's first wife, and the Arianism and/or Nestorianism of her cousin, the monk Bahira
, recorded by John of Damascus
in the early 8th century) which had objections to the concept of the trinity
, and that the later hadith and biographies are in large part legend
s, instrumental in severing Islam from its Christian roots and building a full-blown new religion. John Wansbrough
believes that the Qu’ran is a redaction
in part of other sacred scriptures, in particular the Judaeo-Christian
scriptures. Prof. Herbert Berg writes that "Despite John Wansbrough
's very cautious and careful inclusion of qualifications such as "conjectural," and "tentative and emphatically provisional", his work is condemned by some. Some of negative reaction is undoubtedly due to its radicalness...Wansbrough's work has been embraced wholeheartedly by few and has been employed in a piecemeal fashion by many. Many praise his insights and methods, if not all of his conclusions."
There is considerable academic debate over the real chronology of the chapters of the Qur'an. Carole Hillenbrand
holds that there are several remaining tasks for the Orientalist Qur'anic scholars: Few Qur'anic scholars have worked on the epigraphy of the Dome of the Rock
in Jerusalem whose foundation inscription dates to 72/692 and the antique Qur'an recently discovered in the Yemen, the Sana'a manuscripts
. The Carbon-14
tests applied to this Qur'an date it to 645-690 AD with 95 percent accuracy. Their real age may be a good deal younger, since C-14 estimates the year of the death of an organism, and the process from that to the final writing on the parchment involves an unknown amount of time, and parchments were also re-used often. Paleography has dated the San'a manuscripts to 690-750 AD.
Nevertheless, some content of sīra, like the Constitution of Medina
, are generally considered to be authentic.
In general, the majority of western academics view the hadith
collections with caution. Bernard Lewis
states that "the collection and scrutiny of Hadiths didn't take place until "several generations" after Muhammad's death and that "during that period the opportunities and motives for falsification were almost unlimited." However, some Western historians have defended hadith and the general authenticity of Isnad (chain of transmission).
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
(ca. 570/571 – June 8, 632 AD) is the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, which gives very little information, and is of questioned historicity itself. Next in importance is the sīra literature
Prophetic biography
The sīrat rasūl allāh or al-sīra al-nabawiyya or just al-sīra, is the Arabic term used for the various traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad from which, in addition to the Qur'an and Hadith, most historical information about his life and the early period of Islam is derived.-Etymology:In the...
and Hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
, which survive in the historical works by writers of third and fourth century of the Muslim era (900−1000 AD). There are also a few non-Muslim sources which are valuable both in themselves and for comparison with the statements in the first two sources.
Information on Muhammad
Attempts to distinguish between the historical elements and the unhistorical elements of many of the reports of Muhammad have not been very successful. A major source of difficulty in the quest for the historical Muhammad is the modern lack of knowledge about pre-Islamic Arabia. Harald MotzkiHarald Motzki
-Bibliography:*Hadith: Origins and Developments ISBN 0860787044*The Origins of Islamic Jurisprudence ISBN 900412131 5...
states:
At present, the study of Muhammad, the founder of the Muslim community, is obviously caught in a dilemma. On the one hand, it is not possible to write a historical biography of the Prophet without being accused of using the sources uncritically, while on the other hand, when using the sources critically, it is simply not possible to write such a biography
Sources for the historical Muhammad
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
and accounts of Muhammad's life written down by later Muslims, based on oral tradition
Oral tradition
Oral tradition and oral lore is cultural material and traditions transmitted orally from one generation to another. The messages or testimony are verbally transmitted in speech or song and may take the form, for example, of folktales, sayings, ballads, songs, or chants...
s. These sources are known as sīra
Sira
The sīrat rasūl allāh or al-sīra al-nabawiyya or just al-sīra, is the Arabic term used for the various traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad from which, in addition to the Qur'an and Hadith, most historical information about his life and the early period of Islam is derived.-Etymology:In the...
and hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
.
There are also non-Muslim sources written in Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Syriac, Armenian
Armenian language
The Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
, and Hebrew by the Jewish and Christian communities. These non-Muslim written sources go back to about 636 AD and many of the interesting ones date to within some decades later. One, attributed to a 7th century Armenian scholar Sebeos
Sebeos
Sebeos was a 7th century Armenian bishop and historian who participated in the first Council of Dvin in 645.The history of Sebeos contains detailed descriptions from the period of Sassanid supremacy in Armenia up to the Islamic conquest in 661...
, states that Muhammad was a merchant and that his preaching revolved around the figure of Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
. There are also confirmations of Muhammad's migration
Hijra
Hijra as an Arabic word meaning migration or flight may refer to:* The Hijra is the emigration of Muhammad and his followers to the city of Medina in 622 CE, marking the first year of the Islamic calendar, 1 AH * Hijri year, marks the start of the Hijri year of the Islamic calendar*...
from Mecca to Medina in them. However, they also contain some essential differences with regard to Muslim sources and in particular about chronology and about Muhammad's attitude towards the Jews and Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
.
The Qur'an itself has some, though very few, incidental allusions to Muhammad's life. However, the "Qur'an responds constantly and often candidly to Muhammad's changing historical circumstances and contains a wealth of hidden data that are relevant to the task of the quest for the historical Muhammad."
In the sīra literature
Prophetic biography
The sīrat rasūl allāh or al-sīra al-nabawiyya or just al-sīra, is the Arabic term used for the various traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad from which, in addition to the Qur'an and Hadith, most historical information about his life and the early period of Islam is derived.-Etymology:In the...
, the most important extant biography are the two recensions of Ibn Ishaq
Ibn Ishaq
Muḥammad ibn Isḥaq ibn Yasār ibn Khiyār was an Arab Muslim historian and hagiographer...
's (d. 768), now known as Sīrat Rasūl Allah ("Biography/Life of the Messenger/Apostle of Allah"), which survive in the works of his editors, most notably Ibn Hisham
Ibn Hisham
Abu Muhammad 'Abd al-Malik bin Hisham , or Ibn Hisham edited the biography of Muhammad written by Ibn Ishaq. Ibn Ishaq's work is lost and is now only known in the recensions of Ibn Hisham and al-Tabari. Ibn Hisham grew up in Basra, Iraq, but moved afterwards to Egypt, where he gained a name...
(d. 834) and Yunus b. Bukayr (d.814-815), although not in its original form. According to Ibn Hisham, Ibn Ishaq wrote his biography some 120 to 130 years after Muhammad's death. Many, but not all, scholars accept the accuracy of these biographies, though their accuracy is unascertainable. After Ibn Ishaq, there are a number of shorter accounts (some of which are earlier than Ibn Ishaq) recorded in different forms (see List of earliest writers of sīra). Another biography of Muhammad is that of al-Waqidi's
Al-Waqidi
Abu `Abdullah Muhammad Ibn ‘Omar Ibn Waqid al-Aslami , commonly referred to as al-Waqidi , was an early Muslim historian.He was born and educated in Medina...
(d. 822) and then Ibn Sa'd's (d.844-5). Al-Waqidi is often criticized by early Muslim historians who state that the author is unreliable. These biographies are hardly biographies in the modern sense. The writers did not wish to record the life of Muhammad, but rather to describe Muhammad's military expeditions and to preserve stories about Muhammad, his sayings and the reasons of revelations
Asbab al-nuzul
Asbāb al-nuzūl , an Arabic term meaning "occasions/circumstances of revelation", is a secondary genre of Qur'anic exegesis directed at establishing the context in which specific verses of the Qur'an were revealed...
and interpretations of verses in the Qur'an. In addition to sīra, the biographical dictionaries of Ali ibn al-Athir
Ali ibn al-Athir
Abu al-Hassan Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Muhammad, better known as Ali 'Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir al-Jazari was a Kurdish Muslim historian from the Ibn Athir family...
and Ibn Hajar
Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani
Al-Haafidh Shihabuddin Abu'l-Fadl Ahmad ibn Ali ibn Muhammad, better known as Ibn Hajar due to the fame of his forefathers, al-Asqalani due to his family origin , was a medieval Shafiite Sunni scholar of Islam who represents the entire realm of the Sunni world in the field of Hadith...
provide much detail about the contemporaries of Muhammad
Sahaba
In Islam, the ' were the companions, disciples, scribes and family of the Islamic prophet...
but add little to our information about Muhammad himself.
Lastly, there are the hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
collections, which include traditional, hagiographic
Hagiography
Hagiography is the study of saints.From the Greek and , it refers literally to writings on the subject of such holy people, and specifically to the biographies of saints and ecclesiastical leaders. The term hagiology, the study of hagiography, is also current in English, though less common...
accounts of the verbal and physical traditions
Sunnah
The word literally means a clear, well trodden, busy and plain surfaced road. In the discussion of the sources of religion, Sunnah denotes the practice of Prophet Muhammad that he taught and practically instituted as a teacher of the sharī‘ah and the best exemplar...
of Muhammad. These date two to three hundred years after after the death of Muhammad. The main feature of hadith is that of Isnad (chains of transmission). The majority of Western academics view the hadith collections with caution as accurate historical sources. However, other Western historians have also defended hadith and the general authenticity of Isnad.
Historical authenticity of the Qur'an
The Qur'an is widely regarded by Muslims to be that which issued from Muhammad's mouth from AD 610-632. F.E. Peters states, "Few have failed to be convinced that what is in our copy of the Quran is, in fact, what Muhammad taught, and is expressed in his own words... To sum this up: the Quran is convincingly the words of Muhammad, perhaps even dictated by him after their recitation". Peters argues that "The search for variants in the partial versions extant before the Caliph Uthman’s alleged recension in the 640s (what can be called the 'sources' behind our text) has not yielded any differences of great significance." .
Patricia Crone
Patricia Crone
Patricia Crone, Ph.D., is a scholar, author, Orientalist, and historian of early Islamic history working at the Institute for Advanced Study. She established herself as a major challenger to the established narrative of the early history of Islam.- Career :Patricia Crone completed her...
and Michael Cook
Michael Cook (historian)
Michael Allan Cook is an English-Scottish historian and scholar of Islamic history. He has co-authored a book with Patricia Crone, notably Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World....
challenge the traditional account of how the Qur'an was compiled, and the historicity of Muhammad himself, writing that "there is no hard evidence for the existence of the Koran (or Muhammad) in any form before the last decade of the seventh century." They also question the accuracy of some the Qur'an's historical accounts. It is generally acknowledged that the work of Crone and Cook was a fresh approach in its reconstruction of early Islamic history
Muslim history
Muslim history is the history of Muslim people. In the history of Islam the followers of the religion of Islam have impacted political history, economic history, and military history...
, but their alternative account of early Islam has been almost universally rejected. Van Ess has dismissed it stating that "a refutation is perhaps unnecessary since the authors make no effort to prove it in detail...Where they are only giving a new interpretation of well-known facts, this is not decisive. But where the accepted facts are consciously put upside down, their approach is disastrous." R. B. Sergeant states: "Hagarism [the thesis of Crone and Cook]…is not only bitterly anti-Islamic in tone, but anti-Arabian. Its superficial fancies are so ridiculous that at first one wonders if it is just a ‘leg pull’, pure ’spoof’." However, it has attracted praise as well as criticism, although it has been so poorly received by Muslims, that, in an attempt to at least superficially vindicate the traditional hagiographic historiography of early Islam and Muhammad, that a hoax has circulated since 2006, relating a supposed phone conversation the originator of the hoax had with Ms Crone, wherein she was claimed to have retracted the work.
Gerd R. Puin's
Gerd R. Puin
Gerd Rüdiger Puin is a German scholar and an authority on Qur'anic historical orthography, the study and scholarly interpretation of ancient manuscripts. He is also specialist in Arabic paleography...
initial study of ancient Qur'an manuscripts found in Yemen led him to conclude that the Qur'an is a "cocktail of texts", some of which may have been existent a hundred years before Muhammad. He later stated that "these Yemeni Qur'anic fragments do not differ from those found in museums and libraries elsewhere, with the exception of details that do not touch the Qur'an itself, but are rather differences in the way words are spelled." Karl-Heinz Ohlig
Karl-Heinz Ohlig
Karl-Heinz Ohlig is a German professor of Religious Studies and the History of Christianity at the University of Saarland, Germany.He is the co-editor with Gerd Rudiger Puin of the book Die dunklen Anfänge...
comes to the conclusion that the person of Muhammed was not central to early Islam at all, and that at this very early stage Islam was in fact an Arabic Christian sect (likely Ebionite, Arian
Arian
Arian may refer to:* Arius, a Christian presbyter in the 3rd and 4th century* a given name in different cultures: Aria, Aryan or Arian...
and/or Nestorian, based on the recorded Ebionite faith of Khadija, Muhammad's first wife, and the Arianism and/or Nestorianism of her cousin, the monk Bahira
Bahira
Bahira , or "Sergius the Monk" to the Latin West, was a Syriac or Bahrani Nestorian monk who, according to tradition, foretold to the adolescent Muhammad his future prophetic career.-Islamic tradition:...
, recorded by John of Damascus
John of Damascus
Saint John of Damascus was a Syrian monk and priest...
in the early 8th century) which had objections to the concept of the trinity
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...
, and that the later hadith and biographies are in large part legend
Legend
A legend is a narrative of human actions that are perceived both by teller and listeners to take place within human history and to possess certain qualities that give the tale verisimilitude...
s, instrumental in severing Islam from its Christian roots and building a full-blown new religion. John Wansbrough
John Wansbrough
John Edward Wansbrough was an American historian who taught at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies . Wansbrough's emphasis was on the critique of traditional accounts of the origins of Islam...
believes that the Qu’ran is a redaction
Redaction
Redaction is a form of editing in which multiple source texts are combined and subjected to minor alteration to make them into a single work. Often this is a method of collecting a series of writings on a similar theme and creating a definitive and coherent work...
in part of other sacred scriptures, in particular the Judaeo-Christian
Judeo-Christian
Judeo-Christian is a term used in the United States since the 1940s to refer to standards of ethics said to be held in common by Judaism and Christianity, for example the Ten Commandments...
scriptures. Prof. Herbert Berg writes that "Despite John Wansbrough
John Wansbrough
John Edward Wansbrough was an American historian who taught at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies . Wansbrough's emphasis was on the critique of traditional accounts of the origins of Islam...
's very cautious and careful inclusion of qualifications such as "conjectural," and "tentative and emphatically provisional", his work is condemned by some. Some of negative reaction is undoubtedly due to its radicalness...Wansbrough's work has been embraced wholeheartedly by few and has been employed in a piecemeal fashion by many. Many praise his insights and methods, if not all of his conclusions."
There is considerable academic debate over the real chronology of the chapters of the Qur'an. Carole Hillenbrand
Carole Hillenbrand
Carole Hillenbrand OBE is professor of Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh. She is currently the Vice-President of the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies and a Member of the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics....
holds that there are several remaining tasks for the Orientalist Qur'anic scholars: Few Qur'anic scholars have worked on the epigraphy of the Dome of the Rock
Dome of the Rock
The Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
in Jerusalem whose foundation inscription dates to 72/692 and the antique Qur'an recently discovered in the Yemen, the Sana'a manuscripts
Sana'a manuscripts
The Sana'a manuscripts, found in Yemen in 1972, are considered by some to be the oldest existent version of the Qur'an. Although the text has been dated to the first two decades of the eighth century The Sana'a manuscripts, found in Yemen in 1972, are considered by some to be the oldest existent...
. The Carbon-14
Carbon-14
Carbon-14, 14C, or radiocarbon, is a radioactive isotope of carbon with a nucleus containing 6 protons and 8 neutrons. Its presence in organic materials is the basis of the radiocarbon dating method pioneered by Willard Libby and colleagues , to date archaeological, geological, and hydrogeological...
tests applied to this Qur'an date it to 645-690 AD with 95 percent accuracy. Their real age may be a good deal younger, since C-14 estimates the year of the death of an organism, and the process from that to the final writing on the parchment involves an unknown amount of time, and parchments were also re-used often. Paleography has dated the San'a manuscripts to 690-750 AD.
Historical authenticity of the prophetic biography (sīra)
It is often noted that a coherent image of Muhammad cannot be formed from the literature of sīra, whose authenticity and factual value have been questioned on a number of different grounds. Wim Raven lists the following arguments against the authenticity of sīra:- The fact that no sīra work was compiled during the first century of Islam.
- The many discrepancies exhibited in different narrations found in sīra works.
- Later sources claiming to know more about Muhammad then earlier ones.
- Discrepancies compared to non-Muslim sources.
- Some parts or genres of sīra, namely those dealing with miracles, are not fit as sources for scientific historiographical information about Muhammad.
Nevertheless, some content of sīra, like the Constitution of Medina
Constitution of Medina
The Constitution of Medina , also known as the Charter of Medina, was drafted by the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It constituted a formal agreement between Muhammad and all of the significant tribes and families of Yathrib , including Muslims, Jews, Christians and pagans. This constitution formed the...
, are generally considered to be authentic.
Historical authenticity of the hadith literature
Early Muslim scholars were concerned that some hadiths may have been fabricated, and thus developed a whole science of hadith criticism (see Hadith studies) to distinguish between genuine sayings and those that were forged, recorded using different words, or were wrongly ascribed to Muhammad.In general, the majority of western academics view the hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
collections with caution. Bernard Lewis
Bernard Lewis
Bernard Lewis, FBA is a British-American historian, scholar in Oriental studies, and political commentator. He is the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University...
states that "the collection and scrutiny of Hadiths didn't take place until "several generations" after Muhammad's death and that "during that period the opportunities and motives for falsification were almost unlimited." However, some Western historians have defended hadith and the general authenticity of Isnad (chain of transmission).
See also
- Achtiname of Muhammad
- Relics of MuhammadRelics of MuhammadSome streams of Islam have a tradition of venerating the relics attributed to the Islamic prophet Muhammad. The most genuine relics are believed to be those housed in Istanbul's Topkapı Palace, in a section known as Hirkai Serif Odasi at the start of the Twentieth century...
- Muhammad's letters to the Heads-of-StateMuhammad's letters to the Heads-of-StateAfter the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, Muhammad decided to send letters to many rulers of the world, inviting them to Islam -Overview:Muhammad, according to the usually told Islamic historiography, sent ambassadors with such letters to Heraclius the emperor of Byzantium, Chosroes II the emperor of...
- History of the Qur'an
- Soviet Orientalist studies in IslamSoviet Orientalist studies in IslamSoviet Orientalist studies in Islam are academic discourses by Soviet Marxist theoreticians about Islam, its origins and development based on Historical materialism and Muslims. The central question of this discourse was how Muslim society would fit into the general development of human history....
- Historiography of early IslamHistoriography of early IslamThe historiography of early Islam refers to the study of the early origins of Islam based on a critical analysis, evaluation, and examination of authentic primary source materials and the organization of these sources into a narative timeline....