The Final Sermon: Key Themes 2

The words of our beloved Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) are full of rich lessons. Among them is his address during the farewell Hajj. This is the third in a series of articles on The Prophet’s Last Sermon, Lessons for Humanity.

The sixth of the lessons related to murder and accountability through law. There is a theme that to function on earth in good, humans need law and they need accountability before the law. 

The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) mentioned:

“Deliberate murder is subject to retaliation in kind. Accidental death from a deliberate injury means a death resulting from a stick or a rock, for which the indemnity is one hundred camels: whoever asks for more is a person of the Era of Ignorance.”

This has to do with the laws of crime. Death can be deliberate and that has its punishment. Taking an innocent life with the conditions and so on is punishable by death. We ward off the death penalty in so far as possible. 

If there is an accidental death such as where someone ran over somebody and killed them, there is indemnity for it. This is set by the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace). Even now, the punishment for accidental death would be the material worth of a hundred camels because that was laid down by the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace), not just in the farewell sermon.

100 camels is a considerable payment, even now. This does not allow you to just go and say, “I just killed somebody accidentally, I’ll just pay.” This is just the material amount that is given to the family of the deceased. 

The Devil and His Motives

The seventh reminder in the farewell sermon has to do with the Devil and the motives of the Devil. Our beloved Messenger (Allah bless him and give him peace) tells us, “O people: the Devil has despaired of ever being worshipped in this land of yours. However, he is content to be obeyed in other works of yours – which you deem to be of little importance.”

La ilaha ill’ Allah is preserved, and Muhammad Rasulullah is preserved (Allah bless him and give him peace). 

The health of the heart and the conduct of the one of La ilaha ill’ Allah is susceptible to the whisperings of the Devil. 

Justice and Consistency: The Sacred Months

One of the key themes of the farewell sermon is justice and consistency in the application of the law with the example of the sacred months.

The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) explained this:

“O people: postponing the inviolability of a sacred month [claiming to postpone the prohibition of killing in it to a subsequent month, so as to continue warring despite the sacred month’s having arrived] is a surfeit of unbelief, by which those who disbelieve are led astray, making it lawful one year and unlawful in another, in order to match the number [of months] Allah has made inviolable. Time has verily come full turn, to how it was the day Allah created the heavens and the earth. Four months there are which are inviolable, three in a row and fourth by itself: Dhul-Qa‘da, Dhul-Hijja, and Muharram; and Rajab, which lies between Jumada and Sha‘ban. Have I given the message?—O Allah, be my witness.”

The Arabs were aware of the notion of sacred months. This is something laid down in the Abrahamic way of which they ascribed themselves. The Kaaba, around which the Makkans coalesced and Quraysh settled, its immediate founder was Prophet Ibrahim (upon him be peace) who settled his wife Hajar and his son, Prophet Ismail (upon him be peace) in that land.  

Together with his son, they built the Kaaba. Then Prophet Ismail married some of the local Arabs and they settled around there.

Upon once in barren land, Zamzam had appeared. Because of Zamzam and other water that had appeared in very barren land, it became a habitable place. Other people settled because of the magnificence of the Kaaba. These righteous servants of God were worshipping there. 

Due to the distance from revelation, if they wanted to fight some people or suspend some of the sanctity of the month, they considered this year there is no month of Dhul-Hijjah or any of the other sacred months. This is from the ways of ignorance where people were governed by their whim, not by truth and revelation.

The Natural Order

Time had verily come full turn, this is returning things back to the truth that Prophets Ibrahim and Ismail came with, to how it was the day Allah created the heavens and the earth. Allah has created everything with wisdom and with truth.  

The natural disposition, that is Islam, restores that natural order. The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) made clear that there are four inviolable months, “Four months there are which are inviolable, three in a row and fourth by itself: Dhul-Qa‘da, Dhul-Hijja, and Muharram; and Rajab, which lies between Jumada and Sha‘ban.” 

He (Allah bless him and give him peace) mentions them like this because you cannot shift these around.