Islam Rediscovered
11. Non-Violence and Islam
~ 162 ~
For instance, in the books of
Seerah
, the incident of
Al-Ahzab is called a
ghazwa
(battle), whereas the
truth is that on this occasion the armed tribes of
Arabia, twelve thousand in number, reached the
borders of Madinah with all intentions of waging
war, but the Prophet and his companions dug a
deep trench between them, thus successfully
preventing a battle from taking place. The same is
the case with all the other incidents called
ghazwa
.
The opponents of the Prophet repeatedly tried to
get him embroiled in war, but on all such occasions,
he managed to resort to some such strategy as
averted the war, thus defusing the situation.
There were only three instances of Muslims really
entering the field of battle—Badr, Uhud and
Hunayn. But the events tell us that on all these
occasions, war had become inevitable, so that the
Prophet was compelled to encounter the aggressors
in self-defence. Furthermore, these battles lasted
only for half a day, each beginning from noon and
ending with the setting of the sun. Thus it would be
proper to say that the Prophet in his entire life span
had actively engaged in war for a total of a day and
a half. That is to say, the Prophet had observed the
