In answer to the video "Paul Won Converts Through Peaceful Preaching; Muhammad Used Bribes and Threats (PvM 17)"
As regards implementing the divine will by the sword, the Quran retells the stories of past nations who were ordained, against a mightier ennemy and with God's help, to uproot unrighteousness and establish the will of God in a specific land.
Such was the case with the Israelites back in the times of Moses. They had to cleanse the blessed land of Canaan from its unrighteous dwellers, and the same command was issued to Saul/Talut and David 2:246-252, then finally the Ishmaelites.
Under the Ishmaelite prophet and just as was commanded to the previous semitic prophets, Muslims had to purge the ancient temple of monotheism in Mecca from its unworthy guardians who had swayed into the ways of polytheism
22:40-1"Those who have been expelled from their homes without a just cause except that they say: Our Lord is Allah. And had there not been Allah's repelling some people by others, certainly there would have been pulled down cloisters and churches and synagogues and mosques in which Allah´s name is much remembered; and surely Allah will help him who helps His cause; most surely Allah is Strong, Mighty. Those who, should We establish them in the land, will keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate and enjoin good and forbid evil; and Allah´s is the end of affairs".
So just as Muhammad and the Children of Ishmael were commanded, Allah previously ordered in the days of Moses and the prophets of the children of Israel to fight in His way, see Deut1:41,Deut7,9:4-6,12:1-3,20:16-18 and allthroughout Deuteronomy. The Israelites are commanded to cleanse the land from idolatry, destroying all altars and not leaving a physical trace of idolatrous practices. All subsequent Israelite prophets were to purge all remaining traces of idolatry and evil from the land, by the sword without holding back whether it involves killing Jews or non Jews as prophecised in Isa1:25. In the HB, we read that God's established way of erradicating idolatry is so forecful that He sometimes even tasks non-Jews to do the job when the Israelites failed Jer48:10. This happened when the Chaldeans were sent to destroy the Moabites
"Cursed be he who performs the Lord's work deceitfully, and cursed be he who withholds his sword from blood"or again when the Assyrians of Sennacherib were raised by God so as to destroy, exil and enslave the idolatrous Kingdom of Israel Amos6:11-14. This reoccured with the Babylonians of Nebuchadnezzar whom God calls His servant for performing His will, sent firstly to inflict massacre upon the Israelites for their repeated transgressions, and then upon those Ammonites and Edomites that occupied the holy lands and reintroduced idolatry in it Jer25:9,49:19.
Later on it would be the non-Jew Cyrus, king of Persia who would be divinely aroused and commanded to wage war against the Babylonians until their defeat, expulsion from the holy land and the return of the Jews to Israel so as to re-establish monotheism in it Jer50:14-21,51:1,53.
The same semitic pattern of prophethood is thus found in regards to Muhammad, the Ishmaelites and the Kaaba. God does not and never did tolerate the presence of idolatry in a land declared sacred and dedicated to monotheism. So God tasked His prophet with re-establishing the monotheistic practice at the Kaaba, and should his opponents try fighting and exiling him and his followers, they will consequently be uprooted from the land they had complete dominion over 17:76-7. It was not the prophet's job to relocate the uninvited idols of the Kaaba, especially after years of warning those that put them there, against their corrupt practices, and the impending forceful expulsion.
The Quran addresses the Arabs in no uncertain terms and in a time where none would have imagined for such an outcome to materialize, telling them that the result of their rejection will be similar to the peoples of the Messengers of old such as Noah, Hud, Lot, Shuayb, Salih, Moses etc. Just as these people were judged on a lower but nonetheless terryfing scale for rejecting God's communications, a day will come where God's judgement will be even greater 69:1-12.
The Quran places Muhammad and his followers right inside that pattern since the very beginning of the prophetic mission. It would remind them of this reality and comfort them by saying this Law of God will never change. The rejecters are not denying the messenger, the individual; they are denying the Lord of the Universe
6:33-4"We know indeed that what they say certainly grieves you, but surely they do not call you a liar; but the unjust deny the communications of Allah. And certainly messengers before you were rejected, but they were patient on being rejected and persecuted until Our help came to them; and there is none to change the words of Allah, and certainly there has come to you some information about the messengers".
But a prophet's function isnt to bring God's retribution, rather to create spiritual reform before a day comes where no reform will be possible. The prophecies of destruction are warnings that can be undone depending on the people's answer. A prophetic warning is not irreversible. The Quran gives the example of the nation of the prophet Yunus/Jonas to demonstrate that reality. They reformed themselves prior to the expiration of their time of respite and thus the prophecies of destruction were nullified.
A prophet thus, first and foremost conveys clear warnings. The Quran would call this step a verbal jihad 25:52 because it was so hard and dangerous for the messenger and his early followers.
Once all the stages of warning and thorough explanation of the truth pass, as the era of calls to reform reaches its end and the prophetic warnings are about to unfold, the prophet must declare his unambiguous aqcuital from the rejecters. This was emphatically done in sura Kafirun by the prophet towards the enemies among the Quraysh.
The label of "kafirun" at this specific time of the prophetic mission makes it now clear that no reform will come from the addressees, that their continuous animosity and opposition to a messenger of God and the arguments sent with him, after long years of admonition was not really due to the attachement and respect, as they claimed, to their ancestral ways. Only their desires and wordly interests that had shaped their religion was what stood in the way. Many verses reveal how little consideration they had for their inherited ways. They were ready to bargain and compromise their system so long as their wordly interests were preserved. They suggested that for them to embrace faith then the only possible option was to either bring another Quran or to make some changes in it which would be acceptable to them
68:9"They wish that you should be pliant so they (too) would be pliant"
17:73"And surely they had purposed to turn you away from that which We have revealed to you, that you should forge against Us other than that, and then they would certainly have taken you for a friend"
10:15"those who hope not for Our meeting say: Bring a Quran other than this or change it".The prophet was divinely protected and firmly established in his faith 17:74, to face these moral challenges
10:104"If you are in doubt as to my religion, then (know that) I do not worship those whom you worship other than Allah! But I worship Allah Who causes you to die and I have been commanded that I should be of the believers".
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