Muhammad: The HijraIsrael, give instructions to "keep the covenant" and emphasize that Moses
received "the Book," which also seem to reveal Jewish influen^44 ce.^45
Any allusion to "emigration" could also be suspect of being Medinan, and
all passages regarding pagans should not automatically be thought to be
Meccan, since Islamic traditions clearly testify to the presence of Medinan
polytheists.
For the most part, the suras of what is often classified as the third Meccan
period are actually mixed texts, which appear to contain Meccan as well as
Medinan elements. Unfortunately, as with many other historically important
events in early Islam, the Qur'an does not clearly state when the
"emigration" (or Hijra) to Medina took place, thus only estimates can made
as to when the Hijra occurred in the chronology of Qur'anic passages. For
the sake of simplicity, the Hijra will be considered to have taken place
about the time of the composition of sura 16 in this work. This does not
mean that all of the passages of this and later suras are thought to be
Medinan, but rather, that Qur'an 16 is one of the earliest suras definitely
known to contain Medinan passages of substantial length.^46
As opposed to Mecca, Medina (Yathrib) was located in a region with arable
land. Not terribly much is known about the origins of the Jewish
communities in Medina, but they seemed to have dominated li^47 fe there
until Arab tribes from the south migrated into the area. In ge^48 neral,
nomadic Arabs were averse to agricultural activity, and evi^49 dence seems to
indicate that the Jews were largely responsible for the cultivation of
Medina. Eventually, the Arab tribes in Medina fought against^50 the Jews
and became more independent from them. The later intermitt^51 ent battles in
Medina may have in part been caused by economic factors, a^52 nd the
political situation there was very unstable. The battle of Bu`ath, which was
between the Arab tribes of the Aws and the Khazraj, ended up involving
most of the other Arab and Jewish tribes in Medina. This confl^53 ict took
place a few years before the Hijra, but was so inconclusive that no formal
cessation of hostilities had been made prior to the arrival of Muslims in
Medina.^54