Ah, Hadijia, well I think she was a mentor as well as a wife, a very strong lady who had her own business, and Muhammad was helping her out, so it was a wonderful partnership and I'm sure he learned a lot from her. He had tremendous amount of contact with merchants coming from different parts of the world passing through the Arabian Peninsula. I think he was a very intelligent man, very open-minded, and he was able to communicate with a great variety of peoples. He must have had great charisma as well. 

 

Muhammad had a way with people and with resolving their disputes. Once when the Kaaba fell into disrepair, the clan chieftains quarreled over who would have the honor of putting the sacred black stone back where it belonged. Before violence could erupt, Muhammad proposed an equitable solution. United in the effort, the four leaders shared the weight and the honor. In gratitude, they invited Muhammad himself to replace the sacred stone. He became known as Al-Almin, the trusted one.

 

There are all kinds of indications that he was tremendously interested in religious questions. This is obviously not something that an ordinary person probably was interested in in those days.

 

He talked to sages, Arabic sages. He talked to Jewish and Christian sages who lived in the area. He used to go up into the rock hills around Mecca and meditate, think about things, and at some point had this extraordinary vision which is spoken about very evocatively and allusively. 

 

In a cave above Mecca, Muhammad had an experience that would be the defining moment of his life. An angel was said to appear before him in the form of a man, instructing him to recite in the name of god the Almighty. For Muhammad it was an encounter as profound as it was deeply disturbing.

 

You get a sense of what it would be like to be a normal person in society, perhaps unusual in the sense of your intensity for things like social justice, and finding out what the meaning of life is, but not being endowed with anything that would seem miraculous by your friends, and all of a sudden, having this voice come to you and then come out of you as you speak it and recite it to other people.