The naturalization process
The effort to achieve this outcome was also unprecedented. It was a combination of the revelation of Allah in the Quran, plans from the Prophet also guided with the revelation, and pure hearts, ones full of faith. Here are a few components of this recipe of success:
1- The Quran comes down during and after the immigration telling people how valuable; and how rewarding it is to migrate for the sake of Allah. People were marking their personal calendar with the date they migrated. And good deeds were evaluated by how much they compare to Hijrah.
A lot of reward is placed on those who experience hardship, sickness, death, or murder during their Hijrah, a reward that no one can comprehend [check Al-Hajj 22:58-59 for example].
2- Verses about Hajj, its rulings, and its origin were revealed during that time, giving the strong promise and the strong hint that Muslims will be victorious and they will have the chance to go for Hajj and even control the rulings of Hajj in Makkah, a town they just got driven out of. Promises to come back make it easy to withstand the hardship of migration.
3- The Prophet established A magnificent system of brotherhood was established between the immigrants and the hosts (Al-Ansar). It wasn’t a general direction by the Prophet.
Rather, it was a specific assignment to couples by name. The words of the Quran and the Prophet that admire this concept and effort related to it were so effective. Brotherhood at that time, as it always should be, was an integral part of the Muslims’ faith.
4- The constitution of Madinah stated that the believers from Makkah and from Madinah are one community supporting one another and helping one another. This made the immigrants feel the ownership of Madinah and made them feel the sense of belonging.
5- Rejecting the generous offers made by the hosts. Such offers were rejected collectively and individually. In one incident, the People of Madinah made a very generous offer; that is to divide the palm trees of Madinah, which constituted their wealth, into two halves: one stays with them and one goes to “their brothers from the immigrants,” as they stated.
The Prophet said NO, a strong no. They then changed the offer to employing the immigrants to work in their lands and dividing the outcome between them. The Prophet and the immigrants agreed.
This transformed a large group of the immigrants into farmers, made them learn a new profession they did not know before, increased the working power of Madinah, and made the hosts rest assured that those immigrants are not after their money. It is a win-win situation in nowadays terms.
This effort reminds me with the effort done by America, my new country, to attract the finest of the world population and to naturally involve them in the society creating one of the largest world powers. However, two things are very important here:
– The Prophet made this effort more than 1400 years ago.
– The recent effort in America did not succeed in making the sense of community for all people. There is still a lot of social divides and justice challenges that need to be dealt with.
We ought to learn from the human aspect of the Prophet’s naturalization experience in order for us to help making America a better place for people, all people, including us Muslims.
Probably there were many other actions the Muslims did to overcome this challenge and that lead to this success.
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