Muhammad by Deepak Chopra Page A

“This must never happen again, do you understand? Never!”
    â€œIs that why you had Uthman attacked?” he asked in a voice as quiet as mine was loud. “Is he part of the disease?”
    â€œNobody had anybody attacked,” I muttered resentfully.
    â€œDid the knife go in on its own?”
    â€œUthman is a secret Christian,” I said. “You don’t understand. And since you have eyes in your head, that means yourefuse to understand. Let everything crash. I’m old. What does it matter?”
    I slumped back on a pile of cushions and poured myself another cup. There was nothing more to say. Muhammad gazed out the window. I stared into the dregs of the wine and swatted a fly. It was too hot to argue. If Mecca goes to hell, they can’t blame me.
    â€œI admire you,” said Muhammad suddenly.
    I was so startled, all I could blurt out was, “Why?”
    â€œâ€˜Fate loves a rebel.’ You know that saying?” he asked.
    â€œI’m not the rebel. Things are going on behind closed doors. Conspirators are trying to destroy us. Fanatics, zealots. If they have their way, another army of demons will be at our walls.”
    Muhammad didn’t cringe. I wasn’t so drunk that I didn’t know I was losing my case. I couldn’t live with myself if the blame fell on me. To calm my nerves, I retold the story of Christ’s invasion. I assumed Muhammad had already heard it, but I needed to tell it and he needed hear it again.
    â€œYou were born that year. I knew your mother, as I knew all of the clan of your great-grandfather Hashim. Her belly was swollen when I came to warn her. Aminah wasn’t the kind to be hysterical. She wanted to know everything, so I talked to her as if she was a man.”
    My words were pouring out freely, but I was far away. In my mind’s eye I could see her again, clutching her robe around her throat so that her hand wouldn’t tremble. Aminah was too pregnant to flee, and yet staying behind could mean her death.
    â€œShe had barely heard of the king of Yemen, whose name was Abrahah al-Ashram. You know the insolent vanity ofthose people. Paradise begins when you cross the border into their green land. Abrahah despised Mecca for one thing—the Kaaba and the wealth it brought us. Why shouldn’t hordes of pilgrims come to his kingdom instead of this wretched desert town? In a dream he saw the solution. He had to build a shrine so grand and luxurious that it would awe any pilgrim who set eyes upon it. He obeyed his dream and called his bejeweled shrine Qullays. If a god had spoken in his ear, Abrahah’s ambition might have been realized, but he was listening to demons. They quickly betrayed him. No pilgrims turned away from the Kaaba. The Arabs made up songs ridiculing his gaudy, empty temple. Now Abrahah’s vanity turned to anger. He rounded up an army of mercenaries, spear throwers and archers, the scum of the earth, but experienced in war. They began their march on Mecca, and what did our Bedouin brothers do? They greased the way with food and water, sold at a premium. They even provided guides from the hill towns who were jealous of Mecca. Abrahah created wonder with a pack of huge gray monsters, as the ignorant called them. They had never seen drawings of elephants.”
    I stopped my story and looked at Muhammad. “You think this is only a tale, but the future depends on what I’m saying.”
    He quietly asked me to go on.
    â€œWhen word spread that Abrahah’s army was only a few miles away, the Quraysh gathered in council. The invader sent word that he would kill no innocent civilians. His wish was to enter the city, raze the Kaaba to the ground, and depart. The emissary who brought this news was lucky he wasn’t beheaded on the spot. The Quraysh became furiousand vowed to defend Mecca to the last man. One elder dissented, though. ‘We can rebuild even the most sacred building,’