set about organizing his new community, which consisted of the Muhājirūn (the immigrants from Makkah), and the Anṣār (the supporters who were the Muslims from Yathrib, which was henceforth called God’s Messenger’s city, or Madinah for short). The Prophet took four measures of great importance:
1. He built a mosque to serve as a place of worship, a school where Muslims learnt the details of their faith, a meeting place, and a government headquarters.
2. He established a strong bond of brotherhood between the Muhājirūn and the Anṣār, making one of each group a brother of one of the other group. This brotherhood was considered to be so important that it superseded the tribal bond.
3. He drew a covenant with the other groups in Madinah, namely the Jews and the Arab unbelievers, making them all citizens of the new state that he established in the city. This was a detailed document specifying duties and commitments of each group. This was the first written constitution in human history, establishing a pluralist society based on citizenship.
He sent out several armed expeditions into the areas surrounding Madinah, so as to demonstrate that the new state did not fear anyone. The Arabian society was used to tribal raids that were launched for easy gain. The Prophet wanted to show that Madinah was too strong for anyone to contemplate such an attack. Moreover, the expeditions threatened the trade route of the caravans of the Quraysh, without actually engaging in any fighting: except once resulting in a small clash between a group of six Muslims and a small caravan. These expeditions were formed of the Muhājirūn only.
The new society in Madinah was discovering vistas of life that the people had never encountered. The treatment of other people as brothers and sisters in faith, rather than blood relations and tribesmen, gave all Muslims a new meaning of life. Having a cause to work for also added a new dimension to their outlook. As advocates of Islam, they brought its message to their relatives and fellow citizens. For the first time, the Muslims could conduct their lives according to Islamic teachings without fear. More people were embracing the faith every day. The Prophet continued his efforts of moulding the new community, smoothing its rough edges and consolidating the fledgling Islamic state. However, this state of affairs could not last long, as the Quraysh represented a serious threat and had managed to reassert its position as the leading force in Arabia. If Islam was to move beyond Madinah, it had to neutralize the threat of the Quraysh.
From another point of view, the Muslim community lived in poverty: the influx of the Muhājirūn placed a heavy burden on the economy of the city, and the Quraysh had confiscated all the possessions that they left behind. Therefore, the Prophet was looking for an opportunity to redress this imbalance.
Such an opportunity offered itself in Ramadan of the second year of the Prophet’s settlement in Madinah (year two in the Islamic calendar, which starts with the Prophet’s immigration to Madinah). The Prophet received intelligence that a large trade caravan belonging to the Quraysh was on its way back from Syria to Makkah. He called on Muslims to move quickly to intercept it. A force of 313 men, most of them from the Anṣār, marched with the Prophet to intercept the caravan. The Prophet did not order a full mobilization, because that would have taken time, and the caravan might be then difficult to chase. Moreover, the Muslim force was ill equipped for a major fight. Abū Sufyān, the leader of the caravan, was moving wearily when he came parallel with Madinah. He soon heard that a Muslim force was out to intercept his caravan. He took two actions in response: he moved towards the sea to march by the seaside route, and he sent information to Makkah, urging its people to come to his defence. A well-equipped army of 1000 fighters moved fast to defend the caravan, which was able to slip away and escape its Muslim pursuers.
The two forces met at Badr. Although the Prophet had tried to avoid an armed clash, the hardliners in the Quraysh army thought they should not miss such a chance of defeating the Muslims in battle. However, the Muslims were able to score a resounding victory. Many of the chiefs of Quraysh’s clans were among seventy of their soldiers killed in battle, and a similar number were taken prisoners. The Muslim losses were fourteen martyrs. There was some discussion about the fate of the prisoners of war. Some of the Prophet’s Companions were in favour of killing them in order to demonstrate to the whole of Arabia that the Muslim community was uncompromising toward unbelievers. The Prophet, however, decided to let them go against the payment of ransom. Those who had no money, but were literate, were given their freedom in return for teaching ten Muslim children to read and write.
Over the next few years a number of momentous events occurred, with enemies of Islam resorting to various methods of confrontation. First, the Jewish tribe of Qaynuqāʿ in Madinah violated the treaty that the Prophet made with all Jewish tribes in the city, as well as with the Arab unbelievers. After the Muslims besieged them, the tribe agreed to leave Madinah and find another place.
Then, it was the turn of the Quraysh to launch an attack on Madinah. One year after the Battle of Badr, a 3000-strong army marched at speed, aiming to take the Muslims by surprise. The Muslim fighting force numbered only 700. A battle was fought, in which the Muslims initially gained the upper hand; however a battalion positioned on a hill to the rear deserted their position, thinking that the battle was over and victory was assured. This enabled two units of the Quraysh army to launch a counterattack from behind. The Muslim army was thus besieged. A number of the Quraysh fighters had vowed to kill the Prophet, and when the Muslim troops were in chaos as a result of the attack from their rear, those fighters launched a determined attack against him. They injured him and broke his teeth, however, he was defended by a small number of his dedicated Companions and the attack against him was repulsed. This clash, known as the Battle of Uḥud, ended in a military defeat for the Muslims, who lost seventy martyrs (ten percent of their fighting force).
This battle revealed the existence of hypocrites in Madinah. These were people who pretended to be Muslims, but did not really believe in Islam. Their leader, ʿAbdullāh ibn Ubayy, was able to cause a split in the Muslim ranks before the battle, taking with him no less than 300 men who had initially marched with the army. This reduced the Muslim army to around 700 soldiers, who were left to face a force that was four times their number. The pretext offered by the deserters was absurd, and the Qur’ān quotes their argument: “Had we known there would be a fight, we would certainly have followed you.” (3: 167)
Arguably, in any state based on a coherent set of principles and an ideology, there will always be some people who stand against the system. If their opposition is openly expressed, there is little problem for society. However, where this opposition engages in secret plots to undermine the system, problems arise. When the Prophet established the first Muslim state in Madinah, those of its Arab population who did not accept Islam were of two types: the first were those who continued to reject Islam, making no secret of their stand. No problem was ever recorded with them, either as individuals or as a group. They were large in number initially, but many of them in time decided to embrace Islam, as they began to realize the truth of its message. The second group included those who realized that Islam was gaining in strength and that unless they joined its ranks they would be cut off by their people. Yet, they had no interest in becoming Muslims. Therefore, they pretended to accept Islam, but did not believe in it in reality. These were the hypocrites, and they were to cause the Muslim community significant problems.
The Muslim defeat in the Battle of Uḥud encouraged some tribes to resort to trickery in order to score some success against the Muslim state. Two specific events caused the Prophet and the Muslim community much distress. The first, known as al-Rajīʿ, involved people coming to the Prophet requesting him to send a few of his Companions with them to teach their Muslim people the Qur’ān. He sent six of his Companions, but the group attacked them on the way and killed four of them. Then they sold the other two to the Quraysh, where they were killed in revenge for the soldiers who were killed at Badr. The second involved between forty and seventy Muslims, who were well-versed in the Qur’ān. They travelled to Najd to advocate Islam, after the Prophet had received assurances that they would be under the protection of the local chiefs. However, they were entrapped and killed.
The home front was not always easy for the Muslim state. The next group to pose a problem was the Jewish tribe of al-Naḍīr. They were party to the convention established by the Prophet after his arrival in Madinah, which committed them to certain duties