The Missionary Spirit of Diplomatic Deputations.
The state of Madinah arranged to send missionary and diplomatic deputations to neighboring territories even under the most trying conditions of wartime with the result that at least on four occasions members of missionary and diplomatic deputations were brutally massacred by recalcitrant elements. Simultaneously, several men were trained to work in different areas. On a much wider scale, its civil officers did missionary work and advanced the cause of Islam. Civil officers of the Muslim state were not mercenaries and were quite different from officers of other states. They carried out the highest responsibilities for token remuneration.
The governor of Makkah, for instance, Atab bin Usaid رضي الله عنه, was given only one dirham per month. The civil practices of modern politicians were unknown to them. There was no transgression, no paraphernalia and trappings, no aloofness from the people, no indifference to the needs and requirements of the public, no guards and no security staff during their rounds, no bribes, no sycophants or flatterers, no indiscriminate largesse, no drinking parties, dance or music.
They were a different breed of officers who worked for nominal pay, lived very simply, did their work with honesty, dispensed impartial justice, and were sincere worshippers of God. Their conduct must have won over the people and when they conveyed the message of truth it must have gone deep into their hearts in some places, the entire population was attracted to Islam due to the impact created by their ideal life.
For instance, when Abu Musa Ash'ari رضي الله عنه was appointed governor of Zabeed and Aden, the whole population accepted Islam in a short time, while Jarir bin Abdullah Bajli رضي الله عنه converted all members of the Humair ruling families. Thus the message of Islam continued to penetrate the remotest corners of Arabia bringing about a mental revolution and moral transformation. The bedouin population of Arabia was poor and lived a nomadic life on the meager income from their cattle or resorted to armed robbery.
In the hamlets and villages, their chiefs snatched away all the produce of their labor. Large cities were few and comparatively better off but even there, the gulf between the upper and lower classes existed, the former living in affluence and the latter condemned to starvation level. The rich spent their income on women and wine, gambling, and other vices and some of them, particularly the Jews, carried on a moneylending business and exploited their customers.
The masses in Arabia lived in abject poverty and ate even dried blood, and boiled skin of animals. Education and medical aid were lacking and even those who had learned something had learned it through practical experience. For treatment of disease, they prayed to their idols or used charms and potions, and the soothsayers and astrologers exploited them.
In short, the basic need in Arabia was bread, and in a population whose only problem was how to keep the body and soul together no lessons in higher truths could be taught or learned. Any ideology aimed at raising the level of a people steeped in abject poverty could never succeed by mere preaching or sermons on moral values.
Even if the rod is used to establish order and teach morality the system will become an anathema to the public. Humanity can be conquered by a moral ideology only when along with concern for the Hereafter the problems of this world are also tracked when along with moral uplifts, economic problems are also solved. The movement which Rasulullahﷺ launched while giving the light of faith and moral values also propagated the most effective methods of providing the fill for the stomach. In the brief moral code of the earliest Islam, feeding the hungry was given the highest importance, while care of the orphans, widows, and wayfarers was an incumbent duty of every Muslim.
In this poverty-stricken land, there were vested interests that had the monopoly over cash and kind, agricultural produce, and cattle. To take this wealth from the rich for the use of the poor was not an easy task and unless this problem was solved the higher problems of life could not be tackled. The economic laws of Islam received by stages sufficed for the distribution of wealth in a modes economy, but the vested interest had to be attacked. Jihad solved this problem automatically in the most efficient manner. Islam retained its share in the war booty and under this right the accumulated wealth wherever it exist was brought into circulation. Jewish usury which was extorted from the poor was swept away by the booty. The wealth of the people of Thaqif was taken from them and spread all over Arabia.
Similarly, wherever the mischief-making clans raised their heads the greater portion of the wealth of their chiefs and men of wealth was taken from them and put into circulation. Then the Muslim state realized, from all owners of land and commercial assets, taxes in the form of Zakat from Muslims and Jizia from non-Muslims and the greater part of them particularly Zakat, was earmarked for the poor and every year large quantities of foodgrains, dates, and cattle were transferred from the rich to the poor. The moral approach was also made in solving the economic problem and the central society of Madinah was the most successful experiment in social equality mingled with the economic fraternity.
The whole of Arabia saw the grand spectacle of uprooted people, penniless slaves, starving bedouins, and destitute youths rising to new heights after coming under Islam. They not only stood on the equal status of the highest families and fearlessly challenged the proudest men but at the same time got relief from all their worries, were provided with shelter, work, and weapons, and sometimes even with conveyance, and no obstacles were placed in their marriages. And this order of Islamic brotherhood was not confined to Madinah alone but was gradually spreading on all sides, and a day came when the whole of Arabia was enjoying these benefits.
Then Rasulullahﷺ himself, given the Problems affecting the common man, adopted the most generous methods both in his own person and also as head of the state. He kept nothing in his personal possession and whatever wealth came to him, he promptly distributed it among the poor and the needy. Wealth was not allowed to accumulate in the Baitul mal and whenever any deserving man came he was helped to the utmost limit and when nothing was left, he even borrowed to help a needy caller. Accounts of Rasulullahﷺ's generosity were carried far and wide and needy persons from all quarters came and received help. The aim of this generous distribution of wealth was not a bribe to attract people to Islam but to equalize wealth and bring about a unified economic system.
To sustain the people grounded down by economic distress and lift the community from economic degradation were among the basic demands of Islam. Those who were victims of economic oppression and were so worried by hunger could not be moved by higher aims of life and were eligible for sympathetic and generous treatment. Most of the Arab population was in this condition and while they needed the light of Islam they were also in need of food and clothing.
The people of Madinah who under the Islamic system of economic brotherhood received the opportunity for the first time to rise above their physical worries and think of higher values of life must have cleared all obstacles for the spread of Islam. The economic system of Islam would have taken some time to develop in full but from the very beginning people must have begun to look to Madinah for solutions to their economic problems in addition to receiving the light of Islam.
