The general belief of genealogists (who are the experts in this field, and have taken many many descents back as far as they can go) is this:
Ancestry of the Prophet Muhammad
The Prophet Muhammad's ancestry is traced back to Adnan around 100 BC. This is probably myth.
Beyond that, this attempt to link Adnan to the Biblical Abraham is obvious mythology. Apart from anything else, even if Abraham existed, he would have lived something like 2300 BC.
http://humphrysfamilytree.com/Islam/index.html
The amount of written literature around in the ARabian peninsula at the time of Muhammad was negligible (one of the major reasons why the Quran is held by Muslims to be so special- it comes from a time when the Arabs had not a lot of written material), so, at best you would only have a verbal genealogy. That is not to say that verbal genealogies cannot be accurate- on the contrary, many of the Welsh and Irish oral genealogies from a similar period are held to be accurate for many generations before they descend into political statements (everyone goes back to Noah, or Adam or to a prominent person in history).
The descent below for Mohammad from Adam is in this vein. It may be accurate for a number of generations, and, like all human genealogies, will end up at Adam, but proof for the descent is lacking, and there are clearly many generations missing)
Muhammad's pure descent from Adam
Sirat p. 3
Muhammad was the son of Abdallah, b. Abdul-Muttalib, b. Hisham, b. Abdu Manaf, b. Qusayy, b. Kilab, b. Murra, b. Kab, b. Luayy, b. Ghalib, b. Fihr, b. Malik, b. al-Nadr, b. Kinana, b. Khuzayma, b. Mudrika, b. Ilyas, b. Mudar, b. Nizar, b. Maadd, b. Adnan, b. Udd, b. Muqawwam, b. Hanur, b. Tayrah, b. Yarub, b. Yashjub, b. Nabit, b. Ismail, b. Ibrahim, b. Tarih, b. Nahur, b. Sarugh, b. Rau, b. Falikh, b. Aybar, b. Shalikh, b. Arfakhshadh, b. Sam, b. Nuh, b. Lamk, b. Mattushalakh, b. Akhnukh (prophet Idris?), b. Yard, b. Mahlil, b. Qaynan, b. Yanish, b. Shith, b. Adam.
Note that this descent does not go through Abraham, however.
The Quran does not list a genealogy of Muhammad to show how he is descended from Abraham, although it more than implies that the Arabs are descended from Abraham through Ishmael. This seems to have been something that came from the teachings of Muhammad alone, as it seems not to have been an Arabic belief before his time. I found this on one site:
According to at least one Muslim writer, in pre-Islamic times Ishmael was never mentioned as the father of the Arabs. In his rebuttal to Dr. Robert A. Morey's book Islamic Invasion, W. Aliyyuddin Shareef, is honest enough to admit:
"In pre-Islamic times Ishmael was never mentioned as the Father of the Arabs." (Shareef, In response to Robert Morey's Islamic Invasion, pp.3-4)
Is Muhammad's belief that the Arabs are descendants of Abraham justified? they are definitely Semites by language and culture, but is there proof of descent from Ishmael?
No.
The same site records:
There is also debate over whether Ishmael ever migrated to Mecca, seeing that the Holy Bible clearly denies that Ishmael ever settled in Arabia. The Holy Bible states that Ishmael and his mother settled in Paran near southern Palestine in northeastern Sinai. The proof that Paran is located in the region of Sinai, and not in Mecca, comes from the Holy Bible:
"And the children of Israel took their journeys out of the wilderness of Sinai; and the cloud (of God) rested in the wilderness of Paran." Numbers 10:12
"And afterward the people (Israelites) removed from Hazeroth, and pitched in the wilderness of Paran." Numbers 12:16
"And Moses by the commandment of the Lord sent them from the wilderness of Paran... And they went and came to Moses, and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran, to Kadesh..." Numbers 13:3, 26
"These be the words which Moses spake unto all Israel on this side of Jordan in the wilderness, in the plain over against the Red sea, between Paran, and Tophel, and Laban, and Hazeroth, and Dizahab." Deuteronomy 1:1
The preceding verses clearly demonstrate that Paran could not possibly be Mecca but a locale near Sinai, since Moses and the Israelites never settled in that part of Arabia.
=========
If Ishmael was never in Mecca, but around the Sinai peninsula, then....
Moreover, we can know for sure that Abraham was never in Mecca because his story is recorded accurately in the Old Testament, up to 1000 years before the Quran existed, and his journey can be traced by the mention of the wells and other sites within the Old Testament text. He came from Mesopotamia, settled in Canaan (modern Israel) and there he stayed (with a small excursion along known trade routes, to Egypt, and back again). He died and was buried in Machpelah in Israel, alongside his wife, Sara, and his heir, Isaac. Isaac's heir, Jacob is also buried in the same tomb.Muslims know this because they have built a mosque over the top of the tomb (to stop the Jews from being able to worship at their ancestor's grave).
Had Abraham gone with Ishmael to Mecca (which is right off the known trade routes from Israel anyway. It might seem close on a map, but trade routes were fixed and followed wells. There were no wells through the almost impenatrable Arabian desert to Mecca), why, then, would he have buried his wife in Israel, and then returned (as an extremely old man) to be buried beside Sara by Isaac, who then joined his parents in the grave when his time came.
Where is Ishmael's burial place? No where to be found. WHen he was made to leave with his mother, the slave girl Hagar, they went and did not return. Ishmael was no doubt loved by his father and was not abandoned by God, but Ishmael was not the heir. (see Genesis 17: "As for Sarai your wife, you are no longer to call her Sarai; her name will be Sarah. I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her." Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, "W ill a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?" And Abraham said to God, "If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!" Then God said, "YES, BUT YOUR WIFE SARAH WILL BEAR YOU A SON, AND YOU WILL CALL HIM ISAAC. I WILL ESTABLISH MY COVENANT WITH HIM AS AN EVERLASTING COVENANT FOR HIS DESCENDANTS AFTER HIM. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation. BUT MY COVENANT I WILL ESTABLISH WITH ISAAC, WHOM SARAH WILL BEAR TO YOU BY THIS TIME NEXT YEAR." When he had finished speaking with Abraham, God went up from him. Genesis 17:1-22 )
The heir, Isaac, was buried beside the father.
=============
What is known of Muhammad? Outside of what information is given in the Quran, nothing. No outside references from the time refer to him. We can deduce his approximate birth year c 570 AD, in Mecca, from the Quran and the Hadith, and we can know his death date, June 8, 632 Medina.
We know who he married, and what his life was like from the Quran and the Hadith narratives.
He did not know how to write, that is true, but that has never been a great problem. Many famous leaders in the past did not know how to read or write, or were not good at it. They employed emanuenses (writers) to do the work.
The various Sura (or revelations) of Muhammad were recorded by various writers who were close to him, and eventually collected into one volume, after his death. This became important in the time of Caliph Uthman, who heard that variant readings of some of the suras were causing disputes, and also,because after the wars of apostasy and the Battle of Yamamah in particular a large number of those who had committed the Quran to memory perished. .
He asked Zayd ibn Thabit, who had known Muhammad personally,had been one of Muhammad's emanuenses, and was well versed in the suras, to put together an official version of the Quran, based on his memory of what was correct. All variant manuscripts were then burnt, much to the horror of their holders.
Happy-Dance Oct, 29 2008 at 02:24 PM
singwell-is off researching a lot Oct, 29 2008 at 03:06 PM
thatsJustme May, 06 2008 at 07:23 AM
Cs01kh May, 06 2008 at 07:51 AM
