ARMM commemorates Mohammad's birth

COTABATO CITY, Philippines --- Residents of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao on Thursday celebrated as a special non-working holiday the Maulidin Nabi, or birth of Prophet Mohammad, Islam’s progenitor.

The commemoration of Maulidin Nabi is a yearly event in the ARMM and Administrative Region 12, which started during the time of President Ferdinand Marcos.

Unlike the Eid’l Fitr, or culmination of the month-long Ramadhan fasting season, and the Eid’l Adha, or feast of sacrifice, ARMM’s Muslim communities do not indulge in lavish merry making during the Maulidin Nabi.

Local Muslims sectors, during the Maulidin Nabi, only remember and reflect on Muhammad’s life, works and his examples of piety and diplomacy in dealing both with his followers and with non-Muslims.

ARMM’s acting governor, Mujiv Hataman, said he declared January 24 a holiday in the autonomous region to give local Muslim communities  a day to remember the teachings, customs and traditions of Prophet Mohammad.

“It’s good to ponder and reflect, not just during the Maulidin Nabi, but every day, on the examples of Prophet Mohammad. Particularly on how he governed his followers based on the principles of consultations and consensus-building,” Hataman said in an emailed statement.

There was a time, decades before World War II and until, at least, the ‘60s when Muslims in Mindanao were wrongly called “Mohammadens” owing to their reverence to the prophet.

Muslims revere Mohammad for his missionary works and how he built peace and solidarity with people around him regardless of their races and religions, but do not worship him.

For Muslims, Mohammad was a preacher, a Sharia judge who litigated disputes and civil issues based on the Islamic principles of equality of all men and unity in religious diversity, and simplicity in lifestyle in the context that worldly desires can only lead mankind to destruction and hell.

Islamic history books indicated Mohammad was born in 570 in Mecca in ancient Arabia.

Orphaned at an early age and brought up by his uncle, Abu Talib, he worked as an ordinary shepherd and a merchant. As an adult, Mohammad became popular for his honesty and fair trade practices.

Islamic reading materials have stories of how Archangel Gabriel appeared to Mohammad, while in a retreat in a cave surrounded by mountains, to give to the prophet Allah’s his first revelation.

The event signaled the start of Mohammad’s preaching of a faith that early Arabs found strange and unacceptable at first.

Clerics in the ARMM have lately been using as a pitch to encourage public support for the Mindanao peace process Mohammad’s examples on how he “bent his back,” rather than let clan pride rule, and forge peace accords with tribes and nations around them for the sake of harmonious co-existence.

For contemporary Moro historians, Mohammad had his version of the international humanitarian laws,  governing warfare, ahead of what is now known as the Geneva Convention.

By all historical accounts, Mohammad’s army only fought wars in defense of land, people and religion. He thought his followers to first exhaust all peaceful means of avoiding wars, including forging of treaties to pre-empt them, and to wage one only in defense, not for the purpose of aggression.

Mohammad always reminded his followers to treat enemies wounded in battle in respect and with dignity, to provide food and water to children and women dislocated in conflicts, and to refrain from torturing captured warriors.

He also ordered his army to avoid destroying houses and worship sites of defeated rival groups, and give slain enemies decent burial. He was also a strong advocate of power-sharing among community leaders and involvement  of the masses in governance.

“Prophet Mohammad even gave key roles to non-Muslims in the early Islamic government in Arabia  he ran based on Islamic doctrines on reconciliation and unity of all people regardless of races and religions,” said Ustadz Esmael Ebrahim, a commissioner in the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos.

Ebrahim, an ethnic Maguindanaon, said most Moro communities in the autonomous region have been using the sunnah, or tradition and teachings of Prophet Mohammad, in resolving community issues and misunderstandings, complementing the regular barangay justice system.

Mohammad was chronicled to have died of an illness on a Monday, 8th of June 632, in Medina, at the age of 63, in the house of his wife Aisha, with his head resting on his spouse’s lap.