View source for Sīrah

{{short description|Biographies of Muhammad}}
{{redirect|Sīra|the popular genre of epic|Sīra shaʿbiyya}}
{{redirect|Al-Sira al-Nabawiyya}}
{{Muhammad}}
[[File:PERF No. 665.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|An early manuscript of [[Ibn Hisham]]'s {{tlit|ar|[[Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah (Ibn Hisham)|al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah]]}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Abbott |first=Nabia |author-link=Nabia Abbott |title=Studies in Arabic Literary Papyri: Qur'anic Commentary and Tradition |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |year=1967 |volume=2 |location=Chicago, USA}}</ref>{{Reference page|page=61}}]]
'''Al-Sīra al-Nabawiyya''' ({{Langx|ar|السيرة النبوية}}), commonly shortened to '''Sīrah''' and translated as '''prophetic biography''', are the traditional biographies of the [[Prophets and messengers in Islam|Islamic prophet]] [[Muhammad]] written by [[List of Muslim historians|Muslim historians]], from which, in addition to the [[Quran|Qurʾān]] and [[Hadith|''ḥadīth'' literature]], most historical information about his life and the [[early history of Islam]] is derived.

The main feature of the information that formed the basis of early historiography in Islam was that this information emerged as the irregular products of [[Qāṣṣ|storytellers (''qāṣṣ'', pl. ''quṣṣāṣ'')]] -they were quite prestigious then-<ref>They do not seem, however, to have been more prone to fabrications than other scholars of the early period. This deduction stems from the over-whelmingly positive reputation of the quṣṣāṣ in the early period.DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004335523_008</ref>  without details.<ref>Most Islamic history was [[Oral tradition|transmitted orally]] until after the rise of the [[Abbasid Caliphate]].{{Harvtxt|Vansina|1985}}</ref> At the same time the study of the earliest periods in Islamic history is made difficult by a lack of sources.{{sfn|Donner|2010|p=628}} While the narratives were initially in the form of a kind of heroic epics called magāzī,<Ref>The earliest sources we have on the life of Muḥammad are the maghāzī, but they are far from being a consistent literary genre because they encompass a mix of different types of texts: lists of martyrs, poetry, Qurʾānic explanations, anecdotes resembling those found in the Bible, and of course accounts of military expeditions.https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004466739_005</ref> details were added later, edited and transformed into sirah compilations.<ref name="EQ" /><ref name="Crone-1987-223">{{cite book |last1=Crone |first1=Patricia |title=Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam |url=https://archive.org/details/meccantraderisei00cron |url-access=limited |date=1987 |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=[https://archive.org/details/meccantraderisei00cron/page/n213 223]|isbn=9780691054803 |quote=If one storyteller should happen to mention a raid, the next storyteller would know the date of this raid, while the third would know everything that an audience might wish to hear about.}}</ref> From the very beginning, the process of creating the image of the Prophet as a warrior hero supported by divine help is seen as fitting the ideal hero typology and current needs during the military collapses experienced by the [[Umayyad dynasty|Umayyads]]. Muhammad's position gradually rose from his military stature to that of the sole and central figure in narratives who received [[Miracles|divine assistance]], in parallel with the rise in the value of the hadiths attributed to Muhammad in [[Sharia|Islamic lawmaking]] although it wasn't like that in the beginning.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Armstrong | first1=Lyall R. | title=The ''Quṣṣāṣ'' of Early Islam | chapter=6 Conclusion | date=2017 | pages=277–283 | doi=10.1163/9789004335523_008 | isbn=978-90-04-33552-3 | chapter-url=https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004335523_008 }}</ref>

The stories were written in the form of “founding conquest stories” based on nostalgia for the golden age then. Humphrey, quoted by Antoine Borrut, explains that the stories related to this period were created according to a pact-betrayal-redemption principle.<ref>Borrut A., "From Arabia to the Empire - conquest and caliphal construction in early Islam", in The Historians' Quran , vol.  1 , 2019, pp.  249-289</ref> Western historians describe the purpose of these early biographies as largely to convey a message, rather than to strictly and accurately record history.<ref>{{Citation |last=Lecker |first=Michael |title=Glimpses of Muḥammad's Medinan decade |work=The Cambridge Companion to Muhammad |pages=61–80 |year=2010 |editor-last=Brockopp |editor-first=Jonathan E. |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1017/ccol9780521886079.004 |isbn=978-0-521-88607-9}}</ref> [[Lawrence Conrad]] examines the early sirah books and sees that the dates of Muhammad's birth span a period of up to 85 years.  Conrad defines this as "the fluidity (evolutionary process) continued even in the written period."<ref>Conrad (June 1987). "Abraham and Muhammad: Some Observations Apropos of Chronology and Literary topoi in the Early Arabic Historical Tradition". Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies. 50 (2): 239. doi:10.1017/S0041977X00049016</ref>

== Terminology ==
In the [[Arabic language]] the word ''sīrah'' or ''sīrat'' ({{langx|ar| سيرة}}) comes from the verb ''sāra,'' which means "to travel" or "to be on a journey". A person's sīrah is that person's journey through life, or [[biography]], encompassing their birth, events in their life, manners and characteristics, and their death. In modern usage it may also refer to a person's [[Résumé|resume]]. It is sometimes written as "seerah", "sirah" or "sirat", all meaning "life" or "journey". In Islamic literature, the plural form, ''siyar'', could also refer to the rules of war and dealing with non-Muslims.<ref name="EI2">{{Cite encyclopedia | edition = 2nd| publisher = Brill Academic Publishers| volume = 9| pages = 660–3| last = Raven| first = W. | title = SĪRA | encyclopedia = Encyclopaedia of Islam| isbn = 90-04-10422-4| year = 1997}}</ref>

The phrase {{transliteration|ar|sīrat rasūl allāh}}, or {{transliteration|ar|as-sīra al-nabawiyya}}, refers to the study of the life of Muhammad. The term sīrah was first linked to the biography of Muhammad by [[Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri]] ({{abbr|d.|died}} 124/741–2), and later popularized by the work of [[Ibn Hisham]] ({{abbr|d.|died}} 833). In the first two centuries of [[Islamic history]], {{transliteration|ar|sīrah}} was more commonly known as {{transliteration|ar|maghāzī}} (literally, 'stories of military expeditions'), which is now considered to be only a subset of {{transliteration|ar|sīra}}<ref name="EI2" />—one that concerns the military campaigns of Muhammad.<ref name="Maghazi-oiso">{{cite web |title=Maghazi |url=http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e1372 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170425141459/http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e1372 |url-status=dead |archive-date=April 25, 2017 |website=Oxford Islamic Studies |access-date=26 October 2019}}</ref>

Early works of sīrah consist of multiple historical reports, or {{transliteration|ar|akhbār}}, and each report is called a {{transliteration|ar|khabar}}.{{sfn|Humphreys|1991|p=83}} Sometimes the word ''tradition'' or ''hadith'' is used instead.

==Authenticity==
{{see also|Ibn_Ishaq#Views_about_his_s.C4.ABra_narratives|label 1=Views about Ibn Ishaq|Historicity of Muhammad|Revisionist school of Islamic studies}}
{{See|Manaqib|Qisas al-Anbiya}}
[[File:Map of the Three Arabias Excerpted Partly from the Arab of Nubia Partly from Several Other Authors.png|upright=1.2|thumb|Non-Islamic testimonies about Muhammad's life describe him as the leader of the [[Saracens]],<ref>"Chapter 1. "A Prophet Has Appeared, Coming with the Saracens": Muhammad’s Leadership during the Conquest of Palestine According to Seventh- and Eighth-Century Sources". The Death of a Prophet: The End of Muhammad's Life and the Beginnings of Islam, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012, pp. 18-72. https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812205138.18</ref> believed to be descendants of [[Ishmael]].]]
For centuries, Muslim scholars have recognized the problem of authenticity of hadith. Thus they have developed sophisticated methods (see [[Hadith studies]]) of evaluating ''isnāds'' (chains of transmission). This was done in order to classify each hadith into "sound" (''ṣaḥīḥ'') for authentic reports, as opposed to "weak" (''ḍaʿīf'') for ones that are probably fabricated, in addition to [[Hadith terminology|other categories]].{{sfn|Donner|1998|p=14}} Since many sīrah reports also contain isnād information and some of the sīrah compilers (''akhbārīs'') were themselves practicing jurists and hadīth transmitters (''muḥaddiths''), it was possible to apply the same methods of hadīth criticism to the sīrah reports.<ref>{{Cite book| publisher = Cambridge University Press| isbn = 9780521629362| last = Robinson| first = Chase F.| title = Islamic Historiography| year = 2003| pages=39}}</ref> However, some sīrah reports were written using an imprecise form of isnād, or what modern historians call the "collective isnād" or "combined reports". The use of collective isnād meant that a report may be related on the authority of multiple persons without distinguishing the words of one person from another. This lack of precision led some hadith scholars to take any report that used a collective isnād to be lacking in authenticity.<ref>{{Cite book| publisher = Oxford University Press| isbn = 9780199885008| last = Goodman| first = Lenn E.| title = Islamic Humanism| date = 2003-03-27| quote= ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Dūrī, ''Historical Writing'', p.36: "Ahmad ibn Hanbal rejected the hadiths reported by Ibn Ishaq precisely on the grounds of their use of the collective isnād: "I see him relating a single hadith on the authority of a group of people, without distinguishing the words of one from those of another"" (Tanbih 9-43) But Ibn Hanbal did accept Ibn Ishaq's authority for the maghazi.}}</ref>

According to Wim Raven, it is often noted that a coherent image of Muhammad cannot be formed from the literature of sīra, whose authenticity and factual value have been questioned on a number of different grounds.<ref name="EI2" /> He lists the following arguments against the authenticity of sīra, followed here by counter arguments:

# Hardly any sīrah work was compiled during the first century of Islam. However, [[Fred Donner]] points out that the earliest historical writings about the origins of Islam first emerged in AH 60–70, well within the first century of Hijra (see also [[List of biographies of Muhammad]]). Furthermore, the sources now extant, dating from the second, third, and fourth centuries AH, are mostly compilations of material derived from earlier sources.{{sfn|Donner|1998|p=125}}<ref name=Raven-Sira_662>Raven, W., “Sīra”, in: Brill Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, v.9 p.662</ref>
# The many discrepancies exhibited in different narrations found in sīrah works. Yet, despite the lack of a single orthodoxy in Islam, there is still a marked agreement on the most general features of the traditional origins story.{{sfn|Donner|1998|pp=26-27}}<ref name=Raven-Sira_662/>[[File:First Umayyad gold dinar, Caliph Abd al-Malik, 695 CE.jpg|thumb|[[Gold dinar]] minted by the [[Umayyad]]s in 695, which likely depicts Abd al-Malik.{{efn|The general view among historians and numismatists is that the human figure depicted in the coins minted by Abd al-Malik between 693 and 697, which have come to be known as the "standing caliph" issue, represent [[Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan|Abd al-Malik]].{{sfn|Hoyland|2007|p=594}}}} The historian [[Robert Hoyland]], however, argues that this may be a near-contemporary depiction of the prophet [[Muhammad]].{{sfn|Hoyland|2007|pp=593–596}}]]
# Later sources claiming to know more about the time of Muhammad than earlier ones. Scholar [[Patricia Crone]] found a pattern, where the farther a commentary was removed in time from the life of Muhammad and the events in the Quran, the more information it provided, despite the fact it depended on the earlier sources for its content. Crone attributed this phenomenon to [[Storytelling|storyteller]]s' embellishment.<blockquote>If one storyteller should happen to mention a raid, the next storyteller would know the date of this raid, while the third would know everything that an audience might wish to hear about.<ref name="Crone-1987-223"/></blockquote> In the case of Ibn Ishaq, there are no earlier sources we can consult to see if and how much embroidering was done by him and other earlier transmitters, but, Crone argues, "it is hard to avoid the conclusion that in the three generations between the Prophet and Ibn Ishaq" fictitious details were not also added.<ref name="Crone-1987-223"/><ref name="Pickard-352">{{cite book |last1=Pickard |first1=John |title=Behind the Myths: The Foundations of Judaism, Christianity and Islam |date=2013 |publisher=AuthorHouse. |page=352 |isbn=9781481783637 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KSBb4jBrHFIC&q=If+one+storyteller+should+happen+to+mention+a+raid%2C+the+next+storyteller+would+know+the+date+of+this+raid%2C+while+the+third+would+know+everything+that+an+audience+might+wish+to+hear+about.&pg=PA352 |access-date=18 October 2019}}</ref><ref name=Raven-Sira_662/>
# Discrepancies compared to non-Muslim sources. But there are also similarities and agreements both in information specific to Muhammad,<ref>{{Cite book| publisher = Oxford University Press, USA| isbn = 0192876058| last = Cook| first = Michael| title = Muhammad| date = 1983-01-26 | pages=73–74}}</ref> and concerning Muslim tradition at large.<ref>{{Cite book| publisher = Darwin| isbn = 0878501258| last = Hoyland| first = Robert G| title = [[Seeing Islam as Others Saw It|Seeing Islam as Others Saw It: A Survey and Evaluation of Christian, Jewish and Zoroastrian Writings on Early Islam]]| year = 1998| author-link=Robert G. Hoyland| page=591}}</ref><ref name=Raven-Sira_662/>
# Some parts or genres of sīra, namely those dealing with miracles, do not qualify as sources for scientific historiographical information about Muhammad, except for showing the beliefs and doctrines of his community.<ref name=Raven-Sira_662/>

Nevertheless, other content of sīra, like the [[Constitution of Medina]], are generally considered to be authentic,<ref name="EI2" /> although it does not fulfill any of the conditions of authenticity in the Islamic recording system such as having a reliable chain of narrators up to the person who recorded it.

==Content==
The sīrah literature includes a variety of heterogeneous materials, containing mainly narratives of military expeditions undertaken by [[Muhammad]] and his [[Sahabah|companions]]. These stories are intended as historical accounts and are used for veneration. The sīrah also includes a number of written documents, such as political treaties (e.g., [[Treaty of Hudaybiyyah]] or [[Constitution of Medina]]), military enlistments, assignments of officials, letters to foreign rulers, and so forth. It also records some of the speeches and sermons made by Muhammad, like his speech at the [[Farewell Pilgrimage]]. Some of the sīrah accounts include verses of poetry commemorating certain events and battles.<ref name="EI2" />

At later periods, certain type of stories included in sīrah developed into their own separate genres. One genre is concerned with stories of prophetic miracles, called ''aʿlām al-nubuwa'' (literally, "proofs of prophethood"—the first word is sometimes substituted for ''amārāt'' or ''dalāʾil''). Another genre, called ''faḍāʾil wa mathālib'' — tales that show the merits and faults of individual [[Sahaba|companions]], enemies, and other notable contemporaries of Muhammad.<ref name="EI2" /> Some works of sīrah also positioned the story of Muhammad as part of a narrative that includes stories of [[Prophets in Islam|earlier prophets]], [[Persian Kings]], [[pre-Islamic Arabia|pre-Islamic Arab]] tribes, and the [[Rashidun]].<ref name="EI2" />

Parts of sīrah were inspired by, or elaborate upon, events mentioned in the [[Qur'an]]. These parts were often used by writers of [[tafsir]] and [[asbab al-nuzul]] to provide background information for events mentioned in certain [[ayat]].<ref name="EI2" />
{{Islamic prophets|Events}}

===Comparison to hadith ===
In terms of structure, a [[hadith]] and a historical report (''khabar'') are very similar; they both contain [[isnads]] (chains of transmission). The main difference between a hadith and a khabar is that a hadith is not concerned with an event as such, and normally does not specify a time or place. Rather the purpose of hadith is to record a religious doctrine as an authoritative source of [[Sharia|Islamic law]]. By contrast, while a khabar may carry some legal or theological implications, its main aim is to convey information about a certain event.{{sfn|Humphreys|1991|p=83}} 

Starting from the 8th and 9th century, many scholars have devoted their efforts to both kinds of texts equally.{{sfn|Humphreys|1991|p=83}} Some historians consider the sīrah and ''maghāzī'' literature to be a subset of Hadith.<ref name="Ahmad">{{Cite book| edition = 1st| publisher = King Saud University| author = M. R. Ahmad| title = Al-sīra al-nabawiyya fī ḍawʾ al-maṣādir al-aṣliyya: dirāsa taḥlīliyya| location = Riyadh| year = 1992 | pages=20–34}}</ref>

== Reception ==

During the early centuries of Islam, the sīrah literature was taken less seriously compared to the [[hadith]]s.<ref name="EI2" />
Today, although the orthodox Islamic approach frequently uses sirah material in its [[sermon]]s, [[Qur'anism]] and the academic community (including those called hadith or khabar and whose chain of transmission are labeled as sound by their authors) approach this material with suspicion. While [[Yaşar Nuri Öztürk]] notes that the hadiths, which have now reached millions, were initially limited to a few hundred, Mehmet Özdemir (prof.dr.) draws attention to the almost non-existent number of [[miracles]] (''dalāʾil al-nubuwwa'') in the first records and the hundreds of additions made in later periods.<ref>Özdemir, Mehmet, (2007). Siyer Yazıcılığı Üzerine, Milel ve Nihal, 4 (3), 129-162</ref>

Many Western scholars suspect that there was widespread fabrication of hadith (either entirely or by the misattribution of the views of early Muslim religious and legal thinkers to Muhammad) in the early centuries of Islam to support certain theological and legal positions.{{citation needed|date=August 2025}}<!-- Empty reference <ref name=":0"/--> In addition to fabrication, it is possible for the meaning of a hadith to have greatly drifted from its original telling through the different interpretations and biases of its varying transmitters, even if the chain of transmission is authentic.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hoyland |first=Robert |date=March 2007 |title=Writing the Biography of the Prophet Muhammad: Problems and Solutions |url=https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00395.x |journal=History Compass |language=en |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=581–602 |doi=10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00395.x |issn=1478-0542|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name="MU">{{Citation |last=Görke |first=Andreas |title=Muhammad |date=2020-01-02 |work=The Wiley Blackwell Concise Companion to the Hadith |pages=75–90 |editor-last=Brown |editor-first=Daniel W. |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781118638477.ch4 |access-date=2024-06-29 |edition=1 |publisher=Wiley |language=en |doi=10.1002/9781118638477.ch4 |isbn=978-1-118-63851-4|url-access=subscription}}</ref>  While some hadith may genuinely originate from firsthand observation of Muhammad (particularly personal traits that were not of theological interest, like his fondness for [[tharid]] and sweets), Western scholars suggest that it is extraordinarily difficult if not impossible to determine which hadith accurately reflect the historical Muhammad.<ref name="MU"/>

More recently, [[Revisionist school of Islamic studies|western historical criticism and debate]] concerning sīrah have elicited a defensive attitude from some Muslims who wrote [[apologetic]] literature defending its content.<ref name="EI2" />

==Early compilations of sīra==
The following is a list of some of the early Hadith collectors who specialized in collecting and compiling sīrah and maghāzī reports:
* [[ʿUrwa ibn al-Zubayr]] (d. 713). He wrote letters replying to inquiries of the [[Umayyad]] caliphs, [[Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan]] and [[al-Walid I]], involving questions about certain events that happened in the time of the Prophet. Since Abd al-Malik did not appreciate the maghāzī literature, these letters were not written in story form. He is not known to have written any books on the subject.<ref name="EQ" />
* [[Wahb ibn Munabbih]] (d. during 725 to 737). Several books were ascribed to him but none of them are now extant. Some of his works survive as quotations found in works by [[Ibn Ishaq]], [[Ibn Hisham]], [[Ibn Jarir al-Tabari]], and [[Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī]].
* [[Ibn Shihāb al-Zuhrī]] (d. {{circa|737}}), a central figure in sīrah literature, who collected both ahadith and akhbār. His akhbār also contain chains of transmissions, or [[isnad]]. He was sponsored by the [[Umayyad]] court and asked to write two books, one on [[genealogy]] and another on maghāzī. The first was canceled and the one about maghāzī is either not extant or has never been written.
* [[Musa ibn ʿUqba]], a student of [[Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri|al-Zuhrī]], wrote ''Kitāb al-Maghāzī'', a notebook used to teach his students. The work was lost but a manuscript of Kitab al-maghazi was recently rediscovered. Some of his traditions have been preserved, although their attribution to him is disputed.<ref name="EQ">{{Cite encyclopedia | publisher = Brill Academic Publishers|  pages = 29–49| last = Raven| first = Wim| title = Sīra and the Qurʾān | encyclopedia = [[Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān]] | year = 2006 }}</ref>
* [[Muhammad ibn Ishaq]] (d. 767 or 761), another student of [[Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri|al-Zuhrī]], who collected oral traditions that formed the basis of an important biography of the Prophet. His traditions survived through a number of sources, most notably [[Ibn Hisham]] and [[Ibn Jarir al-Tabari]].

== Number of prophetic biographies ==
{{main|List of biographies of Muhammad}}

The sīrah literature is important: in the [[Urdu language]] alone, a scholar from [[Pakistan]] in 2024 produced a bibliography of more than 10,000 titles, counting multivolume works as a single book and without integrating articles, short essays and unpublished manuscripts, with the researcher also precising that the literature in [[Arabic]] is even more important.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Parekh |first=Rauf |date=14 October 2024 |title=Literary notes: New bibliography lists 10,000 Urdu books on seerat |url=https://www.dawn.com/news/1865129/literary-notes-new-bibliography-lists-10000-urdu-books-on-seerat |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241108084609/https://www.dawn.com/news/1865129/literary-notes-new-bibliography-lists-10000-urdu-books-on-seerat |archive-date=8 November 2024 |website=[[Dawn News]]}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Portal|Islam}}
* [[Depictions of Muhammad]]
* [[Historiography of early Islam]]
* [[Hadith]]
* [[List of hadith collections]]
* [[Biographical evaluation]] (ʿIlm al-rijāl)
* [[Sunnah]]

==Footnotes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Bibliography==
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite book| edition = Revised| publisher = Princeton University Press| isbn = 0-691-00856-6| last = Humphreys| first = R. Stephen| title = Islamic History: A framework for Inquiry| year = 1991}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Darwin Press, Incorporated| isbn = 0878501274| last = Donner| first = Fred McGraw| title = Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing| date = May 1998}}
{{refend}}

==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
*{{Cite book| edition = 1st| publisher = King Saud University| author = M. R. Ahmad| title = Al-sīra al-nabawiyya fī ḍawʾ al-maṣādir al-aṣliyya: dirāsa taḥlīliyya| location = Riyadh| year = 1992}}
* {{Cite journal| issn = 0041-977X| volume = 21| issue = 1/3| pages = 453–463| last = 'Arafat| first = W.| title = Early Critics of the Authenticity of the Poetry of the "Sīra"| journal = Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London| date = 1958-01-01| jstor = 610611| doi=10.1017/s0041977x00060110| s2cid = 194960198}}
* Hagen, Gottfried, ''Sira, Ottoman Turkish,'' in Muhammad in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia of the Prophet of God (2 vols.), Edited by C. Fitzpatrick and A. Walker, Santa Barbara, ABC-CLIO, 2014, Vol. II, pp.&nbsp;585–597. {{ISBN|1610691776}}.
* Jarar, Maher, ''Sira'' (Biography), in Muhammad in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia of the Prophet of God (2 vols.), Edited by C. Fitzpatrick and A. Walker, Santa Barbara, ABC-CLIO, 2014, Vol. II, pp.&nbsp;568–582. {{ISBN|1610691776}}.
* Williams, Rebecca, Sira, Modern English, in Muhammad in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia of the Prophet of God (2 vols.), Edited by C. Fitzpatrick and A. Walker, Santa Barbara, ABC-CLIO, 2014, Vol. II, pp.&nbsp;582–585. {{ISBN|1610691776}}
{{refend}}

{{Muhammad2}}
{{Depictions of Muhammad}}
{{Islam topics}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Biographies of Muhammad|Sirah]]
[[Category:Islamic terminology|Sirah]]