According to B. Tuchman, “history is the unfolding of miscalculation.” In other words, history usually develops in a manner quite contrary to people’s expectations. While events are unfolding, observers may pass judgement on the course they are taking, but the course of history defies all prediction, and in the end, things turn out quite differently from what people had initially expected.
To take an example from Islamic history, in the year 6 AH, the Treaty of Hudaybiyah was signed between Prophet Muhammad and the Quraysh of Mecca. At that time the Quraysh were one in thinking that the Muslims had signed their own writ of destruction, for they accepted peace on the terms which were clearly favourable to the Quraysh. Yet, afterwards, it transpired that this apparent defeat contained the seeds of a great victory for the Muslims.
The same thing has happened time and again throughout history. In 1945, when atom bombs were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, it seemed to the Americans as if Japan would lie in ruins for several decades to come. Yet this was not to be: within forty years after the event, Japan stood at the pinnacle of her economic strength becoming the leading industrial power in the world.
Maulana Wahiduddin Khan is an Islamic spiritual scholar who has authored over 200 books on Islam, spirituality, and peaceful coexistence in a multi-ethnic society.
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