Sunshine at Madinah

by Zakaria Bashier

The second volume in a biography of the Prophet. This book studies his life in Madinah, highlighting the nature and characteristics of the society and state he was able to establish. It contains a description of the events that took place in Madinah during the last ten years of the Prophet's mission.

Genres: Islam

232 pages, Paperback

Published July 1, 2007

Reviews

[Adil Hussain · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled across this book in the second-hand books section of a charity shop. There was something captivating about the title and cover image. It gave the impression of being a Seerah book with a difference and it certainly delivered on that front. It's not your standard chronological telling of events from the life of Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ). Instead, the author has taken the approach of picking a few key events and themes from the Prophet's years in Madinah and he has focused on explaining and contextualising these. The core events and themes that undergo a detailed study in the book are the Constitution of Madinah drafted by the Prophet on his arrival into Madinah, the Prophet's Farewell Sermon, the role of Muslim women in the Prophet's society, and the socio-economic dimensions of the Prophet's state.

This book, published in 1990, was the third in a series of four books written by Zakaria Bashier on the life of Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ). The first two cover the Makkan period of the Prophet's life and the Hijrah respectively. The fourth is a study on peace and war in the life of the Prophet. The present book – Sunshine at Madinah – has left a good impression on me and I'll definitely be looking to read the other three in the series.

[Abdullah Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the sequel to the Makkan Crucible, And although it continues in a similar style, it is much easier to read and much more exciting, probably because of the rapid sequence of events. There are quite a lot of books about the Seerah around and I do recommend this one as a short but detailed account.

[Carla · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book contained a lot of details about what was going on in the early Medina period, it wasn't like most books of seerah that I've read in that it doesn't really tell a story or give a good picture of what was going on during this period. If focused more on the details of the compacts made between the Muslims and Jews as well as social structure of that time. It was good, but if you're looking for a book of seerah, it doesn't follow the same format that other ones do, so unless you're at least somewhat familiar with what was going on during this time, this book won't fill in the gaps.