Islam is not directly concerned with political and economic systems, but indirectly and in so far as political and economic affairs influence man's conduct, it does lay down some very important principles to govern economic life. According to Prof. Massign on, Islam maintains the balance between exaggerated opposites and has always in view the building of character which is the basis of civilization. This is secured by its law of inheritance, by an organized and not an optional system of charity known as Zakat, and by regarding as illegal all anti-social practi ces in the economic field like monopoly, usury, securing of predetermined unearned income and increments, cornering markets, creating monopolies, creating an artificial scarcity of any c ommodity in order to force the prices to rise. Gambling is illegal. Contribution to schools, to places of worship, hospitals, digging of wells, opening of orphanages are highest acts of virtue. Orphanages have sprung for the first time, it is said, under the teaching of the Prophet of Islam. The world owes its Orphanages to this Prophet who was himself born an orphan. "Good all this" says Carlyle about Muhammad. "The natural voice of humanity, of pity and equity, dwelling in the heart of this wild son of nature, speaks."
A historian once said "a great man would be judged by three tests:
(1) Was he found to be of true mettle by his contemporaries?
(2) Was he great enough to raise above the standards of his age?
(3) Did he leave anything as permanent legacy to the world at large?"
This list may be further extended but all these three tests of greatness are eminently satisfied to the highest degree in the case of Prophet Muhammad. Some illustrations of the last two have already been mentioned.
The first is: Was the Prophet of Islam found to be of true mettle by his contemporaries ?
Historical records show that all the contemporaries of Muhammad both friends and foes, acknowledged the sterling qualities, the spotless honesty, the noble virtues, the absolute sincerity and every trustworthiness of the apostle of Islam in all walks of life and in every sphere of human activity. Even the Jews and those who did not believe in his message, adopted him as the arbiter in t heir personal disputes by virtue of his perfect impartiality. Even those who did not believe in his message were forced to say "O Muhammad, we do not call you a liar, but we deny him who has given you a Book and inspired you with a Message." They thought he was one possessed. They tried violence according to their supposition, to cure him. But the best of them saw that a new light had dawned on him and they hastened to seek that enlightenment. It is a notable feature in the history of Prophet of Islam that his nearest relation, his beloved cousin and his bosom friends, who knew him most intimately, were not thoroughly imbued with the truth of his mission and were convinced of the genuineness of his divine inspiration. If these men and women, noble, intelligent and certainly not less educated than the fishermen of Galilee, had perceived the slightest sign of earthiness, deception, or want of faith in the Teacher himself, Muhammad's hopes of moral regeneration, spiritual awakening, and social reform would all have been foredoomed to a failure and whole edifice would have crumbled to pieces in a moment.
On the contrary, we find that devotion of his followers was such that he was voluntarily acknowledged a leader of their lives. They braved for him persecutions and danger; they trusted, obeyed and honored him even in the most excruciating torture and severest mental agony caused by excommunication even unto death. Would this have been so, had they noticed the slightest back sliding in their leader?
Read the history of the early converts to Islam, and every heart would melt at the sight of the brutal treatment of innocent Muslim men and women.
Sumayya, an innocent women, is cruelly torn into pieces with spears. An example is made of "Yassir whose legs are tied to two camels and the beast were are driven in opposite directions". Khabbab bin Arth is made to lie down on the bed of burning coal with the brutal legs of their merciless tyrant on his breast so that he may not move and this makes even the fat beneath his skin melt. "Khabban bin Adi is put to death in a cruel manner by mutilation and cutting off his flesh piecemeal." In the midst of his tortures, being asked weather he did not wish Muhammad in his place while he was in his house with his family, the sufferer cried out that he was gladly prepared to sacrifice himself his fa mily and children and why was it that these sons and daughters of Islam not only surrendered to their Prophet their allegiance but also made a gift of their hearts and souls to their master? Is not the intense faith and conviction on the part of immediate followers of Muhammad, the noblest testimony to his sincerity and to his utter self-absorption in the task assigned to him?
And these men were not of low status or of inferior mental calibre . Around him, in quite early days, gathered what was best and noblest strata in Makkah, its flower and cream, men of position, rank, wealth and culture, and from his own kith and kin, those who knew all about his life. All the first four Caliphs, with their towering personalities, were converts of this early period.
The Encyclopedia Britannica says that "Muhammad is the most successful of all Prophets and religious personalities".
But the success was not the result of mere accident. It was not a hit of fortune. It was a recognition of fact that he was found to be true mettle by his contemporaries. It was the result of his admirable and all compelling personality.
The personality of Muhammad, It is most difficult to get into the truth of it! Only a glimpse of it I can catch. What a dramatic succession of picturesque scenes. There is Muhammad the Prophet; there is Muhammad the General; Muhammad the King; Muhammad the Warrior; Muhammad the Businessman; Muhammad the Preacher; Muhammad the Philosopher; Muhammad the Statesman; Muhammad the Orator; Muhammad the reformer ; Muhammad the Refuge of Orphans; Muhammad the Protector of slaves; Muhammad the Emancipator of women; Muhammad the Law-giver; Muhammad the Judge; Muhammad the Saint.
And in all these magnificent roles, in all these departments of human activities, he is like... a hero...!
Orphanhood is the extreme of helplessness and his life upon this earth began with it; Kingship is the height of the material power and his life ended with it. From an orphan boy to a persecuted refugee and then to an overlord, spiritual as well as temporal, of a whole nation and Arbiter of its destinies, with all its trails and temptations, with all its vicissitudes and changes, its lights and shad es, its ups and downs, its terror and splendor, he has stood the ire of the world and came out unscathed to serve as a model in every face of life. His achievements are not limited to one aspect of life, but cover the whole field of human conditions.
If for instance, greatness consist in the purification of a nation, steeped in barbarism and immersed in absolute moral darkness, that dynamic personality who has transformed, refined and uplifted an entire nation, sunk low as the Arabs were, and made them the torch-bearer of civilization and learning, has every claim to that greatness. If greatness lies in unifying the discordant elements of society by ties of brotherhood and charity, the prophet of the desert has got every title to this distinction. If greatness consists in reforming those wrapped in degrading and blind superstition and pernicious practices of every kind, the Prophet of Islam has wiped out superstitions and irrational fear from the hearts of millions. If it lies in displaying high morals, Muhammad has been admitted by friends and foes as Al Ameen and As-Sadique, the trustworthy and truthful.. If a conqueror is a great man, here is a person who rose from helpless orphan and an humble creature to be the ruler of Arabia, the equal to Chosroes and Caesars, one who founded great empire that has survived all these 14 centuries. If the devotion that a leader commands is the criterion of greatness, the Prophet's name even today exerts a magic charm over millions of souls, spread all over the world.
He had not studied philosophy in the school of Athens of Rome, Persia, India, or China. Yet, he could proclaim the highest truths of eternal value to mankind. Illiterate himself, he could yet speak with an eloquence and fervor which moved men to tears of ecstasy. Born an orphan, blessed with no worldly goods, he was loved by all. He had studied at no military academy, yet he could organize his forces against tremendous odds and gained victories through the moral forces which he marshaled. Gifted men with genius for preaching are rare. Descartes included the perfect preacher among the rarest kind in the world. Hitler in his Mein Kamp has expressed a similar view. He says "A great theorist is seldom a great leader. An agitator is more likely to posses these qualities. He will always be a great leader. For leadership means ability to move masses of men. The talent to produce ideas has nothing in common with the capacity for leadership." "But", he says, "The Union of theorists, organizer and leader in one man, is the rarest phenomenon on this earth; Therein consists greatness." In the person of the Prophet of Islam the world has seen this rarest phenomenon walking on the earth, walking in flesh and blood.
“A poor , hard-toiling ill provided man; careless of what vulgar men toil for. Not a bad man, I should say; something better in him than Hunger of any sort-or these wild Arab men, fighting and jostling three-and-twenty years at his hand, in close contact with him always would not have reverenced him so !
They were wild men, bursting ever and off and on into quarrel, into all kinds of fierce sincerity; without right worth and manhood, you say? Why, he stood there face to face with them; bare, not enshrined in any mystry; visibly clouting his own cloak, c obbling his own shoes; fighting; counselling, ordering in the midst of them : they must have seen what kind of a man he was, let him be called what you like ! No Emperor with his tiaras was obeyed as this man in a cloak of his own clouting.
During three- and- twenty years of rough actual trial, I find something of a veritable Hero necessary for that, of itself” writes Thomas Carlyle in “Heroes and Hero-worship”.
And more wonderful still is what the Reverend Bosworth Smith remarks, "Head of the State as well as the Church, he was Caesar and Pope in one; but, he was pope without the pope's pretensions, and Caesar without the legions of Caesar, without a standing army, without a bodyguard, without a police force, without a fix revenue. If ever a man had the right to say that he ruled by a right divine, it was Muhammad, for he had the powers without instruments and without its supports. He cared not for the dressings of power. The simplicity of his life was in keeping with the public life.”
After the fall of Makkah, more than one million square miles of land lay at his feet, Lord of Arabia, he mended his own shoes and coarse woollen garments, milked the goats, swept the hearth, kindled the fire and attended the other menial offices of the family. The entire town of Madina where he lived grew wealthy in the later days of his life. Everywhere there was gold and silver in plenty and yet in those days of prosperity many weeks would elapse without a fire being kindled in the hearth of the king of Arabia, His food being dates and water. His family would go hungry many nights successively because they could not get anything to eat in the evening. He slept on no soften bed but on a palm mat, after a long busy day to spend most of his night in prayer, often bursting with tears before his creator to grant him strength to discharge his duties. As the reports go, his voice would get choked with weeping and it would appear as if a cooking pot was on fire and boiling had commenced. On the very day of his death his only assets were few coins a part of which went to satisfy a debt and rest was given to a needy person who came to his house for charity. The clothes in which he breathed his last had many patches. The house from where light had spread to the world was in darkness because there was no oil in the lamp.
Circumstances changed, but the prophet of God did not. In victory or in defeat, in power or in adversity, in affluence or in indigence, he is the same man, disclosed the same character. Like all the ways and laws of God, Prophets of God are unchangeable.