Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources

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Lings is at his weakest in one of his final chapters entitled “The Degrees” (LXXXI), which is replete with incautious interpretations or misreporting of Quran and Hadith. Inherent in the reality of degrees and levels in the Religion is the notion of the elite of humankind, the Believers, and the elite of the Believers, the Friends of God. However, Lings turns this notion into a skewed elitism which characterizes the massive majority of people as blind (LXXXI, 329, 3): “Degrees of superiority are also implied by the Revelation in its mention of the heart. In speaking of the majority, it says: Not blind are the eyes, but blind are the hearts within the breasts.” The commentaries are clear that it is not “the majority” at all who are meant but the disbelievers in general, and the disbelievers of Mecca at the time of the Prophet in particular. Lings and a Salafist scholar named Abu Bilal Mustafa al-Kanadi had a public debate about some accounts of Lings' Biography of Muhammad. The exchange was published by Saudi Gazette. [10] Review by Dr Asma Afsaruddin, Indiana University. Quoted by Reza Shah-Kazemi in "A Truly Holy Soul", Q-News no. 363, June 2005 [ permanent dead link]. The late Martin Lings’ (also known as Abu Bakr Siraj al-Din) Muhammad ﷺ: His Life Based On The Earliest Sources is among the seerah books written in English that have received widespread acclaim. Originally published in 1983, the book continues to be among highly-ranked seerah literature in the English language and read by scholars and laypeople alike. The book stands out from the rest as Lings (d. 2005), a Shakespearean scholar, spares no rhetorical device in his prose. For example, Shaykh Hamza Yusuf has said of his work,

In 1939, Lings went to Cairo, Egypt, to visit a friend who was an assistant of René Guénon. Soon after arriving in Cairo, his friend died and Lings began studying Arabic. Cairo became his home for over a decade; he became an English language teacher at the University of Cairo and produced Shakespeare plays annually. [5] Lings married Lesley Smalley in 1944 and lived with her in a village near the pyramids. [6] Despite having settled comfortably in Egypt, Lings was forced to leave in 1952 after anti-British disturbances. [7] Lings in 1948. Symbol & Archetype: A Study of the Meaning of Existence (1991, 2006), Fons Vitae Quinta Essentia series, ISBN 1-870196-05-8

Includes important additions about the prophet’s spread of Islam into Syria and its neighboring states The Book of Certainty: The Sufi Doctrine of Faith, Wisdom and Gnosis signed as Abu Bakr Siraj ad-Din. Cambridge, Islamic Texts Society, 1992 (1st ed. 1952). Yahya, Khalid A. "Review of Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources, by M. Lings". Middle East Studies Association Bulletin. 19 (1): 68-69.

a b c d e "Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources: Revised Edition: Martin Lings (Abu Bakr Siraj Ad-Din)". Islamic Bookstore.com . Retrieved 1 July 2013.A Spiritual Giant" (PDF) (363ed.). Q News. June 2005 . Retrieved 4 July 2013. [ permanent dead link] Khalid Yahya writes that Lings' book brings early Islamic accounts, many of which are scattered, into a single narrative according to Ibn Ishaq's chronological scheme. According to Yahya, Lings successfully presents what most Muslims believe, and have believed throughout history, about Muhammad. [10] W. Montgomery Watt agrees that Lings' book gives an idea of how Muhammad is seen by Muslims. He points out that the book was based on the earliest Islamic sources, and where there is a difference of opinion in those sources, the book takes the most widely accepted view; and that Lings simply accepts the early Islamic sources without discussing their value. [11] Among the oddest leitmotifs of the book are Lings’ preoccupation with and free dramatizing of physical beauty. Khadijah“knew that she herself was still beautiful” (XII, 35, 1); Zaynab bint Jahsh was “a girl of out standing beauty” (XIII, 40, 1); “Ruqayyah was the most beautiful of their daughters and one of the most beautiful women of her generation” (XXIV, 70,1); ... and so on and so forth. adalah tuan rumah bagi segenap peziarah ka’bah yang hadir di Makkah tiap tahunnya. Kekuasaan tersebut dilandasi oleh peristiwa sejarah bahwa Abdul Muthalib lah yang menemukan sumber air zam-zam pada masa mudanya. Kita barangkali bertanya, apa yang dimaksud dengan kenyataan bahwa Abdul Muthalib menemukan sumur zam-zam? Bukankah sumur tersebut adalah mata air yang keluar dari hentakan kaki bayi Isma’il a.s.? Buku ini menjelaskan secara gamblang tentang perpindahan kekuasaan dari klan satu ke klan yang lain terkait dengan “copy right” sumur zam-zam tersebut. Dengan detail pula bercerita tentang satu klan yang kemudian menyembunyikannya dengan menimbunnya hingga hilang selama beberapa generasi dan ditemukan kembali oleh Abdul Muthalib. Siapakah yang menyembunyikan dan apa motif di baliknya? Jawabannya dapat kita temukan dalam buku ini. Buku ini juga memiliki kekhususan dalam hal penyebutan detail nama orang yang masuk dalam ruang sejarah Muhammad. Keterkaitan antara nama-nama penting yang telah kita kenal dalam sejarah islam secara klan disampaikan secara detail dalam buku ini. Misalnya bagaimana hubungan kekerabatan klan antara Muhammad dengan putra angkatnya Zaid bin Haritsah yang sebelumnya merupakan budak keluarga Khadijah. Buku ini juga memuat bagan silsilah para pendiri Klan keturunan Fihr yang kemudian dikenal sebagai Quraisy, asal nama dari sebuah suku besar yang mendiami lembah Bakkah (Makkah). Detail inilah yang nantinya akan membawa kita dalam membangun gambaran utuh mengenai kehidupan Rasulullah teladan umat manusia. Otentitisitas karya ini juga dapat dirasakan melalui penukilan langsung dari berbagai karya klasik terkait dengan ucapan lisan setiap tokohnya. Demikian juga ucapan yang disampaikan oleh lisan Muhammad, maka dalam rangkaian narasi yang disampaikan Lings dalam buku ini dapat ditemukan mutiara-mutiara hadits yang diambil langsung dari kitab aslinya, mulai dari Shahih Bukhari dan Muslim, Sunan Tirmidzi, Ibnu Hanbal, Nasa’i, Abu Dawud dan Ibnu Majah. Sebagaimana yang dituliskan Lings terkait dengan ungkapan Rasulullah di tengah perang Badar, Bergembiralah Abu Bakr! Pertolongan Allah pasti datang kepada kita. Jibril telah hadir, tangannya memegang tali kendali kuda yang ia tunggangi, dan ia akan berperang bersama kita.” Ungkapan tersebut dinukil langsung oleh Lings dari Kitab Shahih Bukhari Bab ke 64, hadits ke-10. Hal lain yang istimewa dari buku ini menurut saya adalah bagaimana Lings menuturkan asbabun nuzul dari ayat-ayat tertentu yang relevan dengan kejadian pada masa Rasulullah. Pola yang demikian menjadi satu nilai tambah bagi pembaca dalam memahami bagaimana konteks sejarah yang menyelimuti suatu ayat sehingga kemudian ia diturunkan. Sehingga tafsir yang dimunculkan terkait dengan ayat tersebut tidak kemudian tercerabut dari konteksnya. Bagi generasi sekarang, boleh jadi ayat-ayat yang dihafal atau diketahuinya tidak dilengkapi dengan pemahaman yang matang tentang bagaimana latar belakang historis turunnya ayat tersebut. Contoh yang dijelaskan oleh Lings dalam buku ini misalnya ayat tentang pengetahuan, “Dan seandainya pohon-pohon di bumi menjadi pena dan laut menjadi tinta, ditambahkan kepadanya tujuh laut lagi sesudah keringnya, niscaya tidak akan habis-habisnya kalimat Allah dituliskan” (Q.S. 31: 27). Turunnya ayat tersebut diceritakan terkait dengan pertanyaan kaum Yahudi mengenai pengetahuan di tengah kegalauan mereka akan keyakinan bahwa Taurat yang diwariskan kepada mereka telah memuat seluruh pengetahuan yang ada. Hal ini setelah His interest in the symbolism of colours found expression in his talent for gardening. From his home in Kent, he would search far and wide for a particular specimen, seeking, for example, a shade of blue that perfectly reflected the perfection of heaven.

Clifton College Register" Muirhead, J.A.O. p399: Bristol; J.W Arrowsmith for Old Cliftonian Society; April, 1948 Lings was born in Burnage, Manchester, in 1909 to a Protestant family. [2] The young Lings gained an introduction to travelling at a young age, spending significant time in the United States because of his father's employment. Lings attended Clifton College [3] and went on to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained a BA in English Language and Literature. At Magdalen, he was a student and then a close friend of C. S. Lewis. After graduating from Oxford Lings went to Vytautas Magnus University, in Lithuania, where he taught Anglo-Saxon and Middle English. [2] Lings advocates applying the title of Furqan not only to the Quran but to “every revealed Scripture” (XXV, 76, 1). This is arguable if he means the word furqan in a metaphorical generic sense of separating truth from error. However, it is fair to say he means it literally so as to deny the exclusivity of the Quran as an universal Message among all revealed Scriptures and also the exclusivity of its abrogating status of all other Scriptures for all time, since he actually grants neither superiority nor abrogating-status to the Prophet Mu A Sufi saint of the twentieth century: Shaikh Ahmad al-°Alawi, his spiritual heritage and legacy ( Islamic Texts Society, 1993) ISBN 0-946621-50-0 Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources is a 1983 biography of the Islamic prophet Muhammad by Martin Lings.

Sacred Art of Shakespeare: To Take Upon Us the Mystery of Things ( Inner Traditions, 1998) 0892817178 Buletin Al-Islamiyah Media Kajian dan Dakwah Universitas Islam Indonesia http://alislamiyah.uii.ac.id Martin Lings’ biography of Muhammad is an internationally acclaimed, comprehensive, and authoritative account of the life of the prophet. Based on the sira, the eighth- and ninth-century Arabic biographies that recount numerous events in the prophet’s life, it contains original English translations of many important passages that reveal the words of men and women who heard Muhammad speak and witnessed the events of his life.