Yshimy,
I agree completely with your points - and the incident with the blind person was one I thought about including, but chose not to, in my previous post.
The point is that the Prophet was the perfect man. He was human. He showed what the pinnacle of being a human being can be.
However, the thread is about 'infallibility' - the inability of making any mistakes (for some of the definitions).
The Prophet did make some minor mistakes - the incident of the blind person is recorded for us.
Let me clarify this incident for those who are not familiar with this. The Prophet was sitting in the company of an important person ( a Chief, I think ) and was discussing religion. A blind man then walked in on them and the Prophet, pbuh, furrowed his brow to show some annoyance with the disturbance. That was it, he did not show this annoyance in his speech to the blind person and by all accounts it was a fleeting annoyance that disappeared.
However, the Quran records that God took the Prophet to task for this show of annoyance that the blind person was not even aware of. It shows the higher standards that the Prophet was being held to.
In that instance, he made a mistake. It was, however, such a minor mistake - but it exemplifies how perfect he was in every other aspect of his life, because this was the biggest mistake he made.
This shows, to me at least, that perfection in human beings cannot reach to the point where no mistakes can be made. It makes one humble enough to realise that we all will sin and that we all need to pray for forgiveness and look for self reform and improvement.
Sometimes the concept of a perfect man and infallibility in ALL things gets mixed up. The Prophet was infallible in all things related to religion - the Quran tells us that the Prophet does not speak of himself, but of what is revealed to him. Therefore all of his pronouncements on religous matters are infallible (and I have honestly not found any that rebel against reason).
In Richard's post at the start of the thread, the third definition of infallibility is what applies to the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him.
As for the black stone, I have also read about the same incident about Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, about kissing the stone. All the early muslims were very careful about idolatory creeping back into religion. The black stone, according to accounts I have read, does pre-date organised religion.. it was part of the first house that was built on the site - the first place of worship. I remember reading that the whole structure was built of these stones originally (by Adam?) and that the one black stone in the corner is what remains from the original building.
Wasalaam,
Shafique
