The Qur'an

142	THE MADINA PERIOD

Thus, though the pilgrimage was postponed, the victory was theirs: other booty would be realized and they could rest now in patience for to Muhammad was the 'guidance' committed. Great would be the glory of Islam. No longer were Christianity and Judaism co-ordinate with it. In Islam alone was salvation to be found; ¹ for now it was to exceed and excel all other religions, and so they could well afford to wait for a year to fulfil their desire. Enough for them to know that this was the will of God. The whole of this forty-eighth Sura is very remarkable and well suited to the occasion.

This special claim for Islam as the one religion had already been made in an earlier Madina Sura:—

The true religion with God is Islam, and those to whom the Scriptures were given did not differ, till after that knowledge had come to them, and out of jealousy of each other. Sura Al-'Imran (iii) 17.

The meaning of this is given in the commentaries to be, that Islam, not Judaism and Christianity, is the true religion, and that Jews and Christians did not reject it till the Qur'an came, when they did so simply out of envy or from the desire to maintain their own superiority.²

¹ Whoso craves other than Islam for a religion it shall surely not be accepted from him, and in the next world he shall be among the lost.' Sura Al-'Imran (iii) 79. ² 'The religion approved by God is Islam not Judaism or Christianity, and they to whom were given the Book of the Pentateuch and the Gospel did not differ about this that Islam is true and that Muhammad is the true prophet, till after that the true knowledge, (i.e., the Qur'an) came to them.' The original is as follows:—

دين بسنديدة نرديكث خداى دين اسلام ست نة بهوديت ونصرانيت واختلاف نكردند درانة دين اسلام حق است ومحمد رسول بيغمبر بحق آنانكة دادة اند بديشان كتاب يعنى توريت وانجيل مكر بس ازانكة آمد بديشان دانشى بحقيقت امر يعنى قرآن بديشان فرود آمد

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THE EMBASSIES

143

After his return to Madina, with a strong sense of his growing power in Arabia, the vision of the Prophet took a wider range, which is shown in the spirit of a passage in a late Madina Sura:—

Say to them, O men, 'Verily I am God's Apostle to you all.' Sura Al-A'raf (vii) 157.

This led him to send embassies, about the years A. D. 627-8, to various Christian rulers, including Heraclius, the Emperor of Byzantium, to the King of Persia and others.' Noldeke says that in these letters, calling upon the Christian sovereigns to embrace Islam and to acknowledge his suzerainty the following passage was included:²—

Say: 'O people of the Book! come ye to a just judgement between us and you—that ye worship not aught but God and that we join no other gods with Him, and that the one of us take not the other for lords, beside God.' Then, if they turn their backs, say, 'Bear ye witness that we are Muslims.'
O people of the Book, why dispute about Abraham,³ when the Law and the Gospel were not sent down till after him. Do ye not then understand?

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Tafsir-i-Husaini, voi. i, p. 62.
Baidawi defines Islam to be the acceptance of the doctrine of the unity and of the code which Muhammad brought. Vol. i, p. 148.

سواى اسلام كى اور كوئى طريقة مقبول نهين جيسا فرمايا مَنْ يَبْتَغِ غَيْرِ الاِْسْلام دِيْنًا فَلَنْ يُقْبَلَ مِنْهُ اسلام كى سوا دوسرا دين دو اختيار كرى نة مانا جائيكا

'Except Islam no other way is approved, as God said, "who chooses other than Islam for a religion, it shall not be accepted from him." Khalasatu't-Tafasir, vol. i, p. 241.
¹ For a full account of these embassies and their result, see Mirkhund, Raudatu's-Safa, part ii, vol. ii, pp. 517 ff.
² It is, however, said that this verse and the verses preceding it were revealed, when later on the Christians of Najran with their Bishop came to see Muhammad. It is also said to refer to the Jews of Madina. Baidawi, vol. i, p. 159.
³ Baidawi comments on the verse thus; 'the Jews and Christians
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