THE TESTIMONY OF HISTORY
Calling people to the divine religion is similar to knocking at the door of every human heart and mind.
Human history astonishingly testifies to the Quranic statement that if Muslims engaged themselves in dawah work, God would defend them from their opponents (5:67). Right from the early phase of Islam, the Muslims have repeatedly faced insecurity engendered by their opponents, and on each occasion, this problem has been solved by conveying the divine message. There are different forms of security resulting from such action. Whenever the Muslims have conveyed the divine message fully and despite that, the addressees have adopted the attitude of denial and insolence, this directly becomes God’s concern. God sends special divine succour, enabling believers to prevail over their enemies. The instances of prophets Hud and Lot are examples.
God’s religion is the voice of every man’s nature itself. Calling people to the divine religion is like knocking at the door of every human heart. In such cases, even if there is little seriousness in man, his heart submits to the call of his nature. If he does not accept it fully, some soft corner is produced in his heart for the truth. He starts feeling that he should help those who call people to the divine religion, at least at the human and moral level. The story of Prophet Joseph provides an example of this nature.
The third form of divine help, which can be called the final form, is that the addressee should be receptive to the divine message. Such divine help has also been given repeatedly throughout history, and as a result, all kinds of problems have been resolved on their own. It was this third form of help that was given in the case of Prophet Muhammad. This was divine help in the fullest sense.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) acknowledged the conquering power of the Islamic message:
“Much has been said of Mahomet’s (Muhammad) propagating his religion by the sword. The sword indeed, but where will you get your sword? At its starting, every new opinion is precisely in a minority of one. In one man’s head alone, there it dwells as yet. One man of the whole world believes it; there is one man against all men. That he takes a sword and tries to propagate with that will do little for him.” (Muhammad: The Hero As Prophet, p. 80)
Islamic history testifies to the efficacy of the divine message.
