By Hailemariam Abebe
Often, when people hear of the holy word Hijra or Hijrah, they do mistakenly think that it is the first historical milestone in the Islamic faith referring to first migrations away from the birth of the Islamic faith or Mecca to Medina, in 622 A.D. The true or accurate first Hijra or Hijrah was however, the one which took place in the year of 613 A.D. The latter date was when the followers of the Prophet Muhammad known as the Sahabah, fled from the persecution and torture by the ruling Quraysh tribe of Mecca and sought refuge in the Christian Kingdom of Axum (Aksum)! And they did not just flee on their own but it was the Prophet Muhammad who “…in order to protect them and their new found religion the Prophet Muhammad, may the mercy and blessings of God be upon him, sent approximately 80 people, including one of his own daughters, to Ethiopia. This event is known as the first Hijrah (migration)…”
If unfamiliar with the historical account of the event, please do read and study it. The whole account of the first Hijrah is so spectacularly, boldly, brightly and heartwarmingly evidence which brightly spotlights into the extraordinary nature of the Axumite sense of justice, hospitality and accommodation! The Prophet himself referred to the Axumite Kingdom as the land of peace and justice and its King or the “Nugus,” not only as a just and truthful man with deep Christian religious convictions who would look after his followers well but that the King was a man who lived by peace and justice! And the Prophet did not just send his followers but also, He sent a letter to the King too and it read as follows:
I begin with the Name of God, the Most Merciful, Most Gracious, From Muhammad, the Messenger of God to the Negus Al-Asham, king of Abyssinia (Ethiopia).
Peace be upon you, I praise God and I bear witness that Jesus, son of Mary, is the slave of God. He was created by the command of God and Mary the virgin, the good, the pure, conceived Jesus. As God created Adam, He created Jesus. I call you to God, the Unique without partner, and to His obedience, and to follow me and believe in that which came to me, for I am the Messenger of God.
I send to you my cousin Jafar with a number of Muslims, and when they come, I ask you to entertain and receive them. Peace be upon all those who follow True Guidance.
As history has recorded, the followers of the Prophet arrived at the royal court and as the Prophet believed, the King welcomed the refugees and granted them asylum to live and practice their religion. This is in fact the first legally sanctioned practice of Islam! It never first occurred anywhere else in the world but in the Christian Empire of Axum! Similarly, the first legally sanctioned mosque was never one elsewhere in the world but in the Axumite Empire or the Al Negashi Mosque in the heart of Tigray!!! But the Arab driven crimes against the holiest of the holy not only of the Christian faith but also of the Muslim faith, is not a modern day and a petrodollar driven phenomenon. It had roots even during the time of the first Hijirah.
At the time the first Muslims arrived in Axum, the then rulers of Mecca known as the Quraysh tribe, immediately sent emissaries to the King, trying to convince him that new religion and the refugees’ belief was illegitimate! The Quraysh tried to even bribe the King too by sending him gifts but “… King was a wise, noble and just man and was prepared to meet and hear both groups…” That was when the Quraysh side argued “Your Majesty, you well know that a group of fools have turned renegade and have taken asylum in your country. They did not embrace your religion, but rather invented their own religion that neither of us knows. We are people of high rank who are related to their fathers, uncles, and tribes, and ask that you would surrender these wretched renegades to us.”
It was then, the refugees turn to make their case and when the King asked them “…why they had chosen this new religion rather than adhere to the religion of their forefathers or embrace the established religion of Christianity…” The faithful who made the case for the new religion was the Prophet Muhammad’s cousin, Jafar, the son of Abu Talib. He stood in front of the King and with eloquence and convictions which caused both the King and his bishops to weep until their beards were soaked with tears, he argued:
O your Majesty, we used to be a people of ignorance. We worshipped idols, ate dead animals, committed great sins, severed family relations, and the strong among us abused the weak. We were like that until God sent from among us a Prophet who was known for his noble descent, honesty, trustworthiness, and decency. He invited us to worship God alone and abstain from worshipping stones and idols. He ordered us to speak nothing but the truth and to render back our trusts to those to whom they are due. Moreover, he ordered us to keep our ties of kinship intact, be good to our neighbors, and abstain from what is forbidden. He also ordered us not to commit evil, nor to say false statements, nor to eat up the property of orphans, nor to accuse chaste women of wrongdoing without proof or witness. He has commanded us to worship God alone and not to associate anything with Him and to pray, give Zakat and fast.
Hence, we believed in him and in God’s message to him. We worshipped God alone. We rejected that which we used to associate with Him as His partners. We consider unlawful what he has told us is unlawful and lawful what he has told us is lawful. For this reason alone, our people have attacked us, tortured us and forced us from our religion. They intend to make us revert to the worship of idols instead of praising God. They want us to consider lawful the evil actions which we used to do in the past. When they tortured us and hemmed us in, and came between us and our religion, we left for your kingdom, choosing you because we need your protection. We hope that we would be treated fairly while we are with you, O King!
After the King listened to the two parties, the King asked Jafar “Do you have with you anything sent down from God to your Prophet?” That was when Jafar recited the opening verses of chapter 19 of the Quran which testifies and honors Maryam, as the mother of Jesus as follows:
(The angel) said: “I am only a messenger from your Lord, (to announce) to you the gift of a righteous son.” She said: “How can I have a son, when no man has touched me, nor am I unchaste?” He said: “So it will be, your Lord said: ‘That is easy for Me (God): And We wish to appoint him as a sign to mankind and a mercy from Us (God), and it is a matter already decreed.’ “So, she conceived him, and she withdrew with him to a far place (i.e. Bethlehem valley).” (Quran 19:19-22)
By the time, Jafar finished his recitation, the King and all those in attendance, were so moved to tears and the “… the sublime words of Quran melted their hearts, as it had already begun to do in Mecca…” But the King had another question to Jafar and that was when he asked him what he thought of Jesus to which Jafar responded “our belief in Jesus relies on what our prophet has told us about him; Jesus is God’s servant and messenger who was created by the command of God.” Then came the decision of the King.
It was after hearing both the recitation and the Muslims belief in Jesus that the King refused to give credence to the Quraish’s side and declared that the description of Jesus the Muslims presented did not differ from that of the Christian belief and told the Quaraysh to leave but granted the Muslims free to live in peace and security in the Kingdom thereby saving Islam from extinction!!! Not a hyperbole but that was in fact the case. That such was the case was recently told at the German parliament when the who is who in Islam, such as the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo, Sheikh Ahmed Al-Tayeb, who told the German Parliament, the Bundestag when said the “King of Axum saved Islam reiterated, if it wasn’t for Emperor Armaha of Axum, Islam as a religion, would have been destroyed by the rulers of Mecca at that time. ‘Christianity was the first to provide sanctuary for Islam; without Abyssinia and its Christian king who protected the first Muslims, Islam would have been destroyed in its cradle,’” he told the German Parliament.
But that is not all. The Kingdom of Axum not only saved Islam, but unlike the relations between the Islamic powers and Christian Europe, the Axumite empire not only has been on good terms with its Islamic neighbors but much more importantly, it has been for Muslims, synonymous with freedom from persecution and fear! And yet even though the Prophet Muhammed had warned His followers never to harm the Axumites, the corrupt leaders of the Arab world had been in violation of the Prophet’s holy words since time immemorial! And so, no one must be surprised that the thugs of the UAE along with the rest of those other tyrants who have been and still are urinating on the Prophet’s holy words with not only their drones but also with their terrorism against that land the Prophet Muhamad called the land “of peace and justice” and its King, “the noble man of faith who lived by peace and justice!” No one should be surprised by the UAE’s crime against Tigray; the home of the first legally sanctioned mosque in the world! After all, history is replete with Arab rulers paying lip service to the faith of Islam but living the filthiest lifestyles of alcoholism, drugs, prostitution, gambling, all forbidden in Islam! The good thing is that the overwhelming majority of Muslims the world over know that their leaders are in fact degenerate scums whose live not only by the filth of the world but also as hired killers for those very powers who want to destroy the faith from the face of the earth! And so, we say to the thugs of the UAE, your drones will never make any difference in the current war against the holiest seat of both Islam and Christianity that is Tigray. It will be, like everything the thugs of the Arab world have done against just about everywhere, empty bravado; a perfect fit for the underworld of prostitution, sex, drugs, alcoholism, gambling and child trafficking, all of which Muslims of great standing fight each and every day to uproot!
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Araweelo News Network.
By Hailemariam Abebe published for Tigrai Online.