Letter to the Najashi of Abyssinia

Some time after the Hijrah to Madinah, the Prophet ﷺ wrote a letter to the Najashi. The Najashi wrote back declaring, "I am a Muslim: I believe in you and all that you say. And if you command me, O Prophet of God, I will come to Madinah and serve you."

The letter itself (as reported by Ibn al-Qayyim) opened, "From Muhammad ﷺ the Messenger of God to Negus, King of Abyssinia (Ethiopia). Peace be upon him who follows true guidance..." and set out Islamic belief about Isa (Jesus): "I bear witness that Jesus, the son of Mary, is the spirit of God and His Word which He cast into Mary, the virgin, the good, the pure, so that she conceived Jesus. God created him from His spirit and His breathing as He created Adam by His Hand." It called the Najashi to Islam with "Aslim taslam (submit and you will get salvation)" and closed with the verse "O People of the Book! Let us come to common terms: that we will worship none but God, associate none with Him, nor take one another as lords instead of God" [Quran, 3:64]. This letter is not to be confused with Ja'far ibn Abi Talib RA's dawah to the Najashi over a decade earlier during the first Hijrah to Abyssinia; by this point Ja'far had already left. Unlike the letters to Heraclius and Khosrow, this letter carried no warning that the Najashi would bear the sins of his people if he refused; the Prophet ﷺ apparently already knew he was close to Islam.