The Qur'an

176	THE MADINA PERIOD

It was all different now; there was to be the most absolute compulsion; but a victorious leader could assume a position and dictate in a way a fugitive preacher with a position yet to make could not. 'The intoxication of success had long since stilled the voice of his better self. The aged Prophet, standing on the brink of the grave, and leaving as his last legacy a mandate of universal war, irresistibly recalls, by force of contrast, the parting words to his disciples by another religious teacher, that they should go forth and preach a Gospel of peace to all nations. Nor less striking in their contrast is the response to either mandate—the Arab, with the Qur'an in one hand and the sword in the other, spreading his creed amid the glare of burning cities and the shrieks of violated homes—and the apostles of Christ working in the moral darkness of the Roman world with the gentle but irresistible power of light, laying anew the foundations of society and cleansing at their source the polluted springs of national and domestic life.'¹

In the one hundred and third verse of the second Sura the Jews are represented as wishing to lead

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Baidawi (vol. i, p. 132) also speaks of its abrogation by the words:—

O Prophet, contend against the Infidels and the Hypocrites and be rigorous with them. Sura At-Taubah (ix) 74.

It is quite clear, therefore, that no general principle of toleration is here laid down. For Arabs there was absolutely none, and men of other religions were only permitted to live on payment of a poll-tax, so that even in their case there was no real toleration.
It is most important to ascertain the respective dates of all such mild passages and also of the harsher verses. Merely to cast together all the kindly ones without any reference to their date, or the circumstances under which they were delivered, as is sometimes done, is simply misleading.
¹ Osborn, Islam under the Arabs, p..54.

RELATION TO JEWS

177

the Muslims astray, and the latter are told to be patient and forgiving:—

Many of the people of the Book desire to bring you back to unbelief after ye have believed, out of selfish envy, even after the truth hath been clearly shown to them. But forgive them and shun them till God shall come in with His working. Truly God hath power over all things. Sura Al-Baqarah (ii) 103.

According to the commentators Mu'alim and Mazhar the Jews were those who, after the defeat of the Muslims in the battle of Uhud, reproached them and said that it proved their religion to be false. They were to be patient with them till the order for killing came. Other commentators say it is abrogated by the verse of Jihad.¹

Husain interprets the words 'till God shall come in with His working,' ² as meaning 'till the time when God brings the order for killing or for the imposition of the jizya, or poll-tax.'

Thus it is clear that, however desirous Muhammad may have been, when his position was weakened after his defeat at Uhud, to conciliate

معالم اور مظهر هى كة بعد جنكث احد يهود مسلمانون كو طعن كرتى اور كهتى اكر دين تمهارا حق محمد بيغمبر هوتى تو ايسى شكست نملتى ارشاد هوا جب تكث حكم قتال نة اترى صبر كرو مكر دوسرى تفسيرون مين ية قصة مذكور نهين هوا اور مشرر مين هى كة مسلمانون كو نهاكتى تهى الله تعالىا نى فرمايا كة تم ابهى صبر كرو اور آيت جهاد سى منسوخ هى

Khalasatu't-Tafasir, vol. i, p. 62.
²

تا وقتيكة بيار خداى فرمان خود راكة حكم است بقتال سا امر بجزية

Tafsir-i-Husaini, vol. i, p. 18.
Baidawi explains 'His working' to mean 'the order for their slaughter and the exaction of the jizya; or the killing of the Bani Quraiza and the banishment of the Bani Nadhir'. Ibn 'Abbas holds that the advice to show forgiveness is cancelled by the 'verse of the sword.' Baidawi, vol. i, p. 79

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