The key figure in the formation of Islam was Muhammad.
His career is
narrated in great detail in the Islamic sources, though it is hard to
say how reliably. Here is the gist of what they tell us. Muhammad's
hometown was Mecca, a settlement in western Arabia inhabited by an Arab
tribe; it was lacking in agricultural resources, but possessed a well-
known sanctuary, the Ka`ba. The tribe was divided into a number of
clans. It had no chief, and it recognized no superior authority either
in Mecca or elsewhere. Early in the seventh century A.D., Muhammad
began to receive the revelations that were in due course to be embodied
in the Koran, the Muslim scripture. His message was unambiguously
monotheist, but it was neither Jewish nor Christian. Although he
succeeded in making some converts in Mecca, his monotheist incivility
with regard to the pagan gods caused great offense to the pagan
majority. Muhammad personally was not in much danger, but his followers
were in dire need of protection, and it was not obvious where this
could come from. The king of Ethiopia was sympathetic, and Muhammad
sent some of his followers to take refuge with him; but if Islam was to
be a contender in Arabia, this king was too far away to help. Muhammad
also sought to find a tribe closer to home that might be willing to
extend its protection; he did this by attending fairs at which members
of different tribes would gather to trade. But he had no success.
Finally he had his opportunity. The oasis of Yathrib
(now Medina) lay
some two hundred miles north of Mecca. It was much larger and had a
much more complex population: two Arab tribes and three Jewish ones.
Like Mecca, it was not under the sway of any chief or ruler; unlike
Mecca, it was in political disarray. While attending a fair, Muhammad
met some members of one of the Arab tribes and told them about Islam.
They responded positively, partly because living alongside Jews had
prepared them to recognize a prophet when they saw one, and partly
because they perceived Muhammad as the solution to their political
problem. When they had left Yathrib, they told him, its people were
more riven by internecine feuds than any other; "maybe," they said,
"God will unite them through you." They undertook to go back to their
people and summon them to Islam, adding, "If God unites them in it,
there will be no man more powerful than you!" And so it turned out. Or
more precisely, after Muhammad and his followers moved to Yathrib in
622, he united the Arab tribes and eliminated the Jewish ones.
By the time he died, in 632, war and diplomacy had
made him the ruler
of an Islamic state. All this was quite unlike the process by which
other peoples of the day were converting to Christianity. Whereas
Augustine had arrived in Kent to find a state already firmly in
control, Muhammad had created one. And it was a state of a very
different kind: he was not a king but a prophet.
