During his conveyance of Islam, Prophet Muhammed (pbuh) made contact with members of various religions. Due to the fact that Islam is a religion of peace, the Prophet preferred the way of agreement in inviting peoples to Islam. In view of the fact that Arabian society was generally composed of mushriks (idol worshippers), it is observed that the Prophet mostly dealt with them during his prophethood. In lexical context, the word “mushrik” derives its meaning from the Arabic verb “shirka” which means “associate with”, and it is used as “one who is associating something/someone with Allah, the Creator, in worship and blaspheming against Him”. “Shirk” which means “partnership in estate and business” also means “hypocrisy, strife, giving oath to somebody else other than Allah, foreboding something, relating the occurrences to profane reasons”.

In the contextual meaning, “mushrik” means Arabs who expressly associate partners with Allah, believe in numerous gods, are not a member of the Muslim, Jewish, Sabians, Christian or Majus faiths, accept associations as a religion and worship idols.

In the Quran, when stating the existing religions in Arabia during the revelation of Islam, mushriks were accounted for as a separate group. When we look at the era of the Prophet, marrying Jews and Christians who are Ahl al-Kitab (People of the Book) and eating from their food was considered halal (permissible). While jizya (the non-burdensome tax paid by non-Muslims residing in a state governed by Islam for the funding of their protection) was taken from Majus and Sabians, it was haram (forbidden) for Muslims to marry their women or eat from their food. On the contrary, no jizya was taken from Arab idolaters who were considered mushriks, and it was forbidden to marry their women and eat from their food.  In this context, Arab mushriks were considered equal with murtads (apostates). In other words, battles could be fought against them without jizya privilege (the offer of paid-for protection in exchange for acceptance of Islam as the governing law of the state while being allowed to adhere to their own laws within their religious communities) when they didn’t become Muslim.

When the Prophet conveyed Islam to his people during his time in Mecca, he patiently endured all hardships and cruelties of the mushriks. The Prophet, who yearned for a peace treaty against the torturing of his people, always kept an open door to the hope of an agreement remembering the benefits of the al-Fudul covenant (an alliance made prior to the coming of Islam in Mecca to ensure justice in a time when it had greatly deteriorated during the Jahiliyya (Age of Ignorance)).

Since the first days of his hijrah (migration) to Medina, the Prophet established a brotherhood between the Ansar (residents of Medina) and Muhajirun (those who immigrated there to establish the first Islamic state). He prepared the first constitution in Islamic History and founded the state of Medina. Later on, he signed treaties for various reasons with neighboring mushrik tribes and other mushriks in Arabia.