The Year of Delegations

Hatim al-Ta'i was the byword for generosity among the Arabs, and his son Adi, chief of Tayy after him, was a Christian with friends at the Roman court and none of his father's nerve. When he heard that the Muslims were conquering tribe after tribe he kept camels ready, and when his lookouts told him Ali was coming he abandoned his people and fled with his wife, children and wealth to the north, near Roman territory. Ali's expedition broke the idol of Tayy and brought back prisoners, and among them a woman demanded to see the Prophet ﷺ: she was the daughter of Hatim, and asked him to be generous to her as Allah would be generous to him. He freed her, gave her a camel and provision, and let her go where she liked. She found her brother in the north, rebuked him for running, and told him to go down to Muhammad ﷺ: either he was a prophet, in which case Adi should follow him, or he was a king, in which case Adi should win his favour. That she allowed the first possibility shows what she already thought. Adi told the story himself, to a student in Kufa, where he died at a hundred and twenty. No one on earth, he said, had been more hateful to him than the Prophet ﷺ; but he decided that if the man spoke the truth he would hear it from him, and if not it would do him no harm. He walked into Madinah at the end of the eighth year or the start of the ninth without protection and without fear, for who would harm the son of Hatim, and men who recognised him shouted his name and took him to the Prophet ﷺ. Adi, accept Islam and you will be safe. He had a religion already, he said, and a better one than the pagans'. The invitation was repeated and refused, and repeated again. Then the Prophet ﷺ said that he knew Adi's religion better than Adi did. Was he not the chief of his people? He was. Did he not take a quarter of their income? He did. And did he not know that his own religion forbade it? Adi said he was ashamed, and knew then that this was a prophet. The Prophet ﷺ took him by the hand and walked him to his house, and on the way an old woman with a small child stopped him about some need of hers, and he stood and talked with her until it was settled, with the chief of Tayy waiting beside him. This, Adi said to himself, is not a king. In the house there was one worn mat. The Prophet ﷺ spread it and told Adi to sit on it, and when Adi protested that there would be nothing left for his host, insisted, and sat on the ground. Then he asked: do you know of any god but Allah? No. Any mightier than Allah? No. The Jews, he said, had earned Allah's anger, and the Christians had gone astray. And then he named the thing that was holding Adi back: perhaps it was the state of the people around him, their poverty and their weakness, seen by a man who lived well among a great civilisation. Had he heard of al-Hirah? A woman would soon ride from al-Hirah to circle the Ka'bah alone, fearing nothing but Allah. The treasures of Kisra ibn Hormuz would be divided among them. Kisra ibn Hormuz? Adi asked. Kisra ibn Hormuz. And a day would come when a man would walk the streets of Madinah with alms in his hand and find no one to take them. Adi became a Muslim there in the house. When he told the story in later life he would say that he had seen two of the three with his own eyes: the woman rode safe, and he had been among those who opened the treasury of Kisra; as for the third, he knew it would come, and it came in the reign of Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz. Later he asked the Prophet ﷺ whether his father, so generous to kin and stranger, would be rewarded, and was told that his father had wanted something and had got what he wanted.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 84: "this is at the end of the 8th year, some say the beginning of the 9th."

The Banu Sa'd ibn Bakr were the people of Halimah, who had nursed the Prophet ﷺ in the desert as an infant, and a branch of the Hawazin who had fought him at Hunayn. Bedouins rather than townsmen like the Thaqif, they were rough in their manners, and the man they sent to Madinah in the ninth year to negotiate a treaty was not yet a Muslim. Dimam ibn Tha'laba, an elder of the tribe, hairy and unkempt, his hair in two plaits, rode his camel to the door of the mosque, couched it there, walked in and demanded to know which of them was the son of Abdul Muttalib. Ignorant and unlettered as he was, he knew the lineage, and that mattered to a man for whom lineage was everything. The Prophet ﷺ said that he was the son of Abdul Muttalib. You are Muhammad ﷺ? I am. I am going to ask you, Dimam said, and I am going to be hard with you, so do not be angry with me. Go on. Your envoy came to us and said that Allah has sent you. He spoke the truth. Who created the heavens? Allah. Who created the earth? Allah. Who set up the mountains? Allah. Who put everything in its place? Allah. Then I ask you by the One who created the heavens and the earth and set up the mountains: do you swear that Allah has sent you to us? I swear by Allah that Allah has sent me. Your envoy said we must pray five times a day; by the One who sent you, did Allah command you to tell us this? Yes. And so on through zakat, fasting and the pilgrimage, the last of which fixes the year, for Hajj had only just been made obligatory. Some say he is the man of the well-known hadith who then asked whether he owed anything beyond the five prayers, the zakat and the fast of Ramadan, and being told no, unless he wished, swore by the One who had sent him with the truth that he would do that much and neither add to it nor take from it. When he had gone the Prophet ﷺ said to the Companions: if he is true, he will enter Paradise. He went home and preached to his people, and Ibn Ishaq says that such was his standing that the whole tribe accepted Islam the day he returned, and that same day he broke the idol they had worshipped. No delegate, it was said, was a greater blessing to his people than Dimam.

Placed here because: Ep. 94: "this took place before one of the most important delegations which was that of Thaqif."

A year after the siege of Ta'if was lifted with the Prophet ﷺ's words that the Thaqif would come to him of their own accord, they came. They were by then the last pagan tribe in the Hejaz, and what brought them was fear as much as faith. When Urwah ibn Mas'ud, the greatest of their chiefs, whom the Qur'an couples with al-Walid ibn al-Mughira as one of the two great men of the two cities, had embraced Islam on the road home from the siege and gone back to call them to it, they had shot him from the dark as he gave the adhan from his roof. The blood was on their hands and they knew what it meant. Ibn Ishaq records the long argument in which no chief would go to Madinah alone to answer for it, until they agreed that all six or seven of them would go together, with their retinue, in Ramadan of the ninth year. Their kinsman al-Mughira ibn Shu'ba met them outside the city and ran for the mosque to tell the Prophet ﷺ, and Abu Bakr stopped him on the way and begged, by Allah, to be the one to carry the good news; every Companion wanted to be the man who made the Prophet ﷺ glad. Mughira went back and taught them how to greet him and what to call him, and they ignored it all, greeting him in the manner of the days of ignorance and calling him by his name. There was no faith in them yet, and the Prophet ﷺ overlooked every discourtesy, had a tent pitched for them inside the mosque, and treated them as honoured guests. They were so afraid of what they had done that they would not touch the food until the go-between had eaten first. The go-between, as Arab custom required at that level, was Khalid ibn Sa'id ibn al-As, a distant cousin of the Prophet ﷺ, and through him the bargaining ran for ten days. Could they have a treaty at all? If they became Muslims. They had heard that riba was forbidden, and all their wealth was riba; they would keep their principal. Could they keep zina, being merchants often away from home? Allah had forbidden it. Could they at least keep wine, in Ta'if, a city of vineyards and cold nights? Allah had forbidden it. They conferred: no one could go home and tell Ta'if that riba, zina and wine were gone; but if they went home without terms and another army came, they would be finished in a month; and after all, said one of them, had not the people around this man given up all three? If they could, so could the Thaqif. Then al-Lat, the second idol of Arabia after Hubal. It would be destroyed. Three years, they asked; two; one; down through the months, and every time no. Then they could not be the ones to do it. They need not be, the Prophet ﷺ said; the Muslims would see to it. Then the prayer: could they be excused bowing, in that cold? There is no good in a religion without prayer. Wudu, then? No. Zakat and jihad? Yes, he said, they were excused; and after they had gone he told the Companions that they would pay zakat and they would fight, for Allah would put faith in their hearts, and they did. Whether that was a prophecy peculiar to him or a precedent for leniency with new Muslims the scholars still argue. Around the tenth day they became Muslims and fasted the last five days of Ramadan with him, so anxious to get it right that when Bilal brought their suhur they said the sun had risen and he told them the Prophet ﷺ was still eating, and when he brought their iftar they said the sun had not set and he told them he had come only after the Prophet ﷺ had broken his fast. The youngest of them, Uthman ibn Abi al-As, had believed before the rest and spent the fortnight out of the elders' tent, learning Qur'an from the Prophet ﷺ and religion from Abu Bakr; when they left, Abu Bakr proposed him as their leader and the Prophet ﷺ made him so. They went home and told Ta'if it must accept Islam, and Mughira and Abu Sufyan were sent to break al-Lat, Mughira first pretending to drop dead at the first blow to show them how foolish they were, and a mosque was raised where it had stood. Wahshi, Hamzah's killer, who had fled to Ta'if before the conquest, became a Muslim about the same time.

Placed here because: Ep. 95: "this took place in Ramadan of the 9th year of the Hijrah."

As part of Thaqif's agreement with the Prophet ﷺ, the tribe would not have to destroy their idol al-Lat, the second most prestigious idol of the pagan Arabs after Hubal, themselves. The Prophet ﷺ sent al-Mughira ibn Shu'ba RA, Thaqif's own nephew, together with Abu Sufyan ibn Harb RA, to carry it out. As the whole tribe gathered anxiously, women crying and elders wailing, Mughira first played a prank on them (striking the idol, crying out, and collapsing as if struck down, so that the crowd rejoiced thinking al-Lat had defended itself) before jumping back up and mocking them for believing it. The idol's caretaker warned that the earth would swallow anyone who reached its base, but Mughira pressed on and demolished al-Lat completely, down to the ground. The Prophet ﷺ then had Uthman ibn Abi al-As RA build a mosque on the site, and the treasures kept in the idol's sanctuary were taken to the Bayt al-Mal and distributed to the poor and needy.

Placed here because: Shortly after the delegation went home; Mughira and Abu Sufyan were sent to break it.

Musaylimah al-Kadhdhab, the aging and highly respected leader of Banu Hanifa in al-Yamamah, watched his tribe fracture as the nobleman Thumamah ibn Uthal RA [see episode 62] and his followers embraced Islam while others held to the old ways. Musaylimah told his people that if the Prophet ﷺ would grant him power after his death and share prophethood with him "like Musa shared it with his brother Harun," he would follow him, and traveled to Madinah to negotiate. His followers brought him into the Masjid draped in fine cloth like a king. He put his condition to the Prophet ﷺ directly, who refused him even a mere stick, let alone rule or prophethood. Returning home, Musaylimah wrote a letter proclaiming himself co-Messenger of Allah with the Prophet ﷺ, splitting "the matter" between himself and the Quraysh; the two envoys who delivered it affirmed its contents, and the Prophet ﷺ, restrained only by the immunity owed to envoys, rebuked them for their kufr. Musaylimah went on to compose mocking imitations of the Qur'an, including a parody of Surah al-Kawthar and a "Surah al-Difda'" (Chapter of the Frog), which even a passing non-Muslim Arab recognized as the words of a liar.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 96 tells it first among its delegations; no month is given.

The Prophet ﷺ sent a letter to Musaylimah al-Kadhdhab of Banu Hanifa calling him to Islam. Musaylimah replied that he would only accept if he were given a share of power.

Placed here because: Ep. 96: "After he returned to his community, he wrote a letter to the Prophet ﷺ."

Najran was a Christian province with ties to the Roman emperor, and the Prophet ﷺ had written to it months before, in the name of the God of Ibrahim, Ishaq and Ya'qub, offering Islam, or the jizya, or war. Its people took counsel. One of them said that a prophet was foretold among the children of Isma'il and that this might be he; another that even if he were not, they should learn his strength. So they sent sixty men, where delegations were usually a handful, twenty-four of them nobles, three of them bishops and one a patriarch, both to impress the Muslims and to judge for themselves. They came into the mosque at Asr dressed as no delegation the Companions had seen, in the manner of Rome rather than Arabia, and when the hour of their own prayer came they asked to pray. The Companions wanted to refuse; the Prophet ﷺ said, let them pray, and they turned to the east, towards the mosque's wall rather than its qibla, and prayed there. The talks ran three or four days. On the first they asked about Isa: if you agree with us that he was born of a virgin, who was his father? The Prophet ﷺ said he had no answer for them yet; let Allah answer. The next day the first sixty verses of Surah Ali Imran came down, and among them: the likeness of Isa with Allah is as the likeness of Adam, whom He created from dust and then said to him, be, and he was. They claimed Ibrahim as a Christian, and the surah answered that Ibrahim was neither a Jew nor a Christian but a hanif who submitted to Allah, and no idolater. At the end of the second day came the verse of mubahala: whoever argues with you about him after the knowledge that has come to you, say, come, let us call our sons and your sons, our women and your women, ourselves and yourselves, and pray earnestly, and lay the curse of Allah on the liars. It is how an argument is ended, not begun, and it names the children and the women first because their ruin is harder to bear than one's own. On the third morning the Prophet ﷺ came out with his family ready for it: his daughter Fatima, her husband Ali, and their sons Hasan and Husayn. The Christians had talked among themselves in the night: if the man was a prophet and they cursed each other, they would be wiped from the earth. They declined the mubahala and accepted the jizya, a reasonable yearly sum in cloth and silver, for as long as Allah willed. They asked besides for a judge to settle their own disputes, having found the Muslims honest, and the Prophet ﷺ sent them Abu Ubaydah ibn al-Jarrah. On the way home, al-Bayhaqi records, the younger brother of one of the most senior men spoke ill of the Prophet ﷺ, and the patriarch told him not to. Why? Because he is the prophet we were promised. Then why did you not follow him, when we follow you? Would you have us give up the honour, the wealth and the standing the emperor has given us? The younger man turned round, went back to Madinah, and became a Muslim. The rest followed their elders home, as most people do.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 96 places it in the Year of Delegations, after the letter to Najran "a few months before"; no month is given.

The tribe of Abd al-Qays sent a second delegation to the Prophet ﷺ in the 9th year of the Hijrah, the Year of Delegations, following up on their first delegation of the 5th year.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 94: the tribe "sent a second delegation in the 9th year, i.e., the Year of Delegations."

The entire tribe of Muzayna, roughly 400 people, came to Madinah in the Year of Delegations to embrace Islam. When they prepared to return home, the Prophet ﷺ instructed Umar ibn al-Khattab RA to provide them food for the journey. Umar had only one bag of dates at home, but obeyed anyway, and found his room filled with dates to the ceiling. All 400 delegates filled their sacks from it, and the pile was reported unchanged when the last of them left.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 94 order; no month is given.

Ten men of Banu Asad ibn Khuzaymah arrived loudly in the Masjid proclaiming the shahada and pointing out that they had come to Madinah unbidden and unfought, unlike other Arab tribes. Allah revealed Qur'an 49:17 correcting their self-regard, instructing the Prophet ﷺ to tell them that accepting Islam is not a favor they have done him, but a favor Allah has done them by guiding them to faith.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 94 order; no month is given.

After Fatima bint Qays RA's 'iddah ended, she heard the call "come to the prayer" and went to the Masjid, praying in the row of women closest to the men. When the Prophet ﷺ finished the prayer, he ascended the minbar, smiling, and told the congregation he had called them together not for a lecture but to relate the account of Tamim al-Dari, newly a Muslim, which agreed with what he ﷺ had already been teaching about the Dajjal. Tamim recounted that he had sailed with 30 men of Lakhm and Judham, been tossed a month by the waves, and landed on an island where they met a shaggy, faceless-seeming beast called al-Jassasah, who directed them to a monastery. There they found a giant man bound in chains, who questioned them about the date-palms of Baysan, the Lake of Tabariyyah, and the spring of Zughar, and about "the unlettered prophet" and whether the Arabs had submitted to him. He then identified himself as al-Masih al-Dajjal, said he would soon be permitted to emerge and would spare no town for 40 nights except Makkah and Taybah (Madinah), which angels guard on every route. The Prophet ﷺ struck the minbar with his staff, declaring three times "This is Taybah," and said the Dajjal is in the east.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 94 order; no month is given.

Wa'il ibn Hujr, a nobleman of Hadhramaut in Yemen descended from one of the region's pre-Islamic kings, came to Madinah in the 9th year of the Hijrah to embrace Islam without any pressure. Three days before his arrival the Prophet ﷺ had already told the Companions he was coming. The Prophet ﷺ honored him more than almost anyone else: seating him beside himself on the minbar and on his own cloak (rida'), and making du'a for him and his children. When Wa'il complained that his family had taken away his right to the throne, the Prophet ﷺ told him Islam would give him something better. The Prophet ﷺ then gave Wa'il the governorship of a small area of Yemen and sent the young Muawiyah ibn Abi Sufyan RA with him as an escort; Wa'il, still new to Islam and not yet purified of his old regal manners, twice refused to let Muawiyah ride his camel or wear his shoes on the hot stones, telling him only to take shelter in the camel's shadow.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 95 order; no month is given.

The tribe of Azd, one of the large tribes of Yemen, came to Madinah and accepted Islam, and the Prophet ﷺ placed a sahabi, Surad ibn Abdillah al-Azdi RA, in charge of them with the task of subduing the neighboring, still-pagan tribe of Jurash. As two envoys of Jurash traveled to Madinah to gauge the Prophet ﷺ and seek a truce, the Prophet ﷺ had already ordered Surad RA to attack, and the attack began the very day the envoys arrived in the Masjid. When the Prophet ﷺ asked them their tribe and learned it was Jurash, he told them, "Verily, Allah's camel is being sacrificed at Jurash as we speak," meaning the slaughter was happening that very moment, a reference they did not understand until Abu Bakr RA (or, in another account, Uthman ibn Affan RA) explained the Prophet ﷺ was informing them of the calamity befalling their people, and urged them to beg him for du'a. The Prophet ﷺ made du'a for the people of Jurash to be guided.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 96 order; no month is given.

Imran ibn Husayn RA narrated that while he sat in the Masjid, a delegation of Banu Tamim (crude, harsh Bedouins of Najd, from whom much of the Confederate army at the Battle of the Trench had come) arrived announcing their Islam. The Prophet ﷺ told them, "I give you good news, O people of Tamim" (meaning of Jannah), but they misunderstood this as an offer of wealth and asked him for money instead; the Prophet ﷺ, showing his adab, said nothing. The Himyarites of Yemen then arrived and announced their own Islam. The Prophet ﷺ said, "O people of Himyar, accept the good news, since the people of Banu Tamim did not accept it." They replied, "We accept the good news! And we have come all the way from Yemen asking you about the creation: how did Allah create it, and how did it all begin?" The Prophet ﷺ answered, "There was Allah, and there was nothing before Him. And He then created the heavens and the earth while His Throne was on the water." Imran ibn Husayn RA then recounted that, right at that point, someone called out that his camel had fled; he ran after it into the desert and, catching neither the camel nor the rest of the hadith, later wished he had let the camel go so he could have heard the whole thing, and since the Himyar delegates themselves went home without becoming narrators of hadith, this account was never completed for later generations.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 96 order; no month is given.

Abd al-Rahman ibn Abi Aqil RA, a one-time sahabi, recalled that his delegation had been forced by their tribe to go and meet the Prophet ﷺ, whom they despised beforehand, yet by the time they left, there was no one in the world more beloved to them than him. A youngster among them asked the Prophet ﷺ why he did not ask his Lord for a kingdom like that of Sulayman AS. The Prophet ﷺ laughed and said that perhaps his companion had been given a kingdom even better than Sulayman's: that Allah grants every prophet one request that He will never refuse, and while other prophets asked for things of this world or for punishment upon their people, the Prophet ﷺ had kept his own request between himself and his Lord; that it be his intercession (shafa'a) for his ummah on the Day of Judgment.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 96 tells it last; no month is given.