Half right, half wrong

Submitted by Simha (United Kingdom), May 27, 2014 at 11:42

The first part of your post is probably correct - about Muhammad having had a different name before. Now, Muhammad itself is, of course, Arabic. The word is amply attested in Arabic and even in old inscriptions from long before the Qur'an. What some have claimed is, that MHMD be a rendering of Syriac MSHBH but that is another matter altogether. Syriac doesn't employ the root H.-M-D, so it cannot be Syriac.

Moreover, your statement about muhammad - mahmud is, of course, quite incorrect. Derivatives of both the 1. and 2. stem are possible.

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