Preface

* Introduction and Overview of the Life of Muhammad

* Donner's Reply to the Skeptics

* Enter Muhammad: An Overview

* The Battle of the Trench

* Chapter One Ibn Khaldun's Social and Economic Theory

* Bedouins and Sedentary Peoples

* Asabiyah

* Chapter Two Pre-Islamic Arabia

* The Hijaz on the Eve of the Rise of Islam

* Pre-Islamic Religion

* Chapter Three The Role of Abraham, Hagar and Ishmael

* Who was the Sacrificial Son?

* The Islamic Theory that Abraham, Ishmael and Hagar Traveled to the Valley of Mecca

* Abraham, Ishmael and the Kaaba

* William Muir on the Abrahamic Question

* Muir on the Founding of Mecca and the Abrahamic Legend

* Chapter Four Recent and Current Scholarship

* The Religion of Mecca

* The Kaaba and Its Devotees

* Hanifiya and the Religion of Abraham

* G.E. von Grunebaum, "The Nature of Arab Unity Before Islam"

* M.J.Kister, "Al-Hira: Some Notes on Its Relations with Arabia"

* Joseph Henninger, "Pre-Islamic Bedouin Religion"

* Moshe Gil, "Jews of Yathrib"

* Fazlur Rahman, "Pre-Foundations of the Muslim Community in Mecca"

* Uri Rubin, "Hanifiyya and Ka 'ba: An Inquiry into the Arabian Background of Din Ibrahim"

* More on Pre-Islamic Religion in the Arabian Peninsula

* Hamilton A.R. Gibb, "Pre-Islamic Monotheism in Arabia"

* W. Montgomery Watt, "Belief in a 'High God' in Pre-Islamic Mecca"

* Uri Rubin, "The Kaaba: Aspects of Its Ritual Functions and Position in Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Times"

* Chapter Five Possible Influences on Muhammad's Inspiration

* Jewish Historians on the Jews of Arabia

* Baron on Pre-Islamic, Arab-Jewish Relations in Arabia

* Chapter Six The Jews of Arabia: A Recent Re-Examination

* Chapter Seven Richard Bell's Origin of Islam in its Christian Environment

* Chapter Eight W. Montgomery Watt's Muhammad at Mecca

* The Daughters of Allah or the So-called Satanic Verses

* More on the "Daughters of Allah" Affair

* A Sociological Argument

* W. Montgomery Watt's Muhammad at Medina

* Chapter Nine Muhammad at Medina: William Muir's Analysis

* Muhammad and the Jewish Tribes of Medina

* The Battle of Badr

* Current Research on the Massacre of the B. Qurayza

* The Conquest of Khaybar

* Chapter Ten Muhammad and the Jews

* Muhammad and the Jews: G.D. Newby's Re-Examination of the Evidence

* Chapter Eleven Concluding Sociological Reflections

* Abu Bakr and the Ridda

* Notes

* Bibliography

* Index