Muhammad: Islam’s First Great General (Volume 11) (Campaigns and Commanders Series) - Hardcover

Gabriel, Richard A.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0806138602 ISBN 13: 9780806138602

Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press, 2007

Synopsis

That Muhammad succeeded as a prophet is undeniable; a prominent military historian now suggests that he might not have done so had he not also been a great soldier.

Best known as the founder of a major religion, Muhammad was also Islam’s first great general. While there have been numerous accounts of Muhammad the Prophet, this is the first military biography of the man.

In Muhammad: Islam’s First Great General, Richard A. Gabriel shows us a warrior never before seen in antiquity—a leader of an all-new religious movement who in a single decade fought eight major battles, led eighteen raids, and planned thirty-eight other military operations. Gabriel’s study portrays Muhammad as a revolutionary who introduced military innovations that transformed armies and warfare throughout the Arab world.

Gabriel analyzes the environment in which Muhammad lived and the religion he inspired as they relate to his military achievements. Gabriel explains how Muhammad changed the social composition of Arab armies by replacing traditional ways of fighting with a new command structure.

Muhammad’s transformation of Arab warfare enabled his successors to establish the core of the Islamic empire—an accomplishment that, Gabriel argues, would have been militarily impossible without Muhammad’s innovations. Richard A. Gabriel challenges existing scholarship on Muhammad’s place in history and offers a viewpoint not previously attempted.

About this title

About the Author

Richard A. Gabriel, a historian, is Adjunct Professor of Humanities and Ethics at Daniel Webster College. He is the author of forty books, including The Great Battles of Antiquity, The Great Armies of Antiquity, and Great Captains of Antiquity.

From Booklist

Gabriel argues that neither the faith nor the prophet would have survived had Muhammad not been an innovative and effective soldier. Though his arms training was rudimentary, Muhammad fought 8 major battles, led 18 raids, and planned 38 other major operations, transforming war in the Arab world. Before Muhammad, Arabian society was based on family and clan. The most common form of fighting was grab-and-run raiding seldom entailing severe bloodshed. There was also the blood feud, usually settled short of massacre. Muhammad's followers were to be loyal not to clan and kin but to the ummah, the community of the faithful. When fighting those not of the ummah, they were to use the tactics of the blood feud. So doing, they birthed a reputation for ferocity. Gabriel depicts Muhammad's military undertakings concisely and discretely, begging the question of how the general can be discriminated from the prophet. Muhammad broke and reshaped military and civil society in his world, a feat impossible to have done without the faith of his followers. Murray, Frieda

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0806138602
• ISBN 13: 9780806138602
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288