[SB] Sifat al Sofwah / صفة الصفوة

Prophet Muhammad (blessings and peace be upon him) was born into a pagan society in which nearly every conceivable vice was practiced and very few virtues existed. As he grew up, he watched with disgust the great drama of evil around him. He witnessed how the human soul was suppressed, how men were oppressing and exploiting the have-nots, orphans, women, and the weakest members of society, and how the wealthy and strong enslaved the poor and weak. Through ignorance, error, superstition, and outright perversity, people were debauched by evil. Tyranny reigned supreme. The society was drunk with arrogance, empty religious formalism, and luxury. In those times of ignorance, Muhammad (blessings and peace be upon him) grew up. He was upright and truthful, and earned the complete trust of the people of Makkah. Muhammad (blessings and peace be upon him) was never taught formally by any human, and yet, in years to come, he would teach the whole world such as no one else in human history has done. You owe it to yourself to find out about this giant of history: you owe it to yourself to read this book.

This biography of Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, is the first written by a contemporary Muslim scholar. It includes complete coverage of the Prophet’s life, a detailed analysis of pre-Islamic Arabia, the situational context of revelation and a comparative study of the basics of Islamic and western civilizations. The author, Muhammad Husayn Haykal, is well known to the Arabic readers. His other works include The Life of Abu Bakr, The Life of Umar al-Faruq and The Home of Revelation. The translator, Ismail Raji al-Faruqi, was an authority on Islam and comparative religion.

This is an outline of the main contours of Wstern scholarshop on the life and achievements of the Prophet Muhammad. It aim to highlight a perceived lack of objectivity and to focus on the need to study Islam from a scholarly and objective angle.