The Battle on Mt. Uhud
In fact, in the following year, an army of three
thousand men came from Mecca to destroy Yathrib. The Prophet’s first idea was
merely to defend the city, a plan of which Ibn Ubayy, the leader of “the Hypocrites”,
strongly approved. But the men who had fought at Badr, believing that God
would help them against any odds, thought it a shame that they should linger
behind walls.
The Prophet, approving of their faith and zeal, gave way
to them, and set out with an army of one thousand men toward Mt. Uhud, where the enemy were encamped. Ibn Ubayy withdrew with his men, who were a third of
the army, in retaliation. Despite the heavy odds, the battle on Mt. Uhud would have been an even greater victory than that at Badr for the Muslims, but for
the disobedience of a band of fifty archers whom the Prophet had set to guard a
pass against the enemy cavalry. Seeing their comrades victorious, these men
left their post, fearing to lose their share of the spoils. The cavalry of Quraish
rode through the gap and fell on the exultant Muslims. The Prophet himself was
wounded and the cry arose that he was slain, until someone recognized him and
shouted that he was still living: a shout to which the Muslims rallied. Gathering
round the Prophet, they retreated, leaving many dead on the hillside. The
field belonged to the Meccans, and now the women of Quraish moved among the
corpses, lamenting the slain from amongst their own people and mutilating the
Muslim dead. Hamzah, the Prophet’s young uncle and childhood friend, was among
the latter, and the abominable Hind, Abu Sufyan’s wife, who bore Hamzah a
particular grudge and had offered a reward to the man who killed him, ate his
liver, plucked from the still warm body. On the following day, the Prophet
again sallied forth with what remained of the army, that Quraish might hear
that he was in the field and so might perhaps be deterred from attacking the
city. The stratagem succeeded, thanks to the behavior of a friendly bedouin
who met the Muslims, conversed with them and afterwards met the army of Quraish.
Questioned by Abu Sufyan, he said that Muhammad was in the field, stronger than
ever, and thirsting for revenge for yesterday’s affair. On that information,
Abu Sufyan decided to return to Mecca.
Massacre of Muslims
The reverse which they had suffered on Mt. Uhud lowered the prestige of the Muslims with the Arab tribes and also with the Jews of
Yathrib. Tribes which had inclined toward the Muslims now inclined toward the Quraish.
The Prophet’s followers were attacked and murdered when they went abroad in
little companies. Khubaib, one of his envoys, was captured by a desert tribe
and sold to the Quraish, who tortured him to death in Mecca publicly.
Expulsion of Bani Nadhir
The Jews, despite their treaty with the Muslims, now
hardly concealed their hostility. They began negotiating alliances with Quraish
and the ‘hypocrites,’ and even attempted to assassinate the Prophet. The
Prophet was obliged to take punitive action against some of them. The tribe of
Bani Nadheer were besieged in their strong towers, subdued and forced to
emigrate.
The War of the Trench
Abu Sufyan must have understood very well that the old
game of tit for tat was no longer valid. Either the Muslims must be destroyed
or the game was lost for ever. With great diplomatic skill he set about
forming a confederacy of bedouin tribes, some, no doubt, opposed to the Muslims,
but others merely eager for plunder, and at the same time he began quietly to
sound out the Jews in Medina regarding a possible alliance. In the fifth year
of the Hijrah (early in 627 C.E.) he set out with 10,000 men, the greatest army
ever seen in the Hijaz (the western region of the Arabian Peninsula). Medina could raise at most 3,000 to oppose him.
The Prophet presided over a council of war, and this
time no one suggested going out to meet the enemy. The only question was how
the town could best be defended. At this point Salman the Persian, a former
slave who had become one of the closest of the companions, suggested the
digging of a deep ditch to join the defensive strong points formed by the lava
fields and by fortified buildings. This was something unheard of in Arab
warfare, but the Prophet immediately appreciated the merits of the plan and
work began at once, he himself carrying rubble from the diggings on his back.
The work was barely finished when the confederate army
appeared on the horizon. While the Muslims were awaiting the assault, news
came that Bani Quraidhah, a Jewish tribe of Yathrib which had, until then, been
loyal, had defected to the enemy. The case seemed desperate. The Prophet
brought every available man to the ditch, leaving the town itself under the
command of a blind companion, and the enemy was met with a hail of arrows as
they came up to the unexpected obstacle. They never crossed it, but remained
in position for three or four weeks, exchanging arrows and insults with the
defenders. The weather turned severe, with icy winds and a tremendous
downpour, and this proved too much for the bedouin confederates. They had come
in the expectation of easy plunder and saw nothing to be gained from squatting
beside a muddy ditch in appalling weather and watching their beasts die for
lack of fodder. They faded away without so much as a farewell to Abu Sufyan. The
army disintegrated and he himself was forced to withdraw. The game was over. He
had lost.
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