The Miracles of Muhammad part 2

Splitting of the Moon




One of the times when God performed miracles at
the hand of the Prophet was when the Meccans demanded to see a miracle from
Muhammad to show his truthfulness. God split the moon in two separate halves
and then re-joined them. The Quran recorded the event:


“The Last Hour draws near, and the moon is split
asunder!” (Quran 54:1)


Prophet Muhammad would recite these verses of
the Quran in large congregations of the weekly Friday prayer and the bi-annual
Eed prayers.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] Had the
event never occurred, Muslims themselves would have doubted their religion and
many would have left it! The Meccans would have said, ‘Hey, your prophet is a
liar, the moon never split, and we never saw it split!’ Instead, the believers
grew stronger in their faith and the only explanation the Meccans could come up
with was, ‘passing magic!’


“The Last Hour draws near, and the moon is split
asunder! And if they see a sign (miracle), they turn away and say, ‘Passing
magic!’- for they are bent on giving it the lie, being always wont to follow
their own desires.” (Quran 54:1-3)


The splitting of the moon is confirmed through
eye-witness testimony transmitted through an unbroken chain of reliable
scholars so many that is it impossible that it could be false (hadith
mutawatir).[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]


A skeptic might ask, do we have any independent
historical evidence to suggest the moon was ever split? After all, people
around the world should have seen this marvelous event and recorded it.


The answer to this question is twofold.


First, people around the world could not have
seen it as it would have been daytime, late night, or early morning many parts
of the world. The following table will give the reader some idea of
corresponding world times to 9:00 pm Mecca time:






Also, it is not likely that a large number of
people in lands close by would be observing the moon at the exact same time.
They had no reason to. Even if some one did, it does not necessarily mean
people believed him and kept a written record of it, especially when many
civilizations at that time did not preserve their own history in writing.


Second, we actually have an independent, and
quite amazing, historical corroboration of the event from an Indian king of
that time.


Kerala is a state of India. The state stretches
for 360 miles (580 kilometers) along the Malabar Coast on the southwestern side
of the Indian peninsula.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] King
Chakrawati Farmas of Malabar was a Chera king, Cheraman perumal of Kodungallure.
He is recorded to have seen the moon split. The incident is documented in a
manuscript kept at the India Office Library, London, reference number: Arabic,
2807, 152-173.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] A group of
Muslim merchant’s passing by Malabar on their way to China spoke to the king
about how God had supported the Arabian prophet with the miracle of splitting
of the moon. The shocked king said he had seen it with his own eyes as well,
deputized his son, and left for Arabia to meet the Prophet in person. The
Malabari king met the Prophet, bore the two testimonies of faith, learned the
basics of faith, but passed away on his way back and was buried in the port
city of Zafar, Yemen.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]


It is said that the contingent was led by a
Muslim, Malik bin Dinar, and continued to Kodungallure, the Chera capital, and
built the first, and India’s oldest, mosque in the area in 629 CE which exists
today.











A pre-renovation picture of the Cheraman Juma
Masjid, India’s oldest mosque dating back to 629 CE. Image courtesy of [ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]





The news of his accepting Islam reached Kerala
where people accepted Islam. The people of Lakshadweep and the Moplas
(Mapillais) from the Calicut province of Kerala are converts from those days.








Cheraman Juma Masjid, named after India’s first Muslim convert, Cheraman perumal Chakrawati Farmas, after renovation. Image
courtesy of [ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]


The Indian sighting and the meeting of the
Indian king with Prophet Muhammad is also reported by Muslim sources. The
famous Muslim historian, Ibn Kahtir, mentions the splitting of the moon was
reported in parts of India.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] Also, the
books of hadith have documented the arrival of the Indian king and his meeting
the Prophet. Abu Sa’id al-Khudri, a companion of Prophet Muhammad, states:


“The Indian king gifted the Prophet with a
jar of ginger. The companions ate it piece by piece. I took a bite as well.”[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]


The king was thus considered a ‘companion’ – a
term used for a person who met the Prophet and died as a Muslim – his name
registered in the mega-compendiums chronicling the Prophet’s companions.[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]

Night Journey and Ascent to Heaven




A few months
before the migration from Mecca to Medina, God took Muhammad in one
night from the Grand Mosque in Mecca to al-Aqsa
Mosque in Jerusalem, a month’s journey of 1230 Km for a caravan. From
Jerusalem, he ascended to the heavens, passing the boundaries of the
physical universe to
be in divine presence, meet God, and witness the Great Signs (al-Ayat
ul-Kubra). His truth became apparent in two ways. First, ‘the Prophet
described the caravans he had overtaken on the way home and said where they
were and about when they might be expected to arrive in Mecca; and each arrived
as predicted, and the details were as he had described.’[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]
Second, he was never known to have been to Jerusalem, yet he described al-Aqsa
Mosque to skeptics like an eye-witness.











The mystical journey is mentioned in the Quran:


“Exalted is He who took His Servant [Prophet Muhammad]
by night from al-Masjid al-Haram to al-Masjid al-Aqsa, whose surroundings We
have blessed, to show him of Our signs. Indeed, He is the Hearing, the Seeing.”
(Quran 17:1)


“So will you dispute with him over what he saw? And
he certainly saw him in another descent at the Lote Tree of the Utmost Boundary
– near it is the Garden of Refuge (Paradise) – when there covered the Lote Tree
that which covered (it). The sight (of the Prophet) did not swerve, nor did it
transgress (its limit). He certainly saw of the greatest signs of his Lord.” (Quran
53:12-18)


The event is also confirmed through eye-witness
testimony transmitted through the ages with an unbroken chain of reliable
scholars (hadith mutawatir).[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]














Entrance of Al-Aqsa Mosque from where Muhammad
ascended the heavens. Picture courtesy of Thekra A. Sabri.

---

Footnotes:



[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] Saheeh Muslim.






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] See ‘Nadhm
al-Mutanathira min al-Hadith al-Mutawatir,’ by al-Kattani p. 215.






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] “Kerala.” Encyclopædia Britannica from Encyclopædia
Britannica Premium Service. (http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9111226)






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] It is
quoted in the book “Muhammad Rasulullah,” by Muhammad Hamidullah: “There is a
very old tradition in Malabar, South-West Coast of India, that Chakrawati
Farmas, one of their kings, had observed the splitting of the moon, the
celebrated miracle of the Holy Prophet at Mecca, and learning on inquiry that
there was a prediction of the coming of a Messenger of God from Arabia, he
appointed his son as regent and set out to meet him. He embraced Islam at the
hand of the Prophet, and when returning home, at the direction of the Prophet,
died at the port of Zafar, Yemen, where the tomb of the “Indian king” was
piously visited for many centuries.”






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]
‘Zafar: biblical Sephar , classical Sapphar, or
Saphar ancient Arabian site located southwest of Yarim in southern
Yemen. It was the capital of the Himyarites, a tribe that ruled much of
southern Arabia from about 115 BC to about AD 525. Up until the
Persian conquest (c. AD 575), Zafar
was one of the most important and celebrated towns in southern Arabia—a
fact
attested to not only by Arab geographers and historians but also by
Greek and
Roman authors. After the extinction of the Himyar kingdom and the rise
of
Islam, Zafar gradually fell into decay.’ “Zafar.” Encyclopædia
Britannica from
Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service.
(http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9078191)






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] ‘Al-Bidaya
wal-Nihaya,’ by Ibn Kathir, vol 3, p. 130.






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] Reported
by Hakim in ‘Mustadrik’ vol 4, p. 150. Hakim comments, ‘I have
not memorized any other report stating the Prophet ate ginger.’






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] ‘Al-Isaba’
by Ibn Hajr, vol 3. p. 279 and ‘Lisan ul-Mizan’ by Imam al-Dhahabi,
vol. 3 p. 10 under the name ‘Sarbanak,’ the name with which the Arabs knew him.






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] ‘Muhammad:
His Life Based on the Earliest Sources’ by Martin Lings, p. 103.






[ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط] Forty five
companions of the Prophet transmitted the reports on his Night Journey and the
Heavenly Ascent. See the works of hadith masters: ‘Azhar al-Mutanathira fi
al-Ahadith al-Mutawatira’ by al-Suyuti p. 263 and ‘Nadhm al-Mutanathira
min al-Hadith al-Mutawatir,’ by al-Kattani p. 207.