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General SummaryThe chief source of our knowledge concerning the teachings of Mohammed is, of course, the Koran. Many of the revelations composing this work were delivered by the prophet while in a state of trance, and these, together with his public speeches and prayers were gathered, shortly after his death, into the book as it now exists. There can be no doubt that the Koran is practically identical with the prophet’s own words. But besides the Koran, there are the private utterances of Mohammed to his intimate friends and carefully treasured in their memories. These traditional sayings, or "Table-talk," are very numerous — more than seven thousand in the standard collection — but no one can tell how many represent the genuine words of the prophet. Pious Moslems, however, have accepted them as authentic, and have derived from them many rules for the guidance of Islam.
153. Prohibitions2
Fight in the path of God with those who fight with you — but exceed not; verily God loveth not those who exceed. And kill them wheresoever ye find them, and thrust them out from whence they thrust you out; for dissent is worse than slaughter; but fight them not at the Sacred Mosque, unless they fight you there: but if they fight you, then kill them: such is the reward of the infidels! But if they desist, then verily God is forgiving and merciful. But fight them till there be no dissent, and the worship be only to God; but, if they desist, then let there be no hostility save against the transgressors.
They will ask thee of the sacred month,1 and fighting therein; say, Fighting therein is a great sin; but turning people away from God’s path, and disbelief in Him and in the Sacred Mosque, and turning His people out therefrom, is a greater sin in God’s sight, and dissent is a greater sin than slaughter.
Forbidden to you is that which dieth of itself, and blood, and the flesh of swine, and that which is dedicated to other than God, and what is strangled, and what is killed by a blow, or by falling, and what is gored, and what wild beasts have preyed on, and what is sacrificed to idols; and to divine by the divination of arrows, that is transgression in you.
Make not God the butt of your oaths, that ye may be pious and fear God, and make peace among men, for God heareth and knoweth.
O ye who believe, verily wine and gambling and statues and divining arrows are only an abomination of the Devil’s making: avoid them then; haply ye may prosper.
2 Lane-Poole, , pp. 137–138.
1 The month of Ramadan.
Chicago: Letters and Table-Talk in Readings in Early European History, ed. Webster, Hutton (Boston: Ginn and Company, 1926), 319. Original Sources, accessed November 23, 2024, http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=USNZZBNB7P7YW5Y.
MLA: . Letters and Table-Talk, in Readings in Early European History, edited by Webster, Hutton, Boston, Ginn and Company, 1926, page 319. Original Sources. 23 Nov. 2024. http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=USNZZBNB7P7YW5Y.
Harvard: , Letters and Table-Talk. cited in 1926, Readings in Early European History, ed. , Ginn and Company, Boston, pp.319. Original Sources, retrieved 23 November 2024, from http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=USNZZBNB7P7YW5Y.
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