Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources by Martin Lings

Before the appearance of this book, Western languages lacked almost entirely a comprehensive and authentic account of the life of the Prophet Muhammad Now, Lings, has produced a superb narrative that, in its sobriety and dignity of style and its scrupulous and exhaustive fidelity to authentic and reliable sources, constitutes a major addition to Islamic literature in English. While remaining close to the Arabic sources he cities, Lings show himself able to render Arabic speech incomprehensible and idiomatic English that is neither markedly archaic nor jarringly contemporary, thus conveying what is, for Muslims, the essential timelessness of the events related. Highly recommended. Hamid Algar in Religious Studies Review Despite the vastness of the subject, this biography makes easy and absorbing reading for anyone interested in religion as such. For those interested in Islam in one way or another, it is mesmerizing. Seyyed Hossein Nasr in Parabola Muhammad is a true work of art, as enthralling and engrossing as the best of novels with the difference that this is no fiction but fact. With the magic of his pen, the author makes all the historical personalities of his book come alive The skill of narration is enhanced throughout the book with the most regal and dignified English, inspiring the sense of majestic grandeur essential for any literary work dealing with Divine and Eternal Truths. The Islamic Quarterly The great book is a classic. There is a freshness, clarity and gripping suspense throughout the book As a test in the how and the why and the when of various interrelationship Koranic and Prophetic traditions It is enlightening and authoritative Our authors familiarity with all the complicated inter-family links of tribal Arabia gives us the certainty that he knows his material thoroughly This work should be translated into Arabic so that the Arab world may drink from it. Muslim World (Cap Town) An excellent introduction to the subject and very well written. Annemarie Schlemiel, I read it straight through, then re-read it, almost in its entirety, fascinated. Titus Hardtack Cover CALLIGRAPHY: (top) the Islamic liturgical invocation of blessings on the Prophet (center) octagonal ornament from the walls of the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, consisting of the names in Kufic script of the Prophet and ten of his chief Companions (see the opening of Chapter LXXXII).