Muhammad's illiteracy : common sense & history

  • Thread starter Thread starter inJESUS
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
I

inJESUS

Guest
Peace to all,

Muslims tell us that Muhammad was illiterate. I would like to use common sense and some history in this thread.

We all know that Abu Talib , his uncle, raised Muhammad. The son of Abi talib, Ali Bin Abi Talib was a highly literate man, famous for his “balagha”.

Muhammad’s sunna says Abi Talib loved Muhammad and gave him his best for 40 years; he loved him with a love not shared to his sons, he used to sleep next to him and always go out with him and provided him with the best food and he kept helping him and taking care of him and providing him with all the necessary until he died.

In light of all this, why would Abu Talib deprive Muhammad he cared for so much from literacy when Ali his son is known to be of high “balagha” ?
 
I am totally confused. he lived in a Literate society. He worked in a field that was related to trade. Would it not be logical that he was functionally literate?
 
He did not live in a “literate society.” He lived in a society where some people were literate and others weren’t. He encouraged literacy, even offering enemy captives freedom if they would only teach a few of the Muslims how to read and write.

But he himself did not read or write, and there isn’t anything bizarre or abnormal about that historically.
 
Sister_Amy said:
He did not live in a “literate society.” He lived in a society where some people were literate and others weren’t. He encouraged literacy, even offering enemy captives freedom if they would only teach a few of the Muslims how to read and write.

But he himself did not read or write, and there isn’t anything bizarre or abnormal about that historically.
Click to expand...
SO who could read? COuld only rulers? Could clerics? Could merchants and bankers?

I do agree that being illiterate in that era is not strange at all.
 
Sister_Amy said:
The conclusion you thus attempted to draw.
Click to expand...
Amy, i specified “common sense” in the OP and you are throwing words without explaining your point of view.
We have a man who loved Muhammad very much and who took him in his travels and who provided him with the best till he died…this same man’s son is famous for his high balagha…the eloquence of Ali Bin Abi Talib is famous. Can you give a reasonable reason as to why Abu Talib will deprive Muhammad of literacy when he loved him so much and provided him with the best as the sunna says, yet he raised his son to be of high balagha?
 
ralphinal said:
SO who could read? COuld only rulers? Could clerics? Could merchants and bankers?

I do agree that being illiterate in that era is not strange at all.
Click to expand...
I imagine some rulers could. Maybe rulers of sedentary societies. Probably not rulers of tribes. Clerics–who would be Jews or Christians–most certainly could, since they would have read their scriptures. Merchants and bankers (what bankers? or banks?) maybe could, maybe not.

For any individual, it probably depended on many things. It’s not like they had special schools, like at age 5 they send you to a special school for merchants that would teach you math and a school for poetry where they’d teach language. It just wasn’t that way.

Muhammad was an orphan. His father died before he was born, his mother sometime later. He went into the desert in his youth to learn Arabic language–it was a custom at that time for children to go grow up in the desert so their language (speaking) would not be influenced by all the travellers in the city whose language was not so pristine. Then he was raised by his grandfather after his mother’s death. It wasn’t until his grandfather was dead that he was raised by his uncle.

There’s no reason at all to assume that he was taught literacy. Ali was young enough to be Muhammad’s son, and his own path to maturity would not at all have been parallel to Muhammad’s, since he was born much later and not orphaned.

There’s really no logic at all in inJESUS’s post; he’s just trying to push an opinion that is more convenient for him, even though it’s not grounded in facts or any kind of proof.
 
inJESUS said:
Amy, i specified “common sense” in the OP and you are throwing words without explaining your point of view.
We have a man who loved Muhammad very much and who took him in his travels and who provided him with the best till he died…this same man’s son is famous for his high balagha…the eloquence of Ali Bin Abi Talib is famous. Can you give a reasonable reason as to why Abu Talib will deprive Muhammad of literacy when he loved him so much and provided him with the best as the sunna says, yet he raised his son to be of high balagha?
Click to expand...
Once again, your common sense is sorely deficient.

Who was born first, Muhammad or Ali?

How old was Muhammad on his first caravan with his uncle?
 
What’s sad is not that Mahomet didn’t know his letters, but that he didn’t know the real Jesus.

I bear witness that there is NO GOD but Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and Jesus is God Incarnate risen from the dead!
 
Sister_Amy said:
There’s no reason at all to assume that he was taught literacy. Ali was young enough to be Muhammad’s son, and his own path to maturity would not at all have been parallel to Muhammad’s, since he was born much later and not orphaned.

There’s really no logic at all in inJESUS’s post; he’s just trying to push an opinion that is more convenient for him, even though it’s not grounded in facts or any kind of proof.
Click to expand...
ونهض أبو طالب بحق ابن أخيه على أكمل وجه، ضمه إلى ولده وقدمه عليهم، واختصه بفضل احترام وتقدير. وظل فوق أربعين سنة يعز جانبه ويبسط عليه حمايته، ويصادق ويخاصم من أجله.

i assume that you are able to read and understand this sentence. If not, it says Abi Taleb joined him with his sons and even prefered Muhammad over his sons, and respected him and stayed for 40 years sheltering him and defending him. Ali’s age is absolutely irrelevant . Once Muhammad grew older, he began to work for his uncle, and he took responsibility of Ali. Actually it was Muhammad who raised Ali. In light of all this, how can he be illietrate when Ali is highly literate?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top