The myth of Mecca?

[Ringo]

Any truth to this: The Myth of Mecca?

The founding events of Islam are Mohammed’s activities in Mecca and Medina, a city north of Mecca. The life of Mohammed, known as the Sira, is popularly accepted to be fully documented historically, that everything he did and said was accurately recorded. According to one hagiographer, although Mohammed "could not read or write himself, he was constantly served by a group of 45 scribes who wrote down his sayings, instructions and activities. … We thus know his life down to the minutest details.”
The evidence for this is "the earliest and most famous biography of Mohammed,” the “Sirat Rasul Allah” (The Life of the Prophet of God) of Ibn Ishaq. The dates given for Mohammed’s life are 570-632 AD. Ibn Ishaq was born about 717 and died in 767. He thus wrote his biography well over 100 years after Mohammed lived, precluding his gaining any information from eyewitnesses to the Sira, as they would have all died themselves in the intervening years.
However, no copies exist of Ibn Ishaq’s work. We know of it only through quotations of it in the History of al-Tabari, who lived over 200 years after Ibn Ishaq (al-Tabari died in 992). Thus, the earliest biography of Mohammed of which copies still exist was written some 350 years after he lived.

They demonstrate that the story of Mohammed uniting various Arab tribes as Genghiz Khan did for the Mongols, and providing them with the religious fervor to conquer in the name of Islam, is “sacred history,” rather than real history. Historian Gordon Newby explains:

The myth of an original orthodoxy from which later challengers fall away as heretics is almost always the retrospective assertion of a politically dominant group whose aim is to establish their supremacy by appeal to divine sanction.

This applies to the Arab Conquest, says al-Rawandi, because for some 200 years the Arab conquerors were a minority amongst a non-Moslem majority. For al-Rawandi, Islam is an invention for the purpose of providing a religious justification for Arab imperialism. The Conquest is the reason and explanation for Islam, not the other way around.

Also, from Spencer, Robert. The Truth about Muhammad. Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 2006. 31:

From a strictly historical standpoint, it is impossible to state with certainty that a man named Muhammad actually existed, or if he did, that he did much or any of what is ascribed to him…Still, some historians believe that the Muhammad who comes to us in the Qur’an, Hadith and Sira is a composite figure, constructed later to give Arab imperialism a foundational mythos. Others have questioned also whether the Muhammad of history was really connected with Mecca and Medina, or if the story was given this setting in order to situate it in Arabia’s most important centers[italics added - Ringo].

Spot on? Really wacky? Somewhere in between?

Google turns up a lot of chaff and little wheat

[CalMeacham]

There are several people who claim that Muhammed did not exist, and that Islam developed independent of a single guiding founder. You can read about some of them and their theories in Ibn Warraq’s book Why I am ot a Muslim:

Amazon.com: Why I Am Not a Muslim: 9781591020110: Warraq, Ibn: Books

I get the clear impression that ibn Warraq (a pseudonym) doesn’t buy this line of reasoning, and I don’t either. On the other hand, the earliest accounts of he Prophet’s life were written by True Believers, and that makes me suspect their complete veracity as much as I do the work of any True Believers, including Christians.
Quite a few religious founders have had their existence doubted. We frequently rehash the existence of Christ on this Board (and there are a quite a few books arguing the topic), and of Buddha, and quite a lot of people doubt the existencve of Lao-Tse. I haven’t heard of doubters of Moses, Abraham, Zoroaster, and Confucius, but doubtless they exist, too.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@CalMeacham

There are several people who claim that Muhammed did not exist, and that Islam developed independent of a single guiding founder. You can read about some of them and their theories in Ibn Warraq’s book Why I am ot a Muslim:

http://www.amazon.com/Why-I-Am-Not-Muslim/dp/1591020115/sr=1-1/qid=1162145275/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-9463120-0156042?ie=UTF8&s=books
I get the clear impression that ibn Warraq (a pseudonym) doesn’t buy this line of reasoning, and I don’t either. On the other hand, the earliest accounts of he Prophet’s life were written by True Believers, and that makes me suspect their complete veracity as much as I do the work of any True Believers, including Christians.
Quite a few religious founders have had their existence doubted. We frequently rehash the existence of Christ on this Board (and there are a quite a few books arguing the topic), and of Buddha, and quite a lot of people doubt the existencve of Lao-Tse. I haven’t heard of doubters of Moses, Abraham, Zoroaster, and Confucius, but doubtless they exist, too.

As far as mainstream consensus goes, Lao Tse, Moses and Abraham are regarded by most historical scholars as purely mythical characters but Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed and Zoroaster are still, on balance, regarded as probably historical but that they’re buried under so many layers of myth it’s hard to know much about whatever authentic personalities lie at the roots of those legends.