The Prophets Of Allah

Battle Of Badr 1

We mentioned a new emphasis of the political freedom of the muslims. For the first time there is an independant state; they act as a political body. In Madinah they have the beginnings of a republic and a political entity. As we mentioned before there were two threats facing the muslims: internal and external. As for the internal threats, Madinah was not yet unified. There would always be a group of people not happy i.e. the munafiqoon (hypocrites). The prophet PBUH dealt with them until the end of his life. Another issue was the jews who had to be dealt with. Externally the main difficulty right now is only Mecca. But slowly the entire Arabia would be involved for the first time in human history. The entire Peninsula would be polarised between two camps - and this would ultimately lead to the unifcation of Arabia under the prophet PBUH.

The history of the Madanih seerah is thus a history of military expiditions. We want to know more but ultimately whatever was recorded were the most important events - and these military expiditons WERE the most important events.

We discussed the minor events before Badr. One of them was the sareeah tul Nakhla. Some sahabah were sent to find out information outside of Mecca; they saw a caravan with booty and decided to capture it in the sacred month of Rajab, killing one person in the process. The prophet PBUH said "I didnt tell you to fight or kill anyone". And Allah revealed the verse in Surah Baqarah
"They ask you about the sacred month - about fighting therein. Say, "Fighting therein is great [sin], but averting [people] from the way of Allah and disbelief in Him and [preventing access to] al-Masjid al-Haram and the expulsion of its people therefrom are greater [evil] in the sight of Allah . And fitnah is greater than killing." The other incident was the Ghazwa tul Ushayra which was the part 1 of the battle of Badr. How so? The prophet PBUH knew the caravan of Abu Suffyan was going northwards to Syria. So the Gazwa tul Ushayra was the intended caravan on the way up - the battle of Badr is the same caravan on the way down i.e. Gazwa tul Ushayra is phase one. By the time the prophet PBUH got there Abu Suffyan found out what happened and he went another route. So because of Gazwa tul Ushayra Abu Suffyan was on high alert and the concept of targeting caravans goes back even before this.

One of the paticular incidences shows us the targeting of caravans was something even the Ansar thought about. Sa'ad ibn Mu'ad - the leader, most vibrant and dynamic Ansar, was a close friend of Ummaya ibn Khalaf (the owner of Bilal) in the times of Jaheleya. So whenever Ummaya went north, he would stay at the house of Sa'ad. And likewise Sa'ad stayed with Ummaya whenever he went Mecca. One time for a business trip after the Hijrah Sa'ad went Mecca, and it was the custom of the time they would always to do tawaaf. So Sa'ad asks Ummaya "when shall I do a good time to do tawaaf?" Ummaya said "go at a time when no one else is there". Why? Because it was known Sa'ad is helping the prophet PBUH. Note his Islam is not known but what is known is that he is supporting and protecting the muslims - so Ummaya says "go right in the heat of the sun when everyone is asleep". Lo and behold Allah willed they meet Abu Jahal and asks Ummaya "who is your friend?" Indeed no one does tawaaf at this time. Ummaya says "this is Sa'ad ibn Mu'ad from Yathrib" and so Abu Jahal gets angry and says "How is it possible that you are performing tawaaf around the house in safety after you have given protection to these renegades (i.e. the quraysh called the muslims 'saboa', 'sooba' renegades who've left the religion of their forefathers) and claim you will help them; now you come to Mecca, show your face and do tawaaf, walahi were it not for the fact that you're a guest of Ummaya you would not return home in one peice". This is an open threat contradicting Islam and their own pagan religion since indeed they believed the haram was sacred, all the way from the time of Ibrahim AS. When it comes to Islam, the double standards however are there! Abu Jahal didn't even know Sa'ad is a muslim. Rather he is saying "you're helping the muslims - that is enough of a crime that you shouldn't be here". Sa'ad got very angry, raised his voice and said "if you are going to threaten me, and deprive me of tawaaf, I will deprive you of your trade routes to Syria!" And so the concept of targetting the caravans was something they though about. And in Badr, that's exactly what he did: Sa'ad targetted the carvans of the Quraysh.