Muhammad in Mecca

The Islamic prophet Muhammad was born and lived in Mecca for the first 52 years of his life (570–622 A.D.). Orphaned early in life, he became known as a prominent merchant, and as an impartial and trustworthy arbiter of disputes. He married his first wife, the wealthy 40-year-old widow Khadijah at the age of 25. He would also marry Aisha and many others later in his life.

According to the Muslim tradition, Muhammad began receiving revelations at the age of 40. The key themes of his messages in Mecca were the oneness of God and the rejection of polytheism, generosity towards the poor and the needy, and the equality between men and women before God. Some of his peers respected his words and became his followers. Many others, including tribal leaders, opposed, ridiculed and eventually boycotted his clan, and Muhammad and his followers were harassed, assaulted, tortured and forced into exile. Several attempts were made on his life. When his uncle and chief protector, Abu Talib, who was the head of the clan of Banu Hashim died, Muhammad migrated to Medina in 622, where he had many followers who agreed to help and assist him.

Muhammad is the one of the first founders of a major world religion who had biographies written by contemporaries, and about whom there are numerous records in historical texts, although like other premodern historical figures not every detail of his life is known.

For the Muslims, Muhammad is just the last prophet of the unique religion preached by the other prophets before him.

The Qur'an is considered to be the most credible primary source for the life of Muhammad in Mecca. Next in importance are the historical works survived from the writers of 3rd and 4th century of the Muslim era.

The text of the Qur'an is generally considered by academic scholars to record the words spoken by Muhammad as the search for variants in Western academia has not yielded any differences of great significance. The Qur'an, however, mainly records the ideological and spiritual considerations of Muhammad, and only fragmentary references to the details of Muhammad's life in Mecca, which makes it difficult to reconstruct the chronological order of the incidents in his or his followers' lives in Mecca. Modern biographers of Muhammad try to reconstruct the economic, political and social aspects of Mecca and read the ideological aspects of the Qur'an in that context.

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