We all know that the year of the Elephant is the year in which Mohammad was allegedly born. The year Islam credits for this event is the year 570 A.D. Islamic tradition says that another major event took place in the same year which is narrated in Sura 105 “The Elephantâ€, and what happened to the army that was marching on Mecca to destroy it and the Kaaba.
In a nutshell Allah sent flights of birds pounding the army of Abraha and his elephants with stones of baked clay and totally annihilated Abraha’s army and Mecca and the Kaaba were saved by the grace of Allah.
Abraha apparently escaped with serious injuries and died a short time later from them.
Lets have a look at real history through archaeology to see if this event really happened !!
The above rock carving was found in SaudiArabia and it talks about Abraha’s military expedition against he Arabs. Below is a translation of the event:
The inscription is now dated 552ce and reads:
"With the power of the Almighty, and His Messiah King Abraha Zeebman, the King of Saba'a, Zuridan, and Hadrmaut and Yemen and the tribes (on) the mountains and the coast wrote these lines on his battle against the tribe of Ma'ad (in) the battle of al-Rabiya in the month of "Dhu al Thabithan" and fought all of Bani A'amir and appointed the King Abi Jabar with Kinda and Al, Bishar bin Hasan with Sa'ad, Murad, and Hadarmaut in front of the army against Bani Amir of Kinda. and Al in Zu Markh valley and Murad and Sa'ad in Manha valley on the way to Turban and killed and captured and took the booty in large quantities and the King and fought at Halban and reached Ma'ad and took booty and prisoners, and after that, conquered Omro bin al-Munzir. (Abraha) appointed the son (of Omro) as the ruler and returned from Hal Ban (halban) with the power of the Almighty in the month of Zu A'allan in the year sixty-two and six hundred."
As one can clearly see, there is no mention of Mecca or Elephants for that matter and actually ended very badly for the Arabs as Abraha was victorious over all the Arab tribes he came up against.
A far greater problem for the Islamic traditions is that the Sabean date on this inscription is 552 A.D. According to the most recent scholarship, Abraha died in 553 A.D. or shortly thereafter – but, according to the Muslims, Muhammad was born in 570 A.D. So, if we want to believe the Muslim traditions concerning Abraha, we have to push Muhammad's birth back 15, 16 or even 18 years. This has enormous consequences for much of early Islamic history. If Muhammad was born 18 years earlier, when did Muhammad begin to receive revelations? When did the Hijrah occur? When did Muhammad die? When did various battles take place, and when did the first four Caliphs reign? This is potentially messing up everything that Muslims believe about their early history. Moreover, this may cast doubt on much of the Islamic Traditions. The accuracy of their so-called "Sahih" Hadiths cannot be trusted because the "chains of transmission" may now be broken - most events in the life of Muhammad has been pushed back 18 years and gaps are bound to open up somewhere in the chains between Muhammad and the time of Bukhari, Muslim, and the other collectors.
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