Mohammed

Abū al-Qāsim Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib ibn Hāshim (<a title="Arabic language" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_language">Arabic</a>: ابو القاسم محمد ابن عبد الله ابن عبد المطلب ابن هاشم‎; <a title="Circa" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circa"><abbr title="circa">c.</abbr></a> 570 – <abbr title="circa">c.</abbr> 8 June 632),<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-Goldman-1">[1]</a> also <a title="Romanization of Arabic" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Arabic">transliterated</a> as Muhammad (محمد), was a man from <a title="Mecca" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecca">Mecca</a> who unified <a title="Arabia" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabia">Arabia</a> into a single religious <a title="Polity" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polity">polity</a> under <a title="Islam" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam">Islam</a>. He is believed by <a title="Muslim" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim">Muslims</a> and <a title="Bahá'í" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bah%C3%A1%27%C3%AD">Bahá'ís</a> to be a <a title="Apostle (Islam)" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostle(Islam)">messenger</a> and <a title="Prophet" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophet">prophet</a> of <a title="God of Islam" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_of_Islam">God</a>. Muhammad is almost universally considered by Muslims as the <a title="Khatim an-Nabuwwah" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khatim_an-Nabuwwah">last prophet</a> sent by God for mankind.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-2">[2]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-3">[n 1]</a> While non-Muslims regard Muhammad to have been the founder of Islam,<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-4">[3]</a> Muslims consider him to have been the restorer of an <a title="Tahrif" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tahrif">unaltered</a> original <a title="Monotheism" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monotheism">monotheistic</a> faith of <a title="Islamic view of Adam" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_view_of_Adam">Adam</a>, <a title="Islamic view of Noah" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_view_of_Noah">Noah</a>, <a title="Islamic view of Abraham" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_view_of_Abraham">Abraham</a>, <a title="Islamic view of Moses" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_view_of_Moses">Moses</a>, <a title="Jesus in Islam" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_in_Islam">Jesus</a>, and <a title="Prophets in Islam" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophets_in_Islam">other prophets</a>.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-espos12-5">[4]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-6">[5]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-7">[6]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-8">[7]</a> Due to his activities as a social reformer, diplomat, merchant, philosopher, orator, legislator, <a title="Military career of Muhammad" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_career_of_Muhammad">military leader</a>, and philanthropist, <a title="Michael H. Hart" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_H.Hart">Michael H. Hart</a> described him as the most influential human in history.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-first_published_in_1978-9">[8]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-10">[9]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-11">[10]</a>

Born in about 570 CE in the <a title="Arabian Peninsula" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabian_Peninsula">Arabian</a> city of <a title="Mecca" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecca">Mecca</a>,<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-abraha-12">[11]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-EncWorldHistory-13">[12]</a> Muhammad was orphaned at an early age and brought up under the care of his uncle <a title="Abu Talib ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Talib_ibn%E2%80%98Abd_al-Muttalib">Abu Talib</a>. He later worked mostly as a merchant, as well as a shepherd, and was first married by age 25.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-IntroQuran182-14">[13]</a> Being in the habit of periodically retreating to a cave in the surrounding mountains for several nights of seclusion and prayer, he later reported that it was there, at age 40,<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-abraha-12">[11]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-IntroQuran184-15">[14]</a> that he was visited by <a title="Gabriel" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel">Gabriel</a> and received <a title="Muhammad's first revelation" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad%27s_first_revelation">his first revelation</a> from God. Three years after this event Muhammad started <a title="Dawah" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawah">preaching</a> these revelations publicly, proclaiming that "<a title="Tawhid" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tawhid">God is One</a>", that complete "surrender" to Him (lit. <a title="Islam" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam#Etymology_and_meaning">islām</a>) is the only way (<a title="Deen (Arabic term)" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deen(Arabic_term)">dīn</a>)<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-16">[n 2]</a> acceptable to God, and that he himself was a prophet and messenger of God, in the same vein as <a title="Prophets in Islam" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophets_in_Islam#Table_of_prophets.2Fmessengers_in_the_Quran">other Islamic prophets</a>.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-Peters_2003_9-17">[15]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-EspositoI-18">[16]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-EoI-Muhammad-19">[17]</a>

Muhammad gained few <a title="Sahabah" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahabah">followers</a> early on, and was met with <a title="Persecution of Muslims by the Meccans" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Muslims_by_the_Meccans">hostility from some Meccan tribes</a>. To escape persecution, Muhammad <a title="Migration to Abyssinia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Migration_to_Abyssinia">sent some of his followers</a> to <a title="Kingdom of Aksum" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Aksum">Abyssinia</a> before he and his followers in Mecca migrated to <a title="Medina" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medina">Medina</a> (then known as Yathrib) in the year 622. This event, the <a title="Hijra (Islam)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijra_(Islam)">Hijra</a>, marks the beginning of the <a title="Islamic calendar" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_calendar">Islamic calendar</a>, which is also known as the Hijri Calendar. In Medina, Muhammad united the tribes under the <a title="Constitution of Medina" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Medina">Constitution of Medina</a>. After eight years of fighting with the Meccan tribes, his followers, who by then had grown to 10,000, took control of Mecca in the largely peaceful <a title="Conquest of Mecca" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquest_of_Mecca">Conquest of Mecca</a>. He destroyed the pagan idols in the city<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-20">[18]</a> and then sent his followers out to destroy all of the remaining pagan temples in Eastern Arabia.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-21">[19]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-22">[20]</a> In 632, a few months after returning to Medina from <a title="The Farewell Pilgrimage" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Farewell_Pilgrimage">The Farewell Pilgrimage</a>, Muhammad fell ill and died. By the time of his death, most of the <a title="Arabian Peninsula" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabian_Peninsula">Arabian Peninsula</a> had <a title="Conversion to Islam" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conversion_to_Islam">converted to Islam</a>, and he had united Arabia into a single <a title="Ummah" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ummah">Muslim religious polity</a>.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-23">[21]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-Lapidus_2002_pp_0-24">[22]</a>

The revelations (or <a title="Ayah" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayah">Ayah</a>, lit. "Signs [of God]") — which Muhammad reported receiving until his death – form the verses of the Quran, regarded by Muslims as the "Word of God" and around which the religion is based. Besides the Quran, Muhammad's life (<a title="Prophetic biography" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophetic_biography">sira</a>) and traditions (<a title="Sunnah" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunnah">sunnah</a>) are also upheld by Muslims as the <a title="Sources of sharia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sources_of_sharia">sources of sharia</a>. They discuss Muhammad and other prophets of Islam with reverence, adding the phrase <a title="Peace be upon him (Islam)" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_be_upon_him_(Islam)">peace be upon him</a> whenever their names are mentioned.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-Ann_Goldman_2006_p.212-25">[23]</a> While conceptions of Muhammad in <a title="Middle Ages" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Ages">medieval</a> <a title="Christendom" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christendom">Christendom</a> and <a title="Premodern" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premodern">premodern</a> times were largely negative, appraisals in <a title="Modern history" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_history">modern history</a> have been far less so.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad#cite_note-EoI-Muhammad-19"> </a>

Mohammed

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