The Prophet Muhammad A simple Guide to his Life
The Power of Peace
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duration, which had already been concluded during
the period of the rightly guided caliphs. Now
justifying the waging of war by citing this verse is
not at all acceptable. This verse will apply only if
the same conditions prevail in the world once again.
Biographers of the Prophet have put the number of
war campaigns at 80. When a reader goes through
these biographies, he receives the impression that
the Prophet of Islam during his 23-year prophetic
period waged wars at least four times a year. But
this impression is entirely baseless. The fact is that
the Prophet of Islam in his entire prophetic period
fought only three battles. All the other incidents,
called
ghazwa,
or military expeditions, are in fact,
examples of avoidance of battle, rather than of
involvement in battle.
For instance, the incident of al-Ahzab has been
called a battle in the books of
seerah.
Whereas in
reality, on this occasion, 12,000 armed tribesmen of
Arabia came to the border of Madinah in order to
wage war, but the Prophet and his companions did
not allow the battle to take place by digging a
trench, which acted as a buffer between the
