Uswa Hasana: Difference between revisions

1,902 bytes added , 21 May

Replaced slave names with more reliable translation as per QHS slavery edit, minor restructure and fixed safiyah link. Some work needed to make the language more encyclopedic and balanced..

[checked revision]

Lightyears

Editors, em-bypass-2, Reviewers, rollback, Administrators

2,856

edits

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-{{QualityScore|Lead=2|Structure=2|Content=3|Language=4|References=2}}
+{{QualityScore|Lead=2|Structure=2|Content=2|Language=2|References=2}}
-In the mainstream theology of Sunni [[Islam]], the Prophet Muhammad is known as '''al-Insān al-Kāmil''' (the perfect human) and '''uswa hasana''' (an excellent model of conduct). This is taken to mean that his conduct in all things, from how he prayed, how he conducted himself in business and in war, his sexual relations with his wives, slaves and concubines, and even how he cleaned himself after defecation and urination is an exemplar and model for all humans to follow at all times, regardless of historical circumstance and independent of culture.
+In the mainstream theology of Sunni [[Islam]], the Prophet Muhammad is known as '''al-Insān al-Kāmil''' (the perfect human) and '''uswa hasana''' (an excellent model of conduct). This is taken to mean that his conduct in all things, from how he prayed, how he conducted himself in business and in war, his sexual relations with his wives, slaves and concubines, and even how he cleaned himself after defecation and urination is an exemplar and model for all humans to follow at all times, regardless of historical circumstance and independent of culture. Salafis tend to apply the concept in the most literal way, though are often criticised by other Muslims, while Islamic Modernists and Quranists tend to take the most adaptable approach. While stories in which Muhammad shows qualities such as piety, patience and kindness to children may be emphasised, other aspects of his conduct reported in the tradition can be controversial.
-==Historical Moral Relativism vs Uswa Hasana==
-Modern historians tend to approach the study of particular historical periods, governments and personages from a perspective of historical and cultural relativism. So when in the course of study it comes to light that for instance Julius Caesar sold the women and children of the Gauls he defeated into slavery and paraded his enemy, the Gaulish king/warlord Vercingetorix, like an animal through Rome before executing him (likely by strangulation), although not necessarily endorsing these actions historians will tend to offer context such as explaining that such actions were not at all unusual for other people at the time. On the other hand, when a leader such as Adolf Hitler ordered his soldiers and security forces entering the Soviet Union to specifically ignore international treaties on the treatment of prisoners of war in order to brutalize and murder as many "sub-humans" as possible or to set up industrial killing camps with the objective of physically annihilating entire ethnic groups, an idea new to the entire history of mankind, historians tend to pass judgement on these actions as being worse for breaking the contemporary norms of the times these leaders lived in, exceeding even their contemporaries' expectations of human cruelty and viciousness.
-When historians turn to the historical narratives of Muhammad offered in the sira, tafsir and hadith traditions, many actions such as Muhammad massacring and enslaving the [[Banu Qurayza]], taking [[Safia]] as a slave-wife after executing her husband, or ordering the execution of Meccan poets who had written verses against him once he conquered Mecca are contextualized by noting that these actions were in keeping with the mores and expectations of warfare and statecraft in the Late Antique/early medieval Middle East. This is more often than not perfectly true--contemporary Arabs potentates, the Romans in Byzantium and the Sassanid Persians had no concept of "human rights", "freedom of speech", or "freedom of religion" inter alia and routinely committed what would today be called crimes against humanity against minority religious groups such as the Manicheans, flaying the flesh from their bones and crucifying them, killing prisoners of war when ransom was not received, and both empires were heavily dependent on slave labor, including the practice of creating eunuchs through forced castration.
-It must, however, be noted that the Islamic concept of "Uswa Hasana" stands in direct contradiction to this modern historical methodology. When Muhammad married Aisha at 6 and consummated the marriage when she was 9, this was not simply the action of a man living in a pre-modern culture where women married and bore children very young to assist in their survival; this was the perfect conduct of the perfect man which is an example for all men of all time to follow. When Muhammad ordered the ancient pagan statues of Mecca smashed and all pagans across the Arabian peninsula given the choice of Islam or the sword, this was the proper and right conduct to be followed by all Muslims and their governments in regard to pagan "mushrikuun" of all times and all of their idols, including [[Islamic Law#Music and Art|the ancient Buddha statues of Afghanistan which were dynamited]] by the Taliban, and as certain Salafi groups in Egypt argue today even including the ultra-ancient pyramids and temples of the ancient Egyptian pagans.
-Muhammad repeatedly told his followers to follow his [[Sunnah]] (example) and in the [[Qur'an]] we see that [[Allah]] even asserts his morality as being “sublime” ({{Quran|68|4}}), therefore according to the doctrine of Uswa Hasana Muhammad cannot be seen as simply a product of his time. To orthodox Muslim eyes, admitting to a cultural relativism vis-a-vis the prophet appears as blasphemy. Amongst other effects it would essentially invalidate the majority of Islamic [[fiqh]] which very often takes as its starting point the actions and attitudes of the prophet regarding a given question. From an orthodox Islamic perspective, this is simply unthinkable. The Qur'an itself though delivered by the prophet was created by god and is beyond the constraints of time, just as likewise the actions of the prophet were in every way divinely ordained and sanctioned. It is not simply 'inspired' but the very words of Allah, uttered through the lips of his final messenger who pleased his lord in every way. Hence, Muhammad's actions are (and always will be) morally acceptable to orthodox Muslims who hold this doctrine.
-==Text from the Qur'an==
+==Relevant Quotations==
+===Quran===
 {{quote|{{qtt|33|21}}|
 '''Original:''' لَّقَدْ كَانَ لَكُمْ فِي رَسُولِ اللَّهِ أُسْوَةٌ حَسَنَةٌ لِّمَن كَانَ يَرْجُو اللَّهَ وَالْيَوْمَ الْآخِرَ وَذَكَرَ اللَّهَ كَثِيرً
@@ Line 37: / Line 27: @@
 uswah n.f. {{Quran|33|21}}, {{Quran|60|4}}, {{Quran|60|6}}}}
+==Historical Moral Relativism vs Uswa Hasana==
+Modern historians tend to approach the study of particular historical periods, governments and personages from a perspective of historical and cultural relativism. So when in the course of study it comes to light that for instance Julius Caesar sold the women and children of the Gauls he defeated into slavery and paraded his enemy, the Gaulish king/warlord Vercingetorix, like an animal through Rome before executing him (likely by strangulation), although not necessarily endorsing these actions historians will tend to offer context such as explaining that such actions were not at all unusual for other people at the time. On the other hand, when a leader such as Adolf Hitler ordered his soldiers and security forces entering the Soviet Union to specifically ignore international treaties on the treatment of prisoners of war in order to brutalize and murder as many "sub-humans" as possible or to set up industrial killing camps with the objective of physically annihilating entire ethnic groups, an idea new to the entire history of mankind, historians tend to pass judgement on these actions as being worse for breaking the contemporary norms of the times these leaders lived in, exceeding even their contemporaries' expectations of human cruelty and viciousness.
+When historians turn to the historical narratives of Muhammad offered in the sira, tafsir and hadith traditions, many actions such as Muhammad massacring and enslaving the [[Banu Qurayza]], taking [[Safiyah]] as a slave-wife after executing her husband, or ordering the execution of Meccan poets who had written verses against him once he conquered Mecca are contextualized by noting that these actions were in keeping with the mores and expectations of warfare and statecraft in the Late Antique/early medieval Middle East. This is more often than not perfectly true--contemporary Arabs potentates, the Romans in Byzantium and the Sassanid Persians had no concept of "human rights", "freedom of speech", or "freedom of religion" inter alia and routinely committed what would today be called crimes against humanity against minority religious groups such as the Manicheans, flaying the flesh from their bones and crucifying them, killing prisoners of war when ransom was not received, and both empires were heavily dependent on slave labor, including the practice of creating eunuchs through forced castration.
+It must, however, be noted that the Islamic concept of "Uswa Hasana" stands in direct contradiction to this modern historical methodology. When Muhammad married Aisha at 6 and consummated the marriage when she was 9, this was not simply the action of a man living in a pre-modern culture where women married and bore children very young to assist in their survival; As the perfect man and excellent model of conduct, the story of his marriage has hampered efforts to eradicate child marriage in some countries around the world in the modern age. When Muhammad reportedly ordered the ancient pagan statues of Mecca smashed and all pagans across the Arabian peninsula given the choice of Islam or the sword, this inspired centuries of iconoclasm and oppression as well as more recent extremism including [[Islamic Law#Music and Art|the ancient Buddha statues of Afghanistan which were dynamited]] by the Taliban, though Clerics from Egypt, whose own ancient religious heritage has only suffered minimal Christian and Muslim iconoclasm over the centuries, denounced the Taliban's actions.
+Muhammad repeatedly told his followers to follow his [[Sunnah]] (example) and in the [[Qur'an]] we see that [[Allah]] even asserts his morality as being “sublime” ({{Quran|68|4}}), therefore according to the doctrine of Uswa Hasana Muhammad cannot be seen as simply a product of his time. To orthodox Muslim eyes, admitting to a cultural relativism vis-a-vis the prophet appears as blasphemy. Amongst other effects it would essentially invalidate the majority of Islamic [[fiqh]] which very often takes as its starting point the actions and attitudes of the prophet regarding a given question. From an orthodox Islamic perspective, this is simply unthinkable. The Qur'an itself though delivered by the prophet was created by god and is beyond the constraints of time, just as likewise the actions of the prophet were in every way divinely ordained and sanctioned. It is not simply 'inspired' but the very words of Allah, uttered through the lips of his final messenger who pleased his lord in every way. Hence, Muhammad's actions are (and always will be) morally acceptable to orthodox Muslims who hold this doctrine.
 ==The Implications of Uswa Hasana for Muslims in the Modern World==
@@ Line 44: / Line 45: @@
 Muhammad and child marriage:
 {{Quote|{{Muslim|8|3310}}|A'isha (Allah be pleased with her) reported: Allah's Apostle (Mohammad) married me when I was six years old, and I was admitted to his house when I was nine years old.}}
-Many Muslim clerics thus argue today that the age of marriage for girls should be as low as 6, and some Muslim countries such as Pakistan follow this in their laws.
+Many Muslim clerics in modern times for this reason have opposed (though some have supported) the raising of the age of marriage in most Muslim countries to 16 or 18 for girls.<ref>Büchler, A. and Schlatter, C. (2013) [https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/78204/ Marriage age in islamic and contemporary muslim family laws. A comparative survey] Journal of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law (EJIMEL), 1(2):37-74.</ref>
 Muhammad and the murder of hundreds of prisoners of war:
@@ Line 54: / Line 55: @@
 Then he (Muhammad) sent for them and struck off their heads in trenches as they were brought to him in batches. Among them was the enemy of Allah Huyyay bin Akhtab and Ka'b bin Asad their chief. There were 600 or 700 in all, though some put the figure as high as 800 or 900.}}
-Islamic extremist groups have used such actions of the prophet as a pretext for murdering captured enemy soldiers, civilians, and minorities, even creating a genre of prisoner execution videos.
+All countries of the world have signed the 1949 Geneva convention, which limits mistreatment of prisoners. Nevertheless, Islamic extremist groups have used such actions of the prophet as a pretext for murdering captured enemy soldiers, civilians, and minorities, even creating a genre of prisoner execution videos.
 Muhammad and slavery:
-{{Quote||These are the names of Muhammad's male slaves: Yakan Abu Sharh, Aflah, 'Ubayd, Dhakwan, Tahman, Mirwan, Hunayn, Sanad, Fadala Yamamin, Anjasha al-Hadi, Mad'am, Karkara, Abu Rafi', Thawban, Ab Kabsha, Salih, Rabah, Yara Nubyan, Fadila, Waqid, Mabur, Abu Waqid, Kasam, Abu 'Ayb, Abu Muwayhiba, Zayd Ibn Haritha, and also a black slave called Mahran, who was re-named (by Muhammad) Safina (`ship').<ref name="Zad al-Ma'ad">Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Zad al-Ma'ad, Part 1, pp. 114-116</ref>}}
+{{Quote|Zad al Ma'ad by Ibn Qayyim pp. 114-16, [https://archive.org/details/ProvisionsOfTheAfterlife/page/30/mode/1 Translation Ismail Abdus Salaam pp. 30-31]|Aboo 'Ubayda has said: his female slaves were four: Maariya who conceived Ibraaheem, Rayhaana, Jameela, and a slave whome he received from Zaynab Bint Jahsh.
+Salma, Umm Raafi', Mayboona, Khadira, Radwa, Razeena, Umm Dameera, and Maymoona Bint Abee 'Usayyib were also his slaves.}}
-{{Quote||Muhammed's Maid Slaves "are Salma Um Rafi', Maymuna daughter of Abu Asib, Maymuna daughter of Sa'd, Khadra, Radwa, Razina, Um Damira, Rayhana, Mary the Coptic, in addition to two other maid-slaves, one of them given to him as a present by his cousin, Zaynab, and the other one captured in a war.<ref name="Zad al-Ma'ad"></ref>}}
+{{Quote|Zad al Ma'ad by Ibn Qayyim pp. 114-16, [https://archive.org/details/ProvisionsOfTheAfterlife/page/30/mode/1 Translation Ismail Abdus Salaam pp. 30-31]|Zayd Bin Haaritha was his male slave whom he emancipated and married to Umm Ayman who gave birth to Usaama. Aslam, Aboo Raafi', Thawbaan, Saleem, Saalih, Rabaah, Yasaar, Mud'im, and Karkara were his slaves, and Mud'im and Karkara were slain at Khaybar, and Allaah knows best.
-When ISIS captured the "pagan" Yazidis of Sinjar, this conduct was used as a pretext for taking young male Yazidis and females Yazidis as slaves, including sex slaves.
+Anjasha and Mihraan whom the messenger of Allaah (may Allaah send salutations upon him) named Safeena were his slaves, and the messenger of Allaah (may Allaah send salutations upon him) emancipated him according to Aboo Haatim.
+Aboo Mashrah, Aflah, 'Ubayd, Keesaan, Dhakwaan, Mihraan, Mirwaan, Hunayn, Sandar, Fudaala, Maaboor, Waaqid, Aboo Waaqid, Qassaam, Aboo 'Usayyib and Muwayhiba were also his slaves.}}
+There is a general Islamic consensus that slavery is no longer permitted in the modern context (though some disagree), only starting when Western powers, especially the British, forced its widespread abolition in the 19th and 20th century. However, when ISIS captured the "pagan" Yazidis of Sinjar, this conduct was used as a pretext for taking young male Yazidis and females Yazidis as slaves, including sex slaves.
 Muhammad and homosexuality:
@@ Line 70: / Line 74: @@
 {{Quote|{{Muslim|4|2127}}| Aisha: I said, Messenger of Allah, may my father and mother be ransom for you, and then I told him (the whole story). He said: Was it the darkness (of your shadow) that I saw in front of me? I said: Yes. He struck me on the chest which caused me pain.}}
-To this day, Islamic religious scholars by and large continue to endorse the beating of disobedient wives by their husbands, and this is not seen as a crime in the laws of most Muslim countries.
+To this day, Islamic religious scholars by and large continue to endorse the beating of disobedient wives by their husbands (with limitations, though likely ineffectual), and this is not seen as a crime in the laws of most Muslim countries.
-In contemporary discourse modern Muslims who wish to live and practice their faith in accordance with modern norms of behavior often condemn such actions as barbaric, and often seek to invoke Muhammad's culture context to explain them. The doctrine of Uswa Hasana, however, makes this argument exceedingly difficult, especially when the argument is between Muslims who wish to follow modern mores and traditionalist Muslims who wish to hew to the classical understanding of the canonical Islamic sources. To take one example, Muhammad himself is claimed to have said: “A man will not be asked as to why he beat his wife.”<ref>Narrated Umar ibn al-Khattab - {{Abu Dawud|11|2142}}</ref>
+In contemporary discourse modern Muslims who wish to live and practice their faith in accordance with modern norms of behavior often condemn such actions as barbaric, and often seek to invoke Muhammad's cultural context to explain them. The doctrine of Uswa Hasana, however, makes this argument exceedingly difficult, especially when the argument is between Muslims who wish to follow modern mores and traditionalist Muslims who wish to hew to the classical understanding of the canonical Islamic sources. To take one example, Muhammad himself is claimed to have said: “A man should not be asked why he beats his wife.”<ref>{{Ibn Majah||3|9|1986}} (graded Hasan, "good", by Dar-us-Salam, though da'if "weak" by al-Albani). [https://web.archive.org/web/20250306231801/https://sunnah.com/ibnmajah:1986 Grading information on sunnah.com (archive)] before it was removed. Similarly, "A man will not be asked as to why he beat his wife." {{Abu Dawud|11|2142}}, though this is graded da'if, "weak" authenticity by al-Albani.</ref>
 ==Challenges to Uswa Hasana from Within the Islamic Tradition==

Uswa Hasana: Difference between revisions

Uswa Hasana (view source)

Revision as of 22:50, 21 May 2025