Prophet Muhammad (PBUH): The most important person in my life - Essay Example

? Prophet Muhammad (PBUH The most important person in my life Nobody knew that when MichaelH. Hart would write his book titles, “The 100: A Ranking of The Most Influential Persons in History”, whom he would choose the top most personality who influenced the world throughout the history. It was nobody but only Muhammad the last prophet of Allah whom he chose to be the most influencing and impacting the human history. No doubt, he was such a revolutionary person. He set the new and just standards of all social welfare and moral concepts and established an exemplary welfare state. This is the very reason that I chose him to be the most important person in my life. It is the faith of every Muslim that his belief (eemaan) cannot be completed without love and devotion for his prophet Muhammad more than love he has for any other human being including his parents and offspring. I love Prophet Muhammad because it is his right to be loved. He is important in my life as it is with other Muslims also, because he proved himself to be the right ideal person of all ages and for all human beings. Let me have a glimpse of his personality and teachings which impressed me so much so that I declared him the most important person in my life. The third most important religion of the western world is considered to be Islam. It is the youngest of all religions and began in 610 A.D. by a gentleman named Muhammad, after being visited by the Archangel Gabriel. The angle recited verses to Muhammad that changed his life. He then became a prophet and began preaching about ideas that were very different from the beliefs of the people who lived around him. One of the most important ideas was that there was only one God. Muhammad was born around the time of 570 A.D. At that time the city of Arabia, where he was born, was no longer ruled by the Persians or the Romans, it was governed by strong, independent, wealthy and powerful families. Most of the Arabic people in Muhammad’s time believed in many Gods. They believed in worshipping trees, shooting stars and stones that were oddly shaped like people. They, like Muhammad, also believed in "Allah" who was the creator of the universe and the number one God. Muhammad was a part of a ruling family of Mecca, but was very poor and had many devastating events happen to him as a child. Both his mother and father died when he was an infant. He was sent to live with his grandfather. Looking at his ancestral background, we come to know that he was not from royal family neither was he a great capitalist or millionaire. Muhammad’s grandfather was a shepherd and taught Muhammad how to fight and to make a poor living raising sheep with his nomadic uncles and aunts. He learned of both the Jewish and Christian faiths in his travels. As Muhammad grew older he began to work for a wealthy woman named Khadija, whose husband had died sometime earlier. He was an honest trader and this impressed Khadija. After working for her for a time they began to fall in love and eventually were married. After Muhammad’s marriage to Khadija, his life became much easier until both of his sons died immediately following birth. The tragedies of his son’s deaths made Muhammad spend a lot of time thinking about his life and religion. He had many doubts about the worship of many gods and believed there was a better way. He often went to a cave on Mt. Hira near Mecca to think and sort out what his visions had told him. Muhammad told many of his friends about his visions, but they still didn't believe in him. They scolded him and told him his ideas were not welcome in there life. Muhammad continued to preach to his family and his very few followers. During this time his wife died. By only believing in only one God Muhammad had made the people in his town uncomfortable. They decided to sentence Muhammad to the rest of his life in prison. In 622 A.D., he fled with his faithful flock to the city of Medina, which was located about 200 miles north of Mecca. This trip is famous in the Islam religion and is called the Hjira, or departure. It marks the beginning of the Islamic era. Muhammad was fifty years old when he went to the small city of Medina with his good friend and faithful follower Abu Bekr. The people of Medina welcomed him and adopted his ideas and his new faith. Soon he became both their spiritual and political leader and started to raid other cities to spread the word of Allah. For several years, Medina, led by Muhammad, fought against Mecca. The words of Muhammad and the Koran began to prove to more and more people that Muhammad’s religion was the right religion for them. In fact, the power of Muhammad became so great that the people of Mecca feared Muhammad would take them over. Finally, Mecca and Medina formed a truce. Muhammad agreed to make Mecca the holy city of the Islam faith. The word Islam is an Arab word that means "submission to the will of God." The Islamic religion has Five Pillars of Faith that are the key to a life of paradise. The first Pillar is faith and the belief in one, almighty God. The second Pillar is Prayer. Five times a day, the faithful are called to pray and stop what they're doing and turn towards Mecca to pray. Almsgiving is the third Pillar of Faith and every good Muslim is obligated to contribute to the upkeep of the mosques. Charity is also considered a steppingstone on the road to paradise, so giving to the poor and to beggars is a very good thing. The rule of fasting is the fourth Pillar of Faith in which there is no eating or drinking between sun up and sun down during the month of Ramadan. Lastly, the fifth Pillar of Faith is Hajj which means a pilgrimage to the holy houses i.e. the house of Allah and the City of the Prophet Medina at least once in his life. (Araby, 221) Although his religion Islam is the youngest of the great living religions, yet it has grown to over 400 million Muslims. It has attracted many persons of other religions because of the ideal and impressing personality of the prophet Muhammad. Because it is a missionary faith like Christianity and Buddhism, it wins new converts each year. Over 50 million Africans living in the regions south of the Sahara desert are now Muslim. His religion Islam has many fine attributes. It insists on kindliness and consideration in daily life to all people; it accepts all people, and puts the lowest beggar on equal footing with the richest merchant; it requires daily prayer, humility and thankfulness to God. Prophet Muhammad’s life was such an unblemished and perfect that even enemies could not cogently find any flaw or breach in his character. Physical features are, no doubt, significant, yet the most significant are the features of one’s deeds, achievements and sublimity of character. Muhammad was rich all these. This does not mean that he was not handsome or physically a perfect man. In fact, there was no other person more handsome than he in the world history simply because he was at the highest point of human character. All this is enough for me to say that he is the most important person in my life. Work Cited Araby, Abdullah Al. Incredible Teachings of Muhammad. 2001. Read More