The Alleged Interception of the Koreishite Caravans
41. The nine alleged interceptions of the Koreish caravans.
It has been asserted by European biographers of Mohammad that several caravans of the Koreish going to and from Syria were intercepted and waylaid by the Moslems soon after the Hegira. The alleged incursions are as follow:
(1.) Seven months after Mohammad’s arrival at Medina, an expedition headed by Hamza surprised a caravan under the conduct of Abu Jahl.
(2.) A month later a party led by Obeida was dispatched in the pursuit of another caravan guided by Abu Sofian.
(3.) After the expiration of another month, a third inroad headed by Sad proceeded to lie in ambush for the Koreish caravan on the way it was expected to pass.
(4.) Nearly twelve months after the Hegira, a fourth attempt was undertaken to plunder a caravan of the Koreishites by Mohammad himself at Abwa.
(5.) In the succeeding month Mohammad again marched to Bowat with the sole aim of despoiling a caravan composed of precious freight under the immediate escort of Omeya-bin Khalf.
(6.) After the lapse of two or three months Mohammad set out to Osheira to make aggression on another rich caravan proceeding to Syria led by Abu Sofian.
All these expeditions are said to have been not attended by any success on the part of the Moslems, the vigilance of the caravans in all cases eluding the pursuit made after them.201
(7.) In Rajab A.H. 2, a small band composed of some six persons was ordered to march to Nakhla to lie in wait there for the caravan of the Koreish. The party had a scuffle at Nakhla, in which a man of the convoy was killed; while two prisoners and the pilfered goods were taken to Medina. Hereupon Mohammad was much displeased, and told Abdallah-bin Jahsh, “I never commanded thee to fight in the sacred month.”
(8.) The caravan of the Koreish, which on its passage had safely escaped the chase of the Moslems, as already described in No. 6, was on its way back to Mecca. Mohammad anticipated their return, and prepared an attack, which terminated in the famous battle of Badr.
(9.) All these predatory inroads to intercept the caravans of Mecca are said to have happened during the first and the second year of the Hegira, or before the battle of Badr. It remains for me now to mention the only remaining instance of Moslem’s foray upon the Koreishite caravan, which took place in the sixth year A.H. at Al-Is. The attack was completely successful.
42. The interceptions were impossible under the circumstances in which Mohammad was placed.
I have already explained (from paras. 21-24) that these early expeditions, numbered 1 to 8, are not corroborated by authentic and trustworthy traditions, and I have also given the probable nature of those marked 4, 5 and 6.
It was impossible for Mohammad and his adherents, situated as they were, to make any hostile demonstrations or undertake a pillaging enterprise. The inhabitants of Medina, where the Prophet with his followers had sought a safe asylum, and at whose invitation he had entered their city, had solemnly bound themselves on sacred oaths to defend Mohammad, so long as he was not himself the aggressor, from his enemies as they would their wives and their children.202 Mohammad, on his own part, had entered into a holy compact with them not to plunder or commit depredations.203
Upon these considerations it was impossible that the people of Medina would have permitted or overlooked the irruptions so often committed by Mohammad upon the caravans of the Koreish: much less would they have joined with their Prophet, had he or any of his colleagues ventured to do so. But granting that the Medinites allowed Mohammad to manifest enmity towards the Koreish by a display of arms, or that no restraint was put by them upon him when he encroached upon the territories of the neighbouring tribes, and that the caravans were molested without any grounds of justice, was it possible, I ask, for the people of Medina to avoid the troubles they would be necessarily involved in by the refuge they had given to their Prophet? They had long suffered from internal feuds, and the sanguinary conflict of Boás, a few years ago, which had paralyzed their country, and humiliated its citizens, was but too fresh in their memory yet.
43. The interceptions, if occurred, were justified by way of reprisals.
Let us suppose that these alleged interceptions of the Meccan caravans by the Moslems did actually take place, as related by the biographers of Mohammad, were they not all justified by the International Code of the Arabs, or the ancient usage and military law of nations. It has been proved beyond all dispute that the Meccans were the first aggressors in persecuting the Moslems, and expelling them from their dear homes at Mecca with the unbearable annoyance, they caused the converts of the new faith in the peaceful prosecution of their religion; taking all these causes of offence into consideration, as well as the International law and the law of Nature, the Moslems might be said to have law and justice both on their sides in waging war with their harassers for the restoration of their property and homes, and even in retaliating and making reprisals until they attained the object long sought by them. When the Meccans, on their own part, had first trumpeted hostility against the Moslems, the right of self-defence, as well as military necessity, compelled the latter to destroy their property, and obstruct the ways and channels of communication by which their traffic was prospering; for, “from the moment one State is at war with another, it has, on general principles, a right to seize on all the enemy’s property of whatsoever kind and wheresoever found, and to appropriate the property thus taken to its own use, or to that of the captors.”204