Sacred Art of Shakespeare: To Take Upon Us the Mystery of Things ( Inner Traditions, 1998) 0892817178 Ketika saya sedang mengendarai motor, Fathurrahman sahabat saya di DPPAI menelepon untuk membuat resensi buku “Muhammad” karya Martin Lings. Namun, ketika berpikir tentang Muhammad s.a.w., tiba-tiba yang terlintas dalam benak saya adalah puisi Garuda yang ditulis Emha Ainun Nadjib dan dilantunkan dalam teater tafsir “Tikungan Iblis”, Agustus 2008 silam. Puisi Garuda ini dalam perasaan saya berbicara tentang kesunyian hati. Mungkin ini sekelumit gambaran perasaan Muhammad ketika mendapati generasinya justru lebih paham kisah hidup penyanyi yang ngetop gara-gara Youtube, heroisme Clark Kent dan Naruto Uzumaki, serta “pahlawan” imajiner yang lain dibanding kemuliaan sejarah kerasulannya. Muhammad, sosok yang dicinta oleh umatnya. Namun, tidak sedikit generasi yang tumbuh di tengah ingar-bingar industrialisme ini hanya tahu namanya saja. Perjalanan hidupnya? Rahasia kenabiannya? Atmosfir kesejukannya? Suci karakternya? Beban perjuangannya? Hampir tak ada waktu bagi generasi ini untuk menyelami, apalagi meneladaninya. Kesunyian yang barangkali dialami oleh sekian banyak tokoh, karakter, pribadi masa lampau yang hanya diingat namanya saja, namun cenderung tidak digubris ajarannya.: Bal Huwa yaquutu baina al ahjari Dene Kanjeng Nabi iku koyo inten, campur karo watu, watu dudu inten Kanjeng Nabi itu laksana intan diantara bebatuan Lings was born in Burnage, Manchester, in 1909 to a Protestant family. [2] The young Lings gained an introduction to travelling at a young age, spending significant time in the United States because of his father's employment. Lings attended Clifton College [3] and went on to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained a BA in English Language and Literature. At Magdalen, he was a student and then a close friend of C. S. Lewis. After graduating from Oxford Lings went to Vytautas Magnus University, in Lithuania, where he taught Anglo-Saxon and Middle English. [2] Lings might have been content to remain in Egypt for the rest of his life, but political events intervened. Abdul Nasser's nationalist revolution was preceded by savage anti-British riots, in which three of Lings's colleagues were killed, and the British university staff were dismissed without recompense.

Among the oddest leitmotifs of the book are Lings’ preoccupation with and free dramatizing of physical beauty. Khadijah“knew that she herself was still beautiful” (XII, 35, 1); Zaynab bint Jahsh was “a girl of out standing beauty” (XIII, 40, 1); “Ruqayyah was the most beautiful of their daughters and one of the most beautiful women of her generation” (XXIV, 70,1); ... and so on and so forth.

He travelled to Egypt in 1940, originally to visit a friend who was lecturing at Cairo University. During the visit, his friend died in a riding accident and Lings was offered the post. It was at about this time that he converted to Islam, and was soon imbued with the Sufi dimension of the religion. He found the critique of modern civilisation by the French Muslim writer, René Guénon, particularly convincing and shared his "universalism", within the context of Islam. Martin Lings’ biography of Muhammad is an internationally acclaimed, comprehensive, and authoritative account of the life of the prophet. Based on the sira, the eighth- and ninth-century Arabic biographies that recount numerous events in the prophet’s life, it contains original English translations of many important passages that reveal the words of men and women who heard Muhammad speak and witnessed the events of his life.

Hernandez, Aaminah (14 July 2005). "Best Biographies of the Prophet Muhammad". OnIslam . Retrieved 1 July 2013. His interest in the symbolism of colours found expression in his talent for gardening. From his home in Kent, he would search far and wide for a particular specimen, seeking, for example, a shade of blue that perfectly reflected the perfection of heaven.Asma Asfaruddin (July 1996). "Review: [Untitled] Reviewed Work: Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources by Martin Lings". Middle East Studies Association Bulletin. 30 (1): 65.

A Spiritual Giant" (PDF) (363ed.). Q News. June 2005 . Retrieved 4 July 2013. [ permanent dead link] In the desert a man was conscious of being the lord of space, and in virtue of that lordship he escaped in a sense from the domination of time. By striking camp he sloughed off his yesterdays; and tomorrow seemed less of a fatality if its where as well as its when had yet to come. But the townsman was a prisoner; and to be fixed in one place, yesterday, today, tomorrow – was to be a target for time, the ruiner of all things. Towns were places of corruption. Sloth and slovenliness lurked in the shadow of their walls, ready to take the edge off a man’s alertness and vigilance. Everything decayed there, even language, one of man’s most precious possessions. Few of the Arabs could read, but beauty of speech was a virtue which all Arab parents desired for their children. A man’s worth was largely assessed by his eloquence, and the crown of eloquence was poetry. To have a great poet in the family was indeed something to be proud of; and the best poets were nearly always from one or another of the desert tribes, for it was in the desert that the spoken language was nearest to poetry. So the bond with the desert had to be renewed in every generation – fresh air for the breast, pure Arabic for the tongue, freedom for the soul; and many of the sons of Quraysh were kept as long as eight years in the desert, so that it might make a lasting impression upon them, though a lesser number of years was enough for that. [3] Word of CautionIn 1955, he joined the staff of the British Museum as assistant keeper of oriental printed books and manuscripts; he was keeper from 1970 to 1973, when he was seconded to the British Library. This work focused his interest in Qur'anic calligraphy and he published a classic work on the subject, The Qur'anic Art Of Calligraphy And Illumination, to coincide with the 1976 World of Islam Festival, with which he was closely involved. From then on, he wrote constantly. For Muslims, his masterpiece was Muhammad: His Life Based On The Earliest Sources (1983), for which he was decorated by Zia al-Haq, then president of Pakistan. a b c d e "Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources: Revised Edition: Martin Lings (Abu Bakr Siraj Ad-Din)". Islamic Bookstore.com . Retrieved 1 July 2013.