The Hijra — Muhammad Establishes Islam as a Political Force
In the twelfth year of his prophetic mission, around July 622, Muhammad and his small community of followers left Mecca for the oasis city of Yathrib, 340 kilometers to the north. This migration, the Hijra, marks Year 1 of the Islamic calendar for good reason: it represents the moment when Islam ceased to be a persecuted religious movement and became a political community capable of reshaping the world. For twelve years Muhammad had preached in Mecca, his birthplace and the commercial and religious center of western Arabia. The Quraysh tribe, who controlled the Kaaba and profited from the pilgrimage trade, had persecuted his followers, boycotted his family, and ultimately planned his assassination. The invitation from tribal leaders of Yathrib, who needed an arbitrator for their chronic inter-tribal feuding, gave him an alternative. At Yathrib, renamed Medina al-Nabi (City of the Prophet), Muhammad issued what scholars call the Constitution of Medina in 622: a written compact between the Muslim emigrants (Muhajirun) and the Medinan converts (Ansar), and notably incorporating the Jewish tribes of the city. It established a unified community (umma) with Muhammad as its arbiter, defined collective responsibility for defense and blood feuds, and recognized the religious distinctiveness of its Jewish signatories. It is among the earliest written constitutional documents in world history. The following decade combined military expansion with religious consolidation. The Battles of Badr (624, a Muslim victory against the odds), Uhud (625, a setback), and the Trench (627, a defensive success) established the community's military credibility. In 628, the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah with Mecca secured the Muslims' right to pilgrimage and proved strategically decisive: two years later, in January 630, Muhammad entered Mecca with an army of 10,000, meeting almost no resistance. The idols in the Kaaba were destroyed and Muhammad performed the circumambulation that would become the model for the Hajj. By the time of his death on 8 June 632 in Medina, virtually all of Arabia had submitted to Islam. The revelation he had received and transmitted, compiled into the Quran within decades of his death, combined with his reported sayings and practice (the Hadith and Sunnah), would form the foundation of a civilization stretching from Spain to Indonesia.
- Year: 622 CE
- Category: Religious
