Editing Muhammad (section)

==Biographical sources==
{{Main|Historiography of early Islam|Historicity of Muhammad}}
[[File:Birmingham Quran manuscript full.jpg|thumb|Two folios of the [[Birmingham Quran manuscript]], an [[Early Quranic manuscripts|early manuscript]] written in [[Hijazi script]], likely during Muhammad's lifetime ({{circa|568–645|lk=no}})]]

===Quran===
{{Main|Muhammad in the Quran}}
The [[Quran]] is the central [[religious text]] of Islam. Muslims believe it represents the words of [[God in Islam|God]] revealed by the archangel [[Gabriel]] to Muhammad.<ref>{{Cite encyclopedia |year=2007 |title=Qurʾān |encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Quran |access-date=24 September 2013 |last=Nasr |first=Seyyed Hossein |author-link=Seyyed Hossein Nasr |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150505001543/https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/487666/Quran |archive-date=5 May 2015 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>''Living Religions: An Encyclopaedia of the World's Faiths'', Mary Pat Fisher, 1997, p. 338, I. B. Tauris.</ref><ref>{{qref|17|106|b=y}}</ref> The Quran is mainly addressed to a single "Messenger of God" who is referred to as Muhammad in a number of verses. The Quranic text also describes the settlement of his followers in [[Yathrib]] after their expulsion by the Quraysh, and briefly mentions military encounters such as the [[Battle of Badr|Muslim victory at Badr]].<ref name="Watt2024">{{Cite encyclopedia |year=2024 |title=Muhammad |encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Muhammad |access-date=4 February 2023 |last1=Watt |first1=William Montgomery |author-link1=W. Montgomery Watt |last2=Sinai |first2=Nicolai |author-link2=Nicolai Sinai}}</ref>

The Quran, however, provides minimal assistance for Muhammad's chronological biography; most Quranic verses do not provide significant historical context and timeline.{{sfn|Bennett|1998|pp=18–19}}{{sfn|Peters|1994|p=261}} Almost none of [[Muhammad's companions]] are mentioned by name in the Quran, hence not providing sufficient information for a concise biography.<ref name="Watt2024" /> The [[Birmingham Quran manuscript]] has been [[radiocarbon dated]] to between 568 and 645, though the manuscript's discoverer has asserted that the text on the parchment is from a later date.{{Sfn|Shoemaker|2022|p=80}}

===Early biographies===
{{Main|Prophetic biography}}
[[File:PERF No. 665.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|An early manuscript of [[Ibn Hisham]]'s {{tlit|ar|[[Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah (Ibn Hisham)|al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah]]}}, believed to have been transmitted by his students shortly after his death in 833.<ref name=":0">{{cite book |last=Abbott |first=Nabia |author-link=Nabia Abbott |title=Studies in Arabic Literary Papyri: Qur'anic Commentary and Tradition |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |year=1967 |volume=2 |location=Chicago, USA}}</ref>{{Reference page|page=61}}]]
Important sources regarding Muhammad's life may be found in the historic works by writers of the 2nd and 3rd centuries of the [[Hijri era]] (mostly overlapping with the 8th and 9th centuries&nbsp;CE respectively).{{sfn|Watt|1953|p=xi}} These include traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad, which provide additional information about his life.{{sfn|Reeves|2003|pp=6–7}}

The earliest written {{tlit|ar|sira}} (biographies of Muhammad and quotes attributed to him) is [[Ibn Ishaq]]'s ''[[Prophetic biography|Life of God's Messenger]]'' written {{circa|767|lk=no}} (150&nbsp;AH). Although the original work was lost, this {{tlit|ar|sira}} survives as extensive excerpts in works by [[Ibn Hisham]] and to a lesser extent by [[al-Tabari]].{{sfn|Nigosian|2004|p=6}}{{Sfn|Donner|1998|p=132}} However, Ibn Hisham wrote in the preface to his biography of Muhammad that he omitted matters from Ibn Ishaq's biography that "would distress certain people".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Holland |first=Tom |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5u3Ukw7AftwC&pg=PT28 |title=In the Shadow of the Sword |publisher=Doubleday |year=2012 |isbn=978-0-7481-1951-6 |page=42 |quote=Things which it is disgraceful to discuss; matters which would distress certain people; and such reports as I have been told are not to be accepted as trustworthy – all these things have I omitted. [Ibn Hashim, p. 691.]}}</ref> Another early historical source is the history of Muhammad's campaigns by [[al-Waqidi]] ({{died in|207}}&nbsp;AH), and [[The Book of the Major Classes|the work]] of Waqidi's secretary [[Ibn Sa'd al-Baghdadi]] ({{died in|230}}&nbsp;AH).{{sfn|Watt|1953|p=xi}} Due to these early biographical efforts, more is known about Muhammad than almost any other founder of a major religion.{{sfn|Armstrong|2013|p=3|loc=Introduction}} Many scholars accept these early biographies as authentic.{{sfn|Nigosian|2004|p=6}} However, Waqidi's biography has been widely [[Al-Waqidi#Islamic criticism|criticized by Islamic scholars]] for his methods, in particular his decision to omit his sources.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Çakmak |first=Cenap |title=Islam: a worldwide encyclopedia |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2017 |isbn=978-1610692175 |location=Santa Barbara, CA |page=1634}}</ref> Recent studies have led scholars to distinguish between traditions touching legal matters and purely historical events. In the legal group, traditions could have been subject to invention while historic events, aside from exceptional cases, may have been subject only to "tendential shaping".{{sfn|Watt|1953|p=xv}} Other scholars have criticized the reliability of this method, suggesting that one cannot neatly divide traditions into purely legal and historical categories.<ref name="Hoyland2007" /> Western historians describe the purpose of these early biographies as largely to convey a message, rather than to strictly and accurately record history.<ref>{{Citation |last=Lecker |first=Michael |title=Glimpses of Muḥammad's Medinan decade |work=The Cambridge Companion to Muhammad |pages=61–80 |year=2010 |editor-last=Brockopp |editor-first=Jonathan E. |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1017/ccol9780521886079.004 |isbn=978-0-521-88607-9}}</ref>

===Hadith===
{{Main|Hadith}}
[[File:PERF No. 732.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Early manuscript of the ''[[Muwatta Imam Malik|Muwatta]]'' of [[Malik ibn Anas]], dated within his lifetime {{circa|780|lk=no}}.<ref name=":0" />{{Reference page|page=114}}]]
Other important sources include the [[hadith]] collections, accounts of verbal and physical teachings and traditions attributed to Muhammad. Hadiths were compiled several generations after his death by Muslims including [[Muhammad al-Bukhari]], [[Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj]], [[Muhammad ibn Isa at-Tirmidhi]], [[Al-Nasa'i|Abd ar-Rahman al-Nasai]], [[Abu Dawood]], [[Ibn Majah]], [[Malik ibn Anas]], [[al-Daraqutni]].<ref name="Lewis1993">{{Cite book |last=Lewis |first=Bernard |author-link=Bernard Lewis |title=Islam and the West |title-link=Islam and the West |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=1993 |isbn=978-0195090611 |pages=33–34}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Jonathan |first=A. C. Brown |author-link=Jonathan A. C. Brown |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nyMKDEAb4GsC&pg=PA9 |title=The Canonization of al-Bukhārī and Muslim: The Formation and Function of the Sunnī Ḥadīth Canon |publisher=Brill |year=2007 |isbn=978-90-04-15839-9 |page=9 |quote=We can discern three strata of the Sunni ḥadīth canon. The perennial core has been the ''Ṣaḥīḥayn''. Beyond these two foundational classics, some fourth-/tenth-century scholars refer to a four-book selection that adds the two ''Sunans'' of Abū Dāwūd (d. 275/889) and al-Nāsaʾī (d. 303/915). The Five Book canon, which is first noted in the sixth/twelfth century, incorporates the ''Jāmiʿ'' of al-Tirmidhī (d. 279/892). Finally, the Six Book canon, which hails from the same period, adds either the ''Sunan'' of Ibn Mājah (d. 273/887), the ''Sunan'' of al-Dāraquṭnī (d. 385/995) or the ''Muwaṭṭaʾ'' of Mālik b. Anas (d. 179/796). Later ḥadīth compendia often included other collections as well. None of these books, however, has enjoyed the esteem of al-Bukhārīʼs and Muslimʼs works.}}</ref>

Muslim scholars have typically placed a greater emphasis on the hadith instead of the biographical literature, since hadith maintain a traditional chain of transmission ({{tlit|ar|[[isnad]]}}); the lack of such a chain for the biographical literature makes it unverifiable in their eyes.{{sfn|Ardic|2012|p=99}} The hadiths generally present an idealized view of Muhammad.<ref name="Görke2020">{{Cite encyclopedia |year=2020 |title=The Wiley Blackwell Concise Companion to the Hadith |publisher=Wiley |last=Görke |first=Andreas |editor-last=Brown |editor-first=Daniel W. |pages=75–90 |doi=10.1002/9781118638477.ch4 |isbn=978-1-118-63851-4}}</ref> Western scholars have expressed skepticism regarding the verifiability of these chains of transmission. It is widely believed by Western scholars that there was widespread fabrication of hadith during the early centuries of Islam to support certain theological and legal positions,<ref name="Brown2020" /><ref name="Görke2020" /> and it has been suggested that it is "very likely that a considerable number of {{tlitn|ar|hadiths}} that can be found in the {{tlitn|ar|hadith}} collections did not actually originate with the Prophet".<ref name="Görke2020" /> In addition, the meaning of a hadith may have drifted from its original telling to when it was finally written down, even if the chain of transmission is authentic.<ref name="Hoyland2007">{{Cite journal |last=Hoyland |first=Robert |year=2007 |title=Writing the Biography of the Prophet Muhammad: Problems and Solutions |journal=History Compass |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=581–602 |doi=10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00395.x |issn=1478-0542}}</ref> Overall, some Western academics have cautiously viewed the hadith collections as accurate historical sources,<ref name="Lewis1993" /> while the "dominant paradigm" in Western scholarship is to consider their reliability suspect.<ref name="Brown2020">{{Cite encyclopedia |year=2020 |title=The Wiley Blackwell Concise Companion to the Hadith |publisher=Wiley |last=Brown |first=Daniel W. |editor-last=Brown |editor-first=Daniel W. |pages=39–56 |doi=10.1002/9781118638477.ch2 |isbn=978-1-118-63851-4 |chapter=Western Hadith Studies}}</ref> Scholars such as [[Wilferd Madelung]] do not reject the hadith which have been compiled in later periods, but judge them in their historical context.{{sfn|Madelung|1997|pp=xi, 19–20}}