Concept

Miracles of Muhammad

Overview

Miracles of Muhammad are miraculous claims attributed to the Islamic prophet Muhammad. A number of terms are used in Islam to refer to the claims of events happening that are not explicable by natural or scientific laws, subjects where people sometimes invoke the supernatural.

In the Quran the term āyah (Arabic: آية; pl. آيات, lit. "sign") refers to signs in the context of miracles of God's creation and of the prophets and messengers (such as Ibrahim/Abraham and Isa/Jesus). In later Islamic sources miracles of the prophets were referred to by Muʿjiza (مُعْجِزَة), literally meaning "that by means of which [the Prophet] confounds, overwhelms, his opponents"; while of saints are referred to as karamat (charismata) included in the books of Manaqib.

The earliest records concerning the Prophetic biography contained "almost no miracles" ("dalāʾil al-nubuwwa"), but hundreds of them were added later, along with chains of narration, during the next 2-3 centuries. A range of miraculous incidents related to Muhammad have been reported in post-Quranic texts such as the Hadith and the Sīrah. Some of them relied on ambiguous Quranic verses that were then developed into elaborate narratives. Notably, the Quranic verses 53:1-2, which is said to have originally forecasted a forthcoming event linked to the Day of Judgment based on a sighting of a lunar eclipse, were ultimately transformed into a historical miracle, the splitting of the moon. This tradition has inspired many Muslim poets. The Qur'an does not overtly describe Muhammad performing miracles, according to historian Denis Gril, and the supreme miracle of Muhammad is finally identified with the Qur'an itself. At least one scholar (Sunni Modernist scholar Muhammad Asad) states that Muhammad performed no miracles other than to bring the Quran to humanity, and other scholars, such as Cyril Glasse and Marcia Hermansen, downplay the miracles of Muhammad, stating "they play no role in Islamic theology", or "play less of an evidentiary role than in some other religions".

Believing in the existence and miracles of Awliya is presented as a "condition" for orthodox Islam by many prominent Sunni creed writers such as Al-Tahawi and Nasafi and is accepted in traditional Sunnis and Shi'ism. Traditional Islam may severely punish the denial of miracles because of consensus of Sunni scholars, rejecting a single letter of the Quran or a hadith which is mutawatir causes one to become a apostate. According to them believing in the miracles of Muhammad in the Quran and in hadith were transmitted by mutawatir way and believing to them was obligatory. This understanding, along with expressions of respect and visits to the graves of saints, are seen as unacceptable heresy by puritanical and revivalist Islamic movements such as Salafism, Wahhabism and Islamic Modernism.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

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Further, each of these powers, to wit the five senses, if actually functionating, perceives only through coming into relation with the object felt, nay rather it only perceives at first so much as has been traced in it of the form of the object felt. Thus, the eye only perceives that form which has imprinted itself in it of the object felt; so also the remainder of the powers (or senses). Again, in the case of…
Avicenna, A Compendium on the Soul
The author is tied to Miracles of Muhammad in the knowledge graph.
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We now come to deal with doubts relative to the inspiration of a particular prophet. We shall not arrive at certitude on this point except by ascertaining, either by ocular evidence or by reliable tradition, the facts relating to that prophet. When we have ascertained the real nature of inspiration and proceed to the serious study of the Koran and the traditions, we shall then know certainly that Muhammed is the…
Ghazzali, The Confessions of Al Ghazzali
Close in meaning to Miracles of Muhammad; the term itself is not named.
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Again, it belongeth to the nature of a Miracle, that it be wrought for the procuring of credit to Gods Messengers, Ministers, and Prophets, that thereby men may know, they are called, sent, and employed by God, and thereby be the better inclined to obey them. And therefore, though the creation of the world, and after that the destruction of all living creatures in the universall deluge, were admirable works; yet…
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
States what Miracles of Muhammad is.
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