Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Lord of the Fries · 10-11-2006, 07:14 PM

Is there good evidence for the historicity of muhammed? Was he a real person, or is he merely a mythological figure? What evidence for his existence is there outside of the sira biographies, the koran and the hadith (which, since they were written or compiled by adherents to the faith, should not be treated as valid sources)?

premjan · 10-11-2006, 10:26 PM

If he wasn't real, who invented him? Definitely there is little air of the miraculous about him, so there is less reason to believe he was invented out of whole cloth - there's not even anything that remarkable about his life or teachings for that matter, unlike Jesus who is supposed to have performed miracles.

Tammuz · 10-11-2006, 10:28 PM

So far I know, not even the most skeptical scholars (who prefer to rewrite the early Islamic history) dispute that Muhammed existed. However, many parts of Islamic history can be disputed, such as when the Quran was compiled etc. According to Islamic accounts, Muhammed was born about 570 C.E, which is also supposed to be the Year of the Elephant. However, according to a Greek inscription, the Year of the Elephant was 522 C.E. I think it is safe to dismiss many Hadiths concerning doctrine, even if Muslims classify them as Sahih. I regard the Hadiths in general as little more than hearsay.

VTboy · 10-11-2006, 10:31 PM

If he existed, he was an evil man, we helped create one of the greatest disease of all. Islam is a disease that plagues this world even to this day.

wordy · 10-12-2006, 04:53 AM

He married a lot of woman and had many kids so he was a real historical person.

Ok myth could create such too but I would be very surprised if he wasn't a real person. The stories about him could be very positive in interpretation so they are likely to be as stories about Ghandi and such heroes. Admires see the good side of a person. Admires of Mother Theresa? idolasize her too. when I heard an interview with her I fail to see her as a good person. She had terrible views on rape victims. they should bear the child and give birth to it. That is not a humane view as I get it. more like a punishment.

Jedi Mind Trick · 10-12-2006, 05:22 AM

I could be wrong but, unlike Jesus, I don't think there are valid grounds for questioning the historical existence of the prophet of Islam.

Malachi151 · 10-12-2006, 05:37 AM

I would say that there is no Muhammad. If there is any basis for Muhammad (which is questionable), thenhe was nothing like described by Muslims, in which case the Muslim Muhammad is still a fictional invention.

Here is agood book on the subject:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quest_f...rical_Muhammed

I have talked to ibn Warraq about this and other Muslims as well. Essentially 99.9% of the information on Muhammad has been made up, presumably out of thin air.

There is far, FAR, less reliable information on Muhammad than people think, BECAUSE Muslims claim that they have all this historical information on him, but the problem is that its all made up.

Here is what we have on Muhammad:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhamma...ammad.27s_life

Quote:

The hadith are the written collection of the Arab oral traditions concerning Muhammad. The dates often given for Muhammad's life are 570-632 CE. The most authoritative hadiths in Sunni Islam are compiled in the "Sahih Bukhari" or "Sahih Muslim", while in Shia'ism more emphasis is placed on the "Usul al-Kafi".

The earliest known biography of Muhammad is a collection of "hadith" called the Sirah Rasul Allah or, the Life of the Apostle of God, by Ibn Ishaq who was born in approximately 717 and died in 767. He thus wrote his biography well over one hundred years after Muhammad died and would not have been able to speak to any eyewitnesses but does reference other biographies of which no texts have survived. Ibn Ishaq's work is contained in fragments quoted in a compilation of anecdotes and traditions composed by Islamic historian Ibn Hisham (d. 834) and al-Tabari (838-923).

Other sources for biographies of Muhammad are:

* the military chronicles of Waqidi (745-822)
* the biographies of Ibn Sa'd (783-845), a student of Waqidi
* later histories
* Qur'anic commentaries
* collections of Prophetic hadith

These texts were recorded more than a century, and often several centuries, after the death of Muhammad. Some passages in the Qur'an are believed to shed some light on Muhammad's biography; however, they require a great deal of interpretation to be useful.

So notice that the first biographical information that we actually have comes from the 9th century, which claims to be based on an earlier work, of which no other evidence exists, from the 8th century, about someone who supposedly lived duing the 6th/7th century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_Muhammad

Quote:

What we do know about him is mainly from the Qur'an and the commentaries on the Qur'an. Modern historians are obliged to handle this information cautiously. The prophet is not mentioned in known historical documents of neighbouring people. The word 'Muhammad' occurs only four times in the Qur'an. The oldest biography of Muhammad had been written by Ibn Ishaq and is dated around 750, over a century after the death of the prophet, hence it cannot be regarded as a very reliable and objective document. Most biographies of Muhammad appear to be meant to add context to Qur'anic verses.

So, no, Muhammad, like Jesuse and Moses, never existed.

More info:

http://skeptically.org/enlightenment/id3.html

Quote:

"It was the storytellers who created the tradition: the sound historical traditons to which they are supposed to have added their fables simply did not exist. . . . Nobody remembered anything to the contrary either. . . . There was no continuous transmission. Ibn Ishaq, al-Waqidi, and others were cut of from the past: like the modern scholar, they could not get behind their sources. . . (102). Finally, it has to be realized that the tradition as a whole, not just parts of it as some have thought, is tendentious, and that that tendentiousness arises from allegiance to Islam itself. The complete unreliability of the Muslim tradition as far as dates are concerned has been demonstrated by Lawrence Conrad. After close examination of the sources in an effort to find the most likely birth date for Muhammad--traditionally `Am al-fil, the Year of the Elephant, 570 C.E.--Conrad remarks that: 'Well into the second century A.H. scholarly opinion on the birth date of the Prophet displayed a range of variance of eighty-five years. . . ." Indeed, it appears that the only secure date anywhere in the whole saga of the origins of Islam is 622 C.E., which has been confirmed from dated coinage as marking the beginning of a new era. . . . As we have seen, the important Islamic concept of Sunna, the right or established way of doing things, began as generalized idea. There was Sunna of a region, the Sunna of a group of persons, or the Sunna of some particular distinguished person, such as David or Solomon or the Caliph, even the Sunna of Allah. It was not until the manufacture of Hadiths (Prophetic traditions) got under way in the second Islamic century that all these vague notions were absorbed and particularized in the detailed sunnt an-nabi (Sunna of the Prophet). . . . Muhammad, as Prophet and mouthpiece for the universal diety Allah, is an invention of the ulama of the second and third centuries A.H. (at pages 102-05).

Jedi Mind Trick · 10-12-2006, 06:03 AM

Again, I could be wrong, but sometimes this exercise of saying that so and so never existed begins to strain credibility. Abraham never existed… Moses never existed… King David never existed… Socrates never existed… Jesus never existed… Peter and Paul never existed… Mohammad never existed… Maybe they never did exist but the dismissal seems a little too oft repeated.

post tenebras lux · 10-12-2006, 06:03 AM

For the people who claim that Mohammed actually existed: what was his real name, please? Mohammed is just a title ("the praised one"), and whilst I know the name of his supposed father and grandfather, I've never heard what his first name was.

So, what was Mohammed's real name?

Jedi Mind Trick · 10-12-2006, 06:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by post tenebras lux

For the people who claim that Mohammed actually existed: what was his real name, please? Mohammed is just a title ("the praised one"), and whilst I know the name of his supposed father and grandfather, I've never heard what his first name was.

So, what was Mohammed's real name?

Haven’t got a clue... My name is John, which I understand means: "Yahweh’s Gift." So what is my real name?

ETA:
Besides, what difference to historicity does it make if the real person (or not real) was identified by a title or a name?

10-11-2006, 07:14 PM	#1
Lord of the Fries Senior Member Join Date: May 2006 Location: Leeds, UK Posts: 666	Historicity of muhammed MERGED with historical Muhammed Is there good evidence for the historicity of muhammed? Was he a real person, or is he merely a mythological figure? What evidence for his existence is there outside of the sira biographies, the koran and the hadith (which, since they were written or compiled by adherents to the faith, should not be treated as valid sources)?

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10-11-2006, 10:26 PM	#2
premjan Obsessed Contributor Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: NJ Posts: 61,538	If he wasn't real, who invented him? Definitely there is little air of the miraculous about him, so there is less reason to believe he was invented out of whole cloth - there's not even anything that remarkable about his life or teachings for that matter, unlike Jesus who is supposed to have performed miracles.

10-11-2006, 10:28 PM	#3
Tammuz Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sweden Posts: 5,525	So far I know, not even the most skeptical scholars (who prefer to rewrite the early Islamic history) dispute that Muhammed existed. However, many parts of Islamic history can be disputed, such as when the Quran was compiled etc. According to Islamic accounts, Muhammed was born about 570 C.E, which is also supposed to be the Year of the Elephant. However, according to a Greek inscription, the Year of the Elephant was 522 C.E. I think it is safe to dismiss many Hadiths concerning doctrine, even if Muslims classify them as Sahih. I regard the Hadiths in general as little more than hearsay.

10-11-2006, 10:31 PM	#4
VTboy Regular Member Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Fairfield, Ca Posts: 177	If he existed, he was an evil man, we helped create one of the greatest disease of all. Islam is a disease that plagues this world even to this day.

10-12-2006, 04:53 AM	#5
wordy Contributor Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Sweden, Europe Posts: 12,091	He married a lot of woman and had many kids so he was a real historical person. Ok myth could create such too but I would be very surprised if he wasn't a real person. The stories about him could be very positive in interpretation so they are likely to be as stories about Ghandi and such heroes. Admires see the good side of a person. Admires of Mother Theresa? idolasize her too. when I heard an interview with her I fail to see her as a good person. She had terrible views on rape victims. they should bear the child and give birth to it. That is not a humane view as I get it. more like a punishment.

10-12-2006, 05:22 AM	#6
Jedi Mind Trick Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Indianaplolis Posts: 4,998	I could be wrong but, unlike Jesus, I don't think there are valid grounds for questioning the historical existence of the prophet of Islam.

10-12-2006, 06:03 AM	#8
Jedi Mind Trick Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Indianaplolis Posts: 4,998	Again, I could be wrong, but sometimes this exercise of saying that so and so never existed begins to strain credibility. Abraham never existed… Moses never existed… King David never existed… Socrates never existed… Jesus never existed… Peter and Paul never existed… Mohammad never existed… Maybe they never did exist but the dismissal seems a little too oft repeated.

10-12-2006, 06:03 AM	#9
post tenebras lux Veteran Member Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Republic and Canton of Geneva Posts: 5,756	For the people who claim that Mohammed actually existed: what was his real name, please? Mohammed is just a title ("the praised one"), and whilst I know the name of his supposed father and grandfather, I've never heard what his first name was. So, what was Mohammed's real name?

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