The Expedition of Tabuk

No one knows the year this happened. Ibn Sayyid al-Nas says it was the ninth year of the Hijrah. Others say the fourth, fifth or sixth. Some clues point to a late date. By then the Prophet ﷺ was married to all nine of his wives: Sawda, Aisha, Hafsa, Umm Salama, Juwayriyya, Zaynab bint Jahsh, Umm Habiba, Safiyyah and Maymunah. Also, Umar was worried at the time about an attack by the Ghassanids, and that fear ended after Tabuk. On the other hand, Umar went in to see Aisha, which points to a time before the verses of hijab. The verses revealed about the episode are in Surah al-Ahzab, but that proves nothing about the date, because the verses of a surah did not have to come down together. The cause is easier to state than the date. The Prophet ﷺ had never lived in comfort. As a boy he worked as a shepherd for pennies. He lived as a lodger in Abu Talib's crowded house. He had no riding animal of his own until the Hijrah. When wealth came, it went to the community rather than to him. It came in the ransoms of Badr, the fields of Khaybar, and the gift of Fadak, which fed his household. Greatest of all were the spoils of Hunayn. He kept none of them for himself, even though the law allowed a ruler his share. This was his own choice. An angel who had never come down before had once brought him an offer from his Lord. He could be a king and messenger, or a slave and messenger. Jibril signalled to him to humble himself, and he chose to be a slave. The narrator says that after that day he was never seen eating while leaning back against a wall. His wives saw the standard of living rising all around them in Madinah, but not in their own rooms. At some point, most likely in the eighth or ninth year, they went to him together and asked for more. No book records exactly what they asked for, and that is right, because it was a private household matter. What is clear is that they asked together, that Aisha and Hafsa led them, and that what they wanted was lawful. He answered with an ila'. This is an oath before Allah to stay away from one's wives. The law allows it for up to four months, when a marriage needs time to cool down. He swore it for one month. Then he withdrew to a small loft near the mosque, which was reached by a ladder. Umar later told the story to Ibn Abbas. Ibn Abbas had waited more than a year for a chance to ask him about the two wives addressed in Surah al-Tahrim. Umar began with the affair of Maria. He explained that the men of the Quraysh had been used to ruling over their women. In Madinah they found people whose women ruled over them, and their own wives began to learn the same ways. One day, at his house in al-Awali, Umar's wife answered him back. When he scolded her, she told him that the Prophet ﷺ's own wives answered him back. Some of them even stayed away from him for a whole day when they were angry. Umar went straight to his daughter Hafsa and asked if this was true. She said it was. He told her that any woman who did that had lost everything. He warned her never to answer the Prophet ﷺ back again, and never to trouble him for anything. If she needed something, she should bring it to her father. He also told her not to be misled by what her co-wife could get away with. Aisha was more graceful than Hafsa and dearer to the Prophet ﷺ, he said, and she would be forgiven things that Hafsa would not. Umar and a neighbour of his from the Ansar used to take turns. One would work the land while the other spent the day with the Prophet ﷺ and brought back the news. In those days everyone was talking about a Ghassanid army that was said to be shoeing its horses to march on them. One night after Isha, the neighbour hammered on Umar's door. Umar asked whether the Ghassanids had come. The neighbour said no, it was something worse. He said the Prophet ﷺ had divorced his wives. Umar went at first light. He found the mosque full of men sitting in silence, turning pebbles over in their hands. In one telling, he went first to Aisha. He asked whether the daughter of Abu Bakr had troubled the Prophet ﷺ so much that he had left all of them. She told him to mind his own business. Then he went to Hafsa and found her weeping. He reminded her that he had warned her. He told her she knew the Prophet ﷺ did not love her, and that if she were not his daughter, the Prophet ﷺ would have divorced her long ago. Hafsa did not know whether they had been divorced. She only knew that he had gone up to the loft. A servant stood at the foot of the ladder. One version says it was Bilal. Umar asked him to ask permission for him to come in. The servant came back and said he had mentioned Umar, but the Prophet ﷺ had said nothing. Umar went and sat by the minbar. Then he came back and was refused a second time. The third time, Umar called up loudly. He said he thought the Prophet ﷺ believed he had come on Hafsa's behalf. He swore by Allah that if he were told to strike off her head, he would do it. Then he was let in. Inside, he found a room with some barley, a half-tanned water-skin, a chamber pot and a few animal hides. The Prophet ﷺ was lying on a mat of palm fibre, and its weave had left marks on his side. Umar asked whether he had divorced his wives. The Prophet ﷺ said he had not. Umar said "Allahu akbar." He could see the tension, so he told the Prophet ﷺ the whole story about the women of Madinah. He also told him how he had warned Hafsa not to compare herself with Aisha. The Prophet ﷺ smiled, then smiled again, and invited Umar to sit. Umar looked around the room and could see nothing else in it. He asked why the Prophet ﷺ did not pray for his people to be given wealth, as Persia and Rome had been, when those nations did not even worship Allah. Then Umar began to cry. When the Prophet ﷺ asked him why, Umar said it was because the mat had marked the side of Allah's chosen one, while Kisra and Caesar lay in silk. The Prophet ﷺ sat up. He said, "O son of al-Khattab, are you in doubt? Are you not content that Allah has chosen us over them for the Next world and given them this world?" Umar asked him to pray for Allah's forgiveness for him. Another version adds something Umar said. He told the Prophet ﷺ that if he wished to divorce any of his wives, then Allah, Jibril and Mika'il, Abu Bakr, Umar himself and all the believers were with him. Umar used to say that he hoped Allah would confirm what he had said. Allah did, in the fourth verse of Surah al-Tahrim. It was one of three times the Qur'an came down in agreement with Umar. After twenty-nine days the Prophet ﷺ came back down. Aisha reminded him that he had sworn to stay away for a month, and it had only been twenty-nine days. He said, "The month may be 29 days as well." He went to her room first. He told her he was going to put something to her. He asked her not to answer in haste, and to consult her parents before she replied. Then he recited the verses Allah had sent down: "O Prophet ﷺ, say to your wives, if you desire the life of this world and its adornment, come and I will provide for you and release you graciously. But if you desire Allah and His Messenger ﷺ and the Home of the Hereafter, then Allah has prepared for those of you who do good a great reward." Aisha understood why he had told her to consult her parents. He knew they would never tell her to leave him. She asked what there was to consult about. She said she chose Allah and His Messenger ﷺ and the Hereafter. Then she asked him not to tell the other wives what she had chosen. He refused. He said Allah had sent him to convey the message, not to make things hard. He put the same choice to each of his wives in turn, and every one of them chose as Aisha had. The whole city had known about the quarrel, and Allah put it into the Qur'an. The problem it revealed did not lie with the wives. It lay in a standard of living that a messenger who had chosen to be a slave could not share with them. The episode is the source of the law of ila'. It is also the source of the husband's right to give his wife the choice of divorce. And it gives the plainest picture the Companions left of how the Prophet ﷺ chose to live.

Placed here because: ~ Ep. 98: Umar RA "said, 'During this time, we were discussing the Ghassanids and how they might attack us.' (Side note: This is why some scholars say this incident occurred before Tabuk, because after Tabuk, the Ghassanids were not a threat.)" The year itself is disputed.

The Battle of Tabuk has two names, and the sahaba used both. The first is Ghazwa Tabuk, because the Muslim army was saved at Tabuk. On the march the sahaba had run out of water. Mu'adh ibn Jabal RA reports that the Prophet ﷺ told them they would reach the spring of Tabuk the next day, at the hottest part of the day. He warned them not to touch its water until he arrived. Two men touched it before he came, and they were rebuked. The Prophet ﷺ then washed his hands and face in what water remained, and the water gushed out until the whole army drank from it. The army is traditionally reported as 20,000 men, though figures like this in the sources were often inflated. The second name is Jaysh al-Usrah, the Army of Difficulty. Imam al-Bukhari records this name alongside Ghazwa Tabuk in his own chapter heading. The army earned the name because this campaign was harsher than any other. Managing so large an army strained food, water and supplies. The march took place in the hottest part of the year, with temperatures around 110°F. It was also the longest distance any army led by the Prophet ﷺ ever marched, roughly 650 km northwest of Madinah. Finally, it fell during Madinah's August harvest. This was a farming society with no idea of a steady salary, so leaving meant giving up the year's main income. The expedition took place in the month of Rajab, 9 AH, exactly six months after the Siege of Ta'if. It was the Prophet ﷺ's final ghazwa, or military campaign. After it he made his Farewell Hajj and fell ill, and from there the seerah moves toward his death and the khilafa. No swords actually clashed at Tabuk. The difficulty was the march itself. Every able-bodied man was called to take part, even men from as far away as Makkah. The most famous story of the expedition, however, is not about the march. It is about the people who missed it. Ka'b ibn Malik RA was one of the earliest Ansari converts, from Banu Salama, and he had taken part in the Bay'at al-Aqaba. He owned two camels and was healthier and wealthier than he had ever been. Even so, he kept putting off his preparations day after day, until the army had gone too far to catch. Ka'b was not alone. Apart from the hypocrites and those with a genuine excuse, the whole city had marched. When the Prophet ﷺ returned, more than eighty of the men who had stayed behind came to him, swore oaths and offered excuses. He accepted what they said at face value and left their true intentions to Allah. Qur'an 9:43 later mildly rebuked him for this. Only three men refused to lie and told the Prophet ﷺ the plain truth. They were Ka'b, Murara ibn al-Rabi' al-Amri RA and Hilal ibn Umayyah al-Waqifi RA. Murara and Hilal were both veterans of Badr. The Prophet ﷺ forbade the whole community to speak to the three of them. For fifty nights everyone shunned them. In Ka'b's case, this included his own cousin Abu Qatada RA. During this time the King of Ghassan sent Ka'b a letter to lure him away. Ka'b burned it, seeing it as a test. Forty days in, the three men were also ordered to separate from their wives. On the fiftieth morning, Ka'b was praying Fajr on his rooftop. A man of the Aslam tribe climbed Jabal Sal', the mountain you can see as you leave the Masjid al-Nabawi. He called out that Allah had accepted their repentance. His voice reached Ka'b before a horseman who had been sent to bring the news in person. Ka'b gave that horseman the only clothes he owned. He then had to borrow a garment from a neighbour so that he could go to the Prophet ﷺ. The repentance of Ka'b and his two companions was announced across Madinah. It was the occasion for Qur'an 9:117-119, which speaks of Allah turning in mercy to "the three who were left behind." Of all the Muhajirun, only Talha ibn Ubaydillah RA stood up to congratulate Ka'b. From that day on, Ka'b resolved never again to knowingly tell a lie. Before the army set out, the Prophet ﷺ called for donations from the minbar, and the sahaba raced to give. Umar ibn al-Khattab RA thought he could finally outdo Abu Bakr RA. He brought half his wealth and told the Prophet ﷺ that he had left an equal amount for his family. This is narrated in Sunan al-Tirmidhi. Then Abu Bakr RA brought everything he owned. He said he had left his family only "Allah and His Messenger ﷺ." Umar admitted that he could never compete with him again. Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf RA had arrived in Madinah with nothing but the clothes on his back. Now he gave 200 uqiyas of grain. Uthman ibn Affan RA gave on two occasions that are remembered. The first was during the Prophet ﷺ's khutbah. Uthman pledged a hundred camels, then raised it to two hundred, and finally to three hundred with everything they carried. At that, the Prophet ﷺ came down from the minbar and declared, "Uthman has no sin after what he has done today." The second came when one of Uthman's trading caravans returned from Syria around the same time. He sold the whole caravan for roughly a thousand gold coins and poured the coins out before the Prophet ﷺ. The Prophet ﷺ said, "Whatever Uthman does after today, it will not harm him." Years later, when the neo-Kharijites turned against Uthman, Ibn Abbas RA reminded them of this promise in his defence. The hypocrites, by contrast, gave nothing and mocked those who did. A poor Ansari man had earned two handfuls of dates by drawing water all night, and he brought one of them. Two hypocrites jeered at him. They said that Allah had no need of so little, and that the man needed it more than anyone. This prompted Qur'an 9:79. Other hypocrites made excuses to avoid marching at all. Al-Jad ibn Qays asked to be let off, claiming he feared he would lose self-control around Roman women. The Prophet ﷺ simply turned away from him, and Qur'an 9:49 is tied to this. Qur'an 9:81-82 and 9:42 rebuke the wider group of hypocrites for rejoicing at staying behind and for finding the journey too far. On the other side were the Bakka'un, "the Criers." They were roughly seven men, including relatives of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari and Irbad ibn Sariya RA. They wanted to march but had no mount. When the Prophet ﷺ told them so, they wept (Qur'an 9:92). Later, at Tabuk, the Prophet ﷺ told the sahaba that sincere companions like these, back in Madinah, shared fully in the army's reward. Ulba ibn Zayd RA had no wealth to give. Instead, he pledged to defend the Prophet ﷺ with his own honour against the hypocrites' taunts. The Prophet ﷺ accepted this as charity. Wathila ibn al-Asqa' RA also had no money and no mount. Every day he went to the marketplace and offered his future share of the ghanima, the spoils of war, to anyone who would take him along. In the end, an elder of the Ansar agreed to share a camel and meals with him. Later, Wathila tried to hand over the very camels he had won as booty in payment, but the elder refused to accept them. Two other companions also put off their preparations, as Ka'b ibn Malik RA had, and nearly missed the expedition. But they recovered themselves at the last moment. Abu Khaythama al-Ansari RA delayed just as Ka'b did. Then he came home and found that his wife had prepared a shaded, watered rug and food for him. He rebuked himself for enjoying comfort while the Prophet ﷺ endured the heat, and he rushed out alone to catch up. The Prophet ﷺ spotted a lone rider in the distance and said, "Let it be Abu Khaythama." When he arrived, the Prophet ﷺ asked him why he had been delayed. Once he heard the story, he gently rebuked him, saying, "Woe to you, Abu Khaythama!" Abu Dharr al-Ghifari RA fell behind because his camel was unfit to travel. So he loaded its burden onto his own back and walked the whole distance alone. The Prophet ﷺ saw a solitary figure approaching on foot and said, "Let it be Abu Dharr!" Then he remarked, "May Allah have mercy upon Abu Dharr. He is walking by himself, he will die by himself, and he will be resurrected by himself." Years later, this was fulfilled almost exactly when Abu Dharr died alone in the desert. Ibn Sa'd places his death in the khilafa of Ali ibn Abi Talib RA. His exile and death have their own separate event. The hypocrites also organised opposition during this same period. This included building Masjid al-Dirar as a rival headquarters. That story is treated as its own event (see Masjid al-Dirar), because it unfolded on a separate track at the same time as the march. Before leaving Madinah, the Prophet ﷺ put Muhammad ibn Maslamah RA in charge of the city's affairs. He always appointed someone to run the city whenever he left it. He told Ali ibn Abi Talib RA to stay behind and take charge of his household, the Mother of the Believers and the Ahl al-Bayt, since the journey would take more than a month. The munafiqun, the hypocrites, mocked Ali RA for staying behind and called him unfit to fight. Ali RA was well known for his bravery, but the taunt stung him. He armed himself and caught up with the army to protest. The Prophet ﷺ reassured him with what is known as the hadith of manzila. He said, "Are you not content to be with me like Harun was with Musa, except that there is no prophet after me?" Ali RA was left in charge only of the Prophet ﷺ's family, not of Madinah itself. Madinah was Muhammad ibn Maslamah RA's responsibility. Sunni scholars point to this detail against the Shia reading of the hadith, which takes it as evidence of a designated political succession. The army left by way of Thaniyat al-Wada'. This is the hill north of the Haram where Madinan families traditionally gathered to say farewell to travellers. There the Prophet ﷺ paused to organise the army into battalions by tribe, each with its own leader and flag. It was the largest army ever assembled under him. He had no military training, yet this organisation showed his skill. On the march, the sahaba began falling asleep on their mounts after Fajr, and their camels scattered. Mu'adh ibn Jabal RA found himself riding alone, close to the Prophet ﷺ. He took the chance to ask him privately what deed would gain him Jannah. This conversation is preserved at length in Musnad Imam Ahmad (see the Sayings & Actions below). The army camped at Tabuk for twenty days, and the Prophet ﷺ prayed qasr, the shortened prayer of a traveller, throughout. Later fiqh discussions cite this when asking how long a traveller (musafir) praying qasr may stay in one place. The morning after they arrived, he ﷺ also delivered a khutbah, which Uqba ibn Amir al-Juhani RA preserved (see the separate Khutbah at Tabuk event). During the twenty days at Tabuk, the Prophet ﷺ also sent Khalid ibn al-Walid RA to Dawmat al-Jandal. There Khalid captured Ukaydir ibn Abd al-Malik, the Kindah chieftain. Through treaties, he sealed the whole northern frontier against Rome (see the separate Dawmat al-Jandal expedition). Over the twenty days at Tabuk, the Prophet ﷺ gave many short khutbahs and khatirahs, or brief talks. Several of them are preserved in the books of hadith and seerah. In one, he ﷺ said that Allah had given him five things granted to no prophet before him. First, he ﷺ was sent to all of mankind, not to one people alone. Second, Allah made him victorious through the awe his enemies felt a month's journey away. Third, ghanima was made lawful for him ﷺ, though it had not been for earlier nations. Fourth, the whole earth was made a place of purification and prayer, so his ﷺ ummah could pray anywhere, not only in a house of worship. Fifth, he ﷺ had saved his own personal request to Allah for the Day of Judgment, and he promised it to whoever testifies la ilaha illallah. This is understood as the Great Intercession. In another talk, narrated by Awf ibn Malik RA, he ﷺ foretold six signs before the Day of Judgment. The last of them are a truce and then a betrayal by the Bani al-Asfar, the Romans. The stay also saw repeated miracles in which food and water increased when supplies ran low. These were reported four or five times on this expedition alone. There was also a karamah, in which a companion who was lost in the dark found his way back to camp by the light of his own glowing fingers. One Fajr, the Prophet ﷺ was delayed while performing wudu, so Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf RA led the salah. Al-Mughira ibn Shu'ba RA helped the Prophet ﷺ with his wudu and narrated what happened. His account includes the Prophet ﷺ's instruction to leave his khuff, his leather socks, on rather than take them off for washing. The Prophet ﷺ then prayed the rak'ah he had missed behind Abd al-Rahman. It was the only time in his life ﷺ that he prayed a full rak'ah led by a companion. During these days the companion Abdullah Dhu al-Bijadayn RA also died, and the Prophet ﷺ buried him with his own hands (see the separate event on his death and burial). The hadith literature also dates several fiqh rulings to Tabuk. One is that washing each limb once in wudu is enough when water is scarce. Another is that the Prophet ﷺ prayed with a sutrah roughly the size of a camel's saddle. A third is that he ﷺ combined salahs only while actually on the move, and not once he had settled, even briefly. He had done the same at the Conquest of Makkah the year before. At Tabuk he still prayed qasr for the whole twenty days, but he did not combine. The last is that the skin of a dead animal becomes pure, and so usable, once it is tanned. On the return march, the army passed through al-Hijr. These are the rock-carved dwellings of the ancient people of Thamud and of Prophet Saleh AS (see the separate event on passing by al-Hijr). At one point the animals grew too weak to carry the army. The Prophet ﷺ made a du'a over them, and they were strengthened. Decades later, at the Muslim conquest of Cyprus in 28 AH, the companion Fudala RA recognised that this du'a had been fulfilled. When water ran short, the Prophet ﷺ prayed for rain. After a night of rain, he gave a khutbah. In it he contrasted the believers, who credited the rain to Allah, with the hypocrites, who credited it to a star. Then the Prophet ﷺ's own camel went missing. A hypocrite mocked him ﷺ, saying that he claimed revelation from heaven yet did not know where his own camel was. The Prophet ﷺ then announced, through revelation, exactly where the camel was, and it was found there. A companion who learned who had made the mocking remark expelled the man from his unit. Elsewhere on the march, some hypocrites mocked the Prophet ﷺ's prophecies that Rome and Persia would be conquered. They were exposed when Qur'an 9:64-66 was revealed. The verses quoted the mocker's excuse before he could even finish giving it (see the separate event on the munafiqun's mockery). Separately, a group of some fourteen or fifteen hypocrites made a sudden, unplanned attempt to throw the Prophet ﷺ off a cliff at night. His own evasive action foiled them. Ammar ibn Yasir RA and Hudhayfah ibn al-Yaman RA were watching, but did not realise what was happening (see the separate event on the assassination attempt). The army finally returned to Madinah after some fifty to sixty days away. The city's women and children came out to greet it at Thaniyat al-Wada'. Among them was the companion al-Sa'ib RA, who was then a child. This welcome is popularly linked to the Hijrah, but Sh. Yasir Qadhi and others hold that it belongs here instead (see the separate event on the return to Madinah). Also on the return march, one of the munafiqs was reported to have said that if Islam were true, it would mean that they themselves were more misguided than donkeys. He then swore under oath that he had never said it. Allah exposed the lie in Surat al-Tawba (Qur'an 9:74). Other hypocrites, who had stayed behind, told one another, "Do not march forth in the heat." The same surah replied that the Fire of Hell is far hotter (Qur'an 9:81-82). There is also a popular story that is widely repeated as the reason Qur'an 9:75-77 was revealed. In it, a named sahabi begs the Prophet ﷺ for wealth and promises to become generous. Once Allah grants him riches, he turns stingy. Later he repents, but his charity is refused. Sh. Yasir Qadhi rejects this story as unreliable. Its chain is weak, and it also has the Prophet ﷺ refusing the charity of a man who had repented. That contradicts the Qur'an's own teaching that Allah accepts repentance. The verses instead describe the hypocrites in general. Some of them vowed to give charity if they were made wealthy, then grew stingy once Allah provided for them.

Placed here because: Ep. 87: "When did this take place? The month of Rajab in the 9th year of the Hijrah. Exactly 6 months after the Siege of Ta'if."

On the morning the army arrived at Tabuk, after the dawn prayer (Salat al-Fajr), the Prophet ﷺ stood up and gave a khutbah (sermon). The companion Uqba ibn Amir al-Juhani RA narrated it. The Prophet ﷺ first praised Allah and then said, "O people, amma ba'd." The Arabic phrase amma ba'd means "to proceed", and it marks the move from praise to the sermon itself. The khutbah was a series of short, deep sayings. They spoke of the Book of Allah, the path of Ibrahim AS, the Sunnah, sincerity in deeds, the guidance of the prophets and the death of a martyr. Others praised giving in charity and taqwa (mindfulness of Allah). Others warned against a lying tongue, riba (interest), and blindness of the heart. He ended by asking Allah three times to forgive him and his ummah (community). Then he closed with the customary words, "Astaghfirullaha li wa lakum", meaning that he asked Allah's forgiveness for himself and for them.

Placed here because: Ep. 92: "For 20 days when he was there, he gave lots of small khutbahs."

During the twenty days the army camped at Tabuk, a companion named Abdullah Dhu al-Bijadayn RA died. His nickname means "the one with the two coarse garments." When he became Muslim, his tribe threw him out with only one garment. On reaching Madinah he was so embarrassed that he tore it in two, so that it would look as if he had two garments. Ibn Mas'ud RA reports that he woke one night and saw a fire in the distance. Around it were the Prophet ﷺ, Abu Bakr RA and Umar RA. He went over and found that Abdullah had died, and that the three of them were preparing to bury him. The Prophet ﷺ himself went down into the grave and asked Abu Bakr and Umar to hand him the body. As he filled the grave, he said, "O Allah, I am pleased with this servant of Yours, so You as well be pleased with him." Ibn Mas'ud RA said afterwards how much he wished he had been the one lying in that grave.

Placed here because: ~ During the encampment; the day is not given.

While the Prophet ﷺ was camped at Tabuk, he sent Khalid ibn al-Walid RA with a few hundred sahaba (companions) on a small expedition to Dawmat al-Jandal. This was the home of the Christian Arab tribe of Kindah, which had close ties with the Roman emperor. Their chieftain, Ukaydir ibn Abd al-Malik, was called a king (malik). The Prophet ﷺ told Khalid that he would find Ukaydir away from his entourage, in the middle of some cows. That is exactly what happened. One night Ukaydir's herd of cows kept barging against the door of his palace. His wife grew fed up and told him to deal with it, so he went out himself with a few servants. Khalid found him there in the open and captured him. Ukaydir was brought before the Prophet ﷺ. He did not embrace Islam at that time. He did agree to break off his ties with the Romans, to pay the jizya (a tax paid by non-Muslims under Muslim protection), and not to attack the Muslims. To show his loyalty, he later sent gifts to the Muslim camp. Among them was a hulla, a fine two-piece garment with gold thread, more beautiful than anything the companions had seen. The Prophet ﷺ wore it, and the companions gathered around it in awe.

Placed here because: Sent from Tabuk during the encampment; Rajab 9 AH.

On the march back from Tabuk, the army passed by al-Hijr. This was the home of the ancient people of Thamud, to whom Allah had sent the prophet Saleh AS. Their houses were carved straight into the mountain, and they still stand today, along with the well that their famous she-camel drank from. Some of the sahaba began rushing in to look inside the houses. The Prophet ﷺ had the call "al-salatu jami'ah" ("the prayer is gathering") made to bring the army back together. He asked them, "Why would you want to enter in upon a people whom Allah's wrath has come down upon?" They said they were amazed by the place. He replied, "Should I not tell you something more amazing than that? A man from amongst you who is informing you about what happened, and what will happen." He also said, "Do not enter in upon a people who have wronged themselves and were punished, unless you are crying as you go in, lest you will be punished how they were punished." Then he covered his face with his turban, lowered his head and hurried through the valley without stopping. Some of the army had drawn water from the wells of Thamud, and some had mixed it into dough for bread. When the Prophet ﷺ heard of this, he told them to give the water and the bread to the animals and not to eat it. He also said, "Do not ask Allah for miracles, because the people of Saleh asked, but they hamstrung it." Saleh AS's people had asked for a miracle, a she-camel brought out of solid rock. Then they hamstrung her, ignoring the warning never to harm her, and a swift punishment destroyed them. After leaving the valley, the army camped for the night. The Prophet ﷺ told them not to leave their tents at night unless someone was with them. Two men disobeyed. It is said that one of them lost his mind and was cured when the Prophet ﷺ prayed for him. The wind is said to have carried the other to a distant mountain, and he had to find his own way back to Madinah.

Placed here because: ~ The sources place it on the return march; al-Hijr lies on the road both ways, so the leg is not certain.

While traveling at night on the return from Tabuk, the Prophet ﷺ separated from the rest of the army and rode up onto the top of a cliff, with only his camel and two or three companions (among them Ammar ibn Yasir RA and Hudhayfah ibn al-Yaman RA) nearby. In the middle of the night, around fourteen or fifteen men with their faces covered charged toward the Prophet ﷺ's camel. He took evasive action and went quickly down into the valley, and the men fled. He then told Ammar RA that they were hypocrites who had wanted to throw him off the edge of the cliff, but that Allah had protected him. Most of the sahaba never heard of the incident at the time, and the Prophet ﷺ simply moved on.

Placed here because: On the return march (Ep. 92, "what happened on the way back").

On the march back from Tabuk, a group of hypocrites began laughing and joking far beyond what was decent. One of them mocked the Prophet ﷺ for promising that the Muslims would conquer Rome and Persia. Nobody could see it yet, but both prophecies came true within a few years of his death ﷺ. Another hypocrite sneered at the Muslims around them, saying they recited the Qur'an but were cowards who only fattened their bellies. One of the companions overheard them. He told the speaker that he was lying and was an enemy of Allah, and said he would report him to the Prophet ﷺ. He galloped to the front of the army, but when he arrived the Prophet ﷺ was already receiving revelation. The hypocrite, afraid that he had already been reported, rushed up behind. He jumped off his camel to look humble and sorry, and blurted out his excuse that they had only been talking idly and joking. At that very moment the Prophet ﷺ began reciting the newly revealed verses, and the Qur'an quoted the man's excuse word for word as he spoke it. Without even looking at him, the Prophet ﷺ kept reciting that he had committed kufr (disbelief) after his Iman (faith). The companion later described the man running beside the Prophet ﷺ's camel, holding on to the stirrup and being dragged along.

Placed here because: ~ On the return march; its order against the attempt at the pass is not given.

As the Prophet ﷺ prepared for the expedition to Tabuk, he asked the Muslims to give money for the army, known as the Jaysh al-Usrah, the Army of Hardship. The hypocrites of Madinah gave nothing and made excuses to stay behind. The Prophet ﷺ accepted their excuses, and Allah gently rebuked him for it in verse 9:43 of the Qur'an. At this same time, the hypocrites collected money and built a masjid of their own, within walking distance of Masjid Quba. The books of tafsir, such as those of Ibn Kathir and al-Tabari, give the real story behind it. The man behind the plan was Abu Amir al-Rahib, "the Monk", a leading elder of the Aws who had become a Christian before Islam. He rejected Islam, and after Badr he fled to Makkah. Before Uhud he promised the Quraysh that the Aws would listen to him, but none of them did. He finally made his way to the circle of the Roman emperor. From there Abu Amir wrote to his friend Abdullah ibn Ubayy ibn Salul, the leader of the hypocrites. He asked him to set up a base in Madinah, so that the Romans could later be brought in to take the city. Ibn Ubayy built this masjid to be that headquarters. In public, the hypocrites said the masjid was for their weak people, so they would have somewhere close to pray when it rained, even though Masjid Quba was nearby. As an insult, Ibn Ubayy invited the Prophet ﷺ to come and pray two rak'at in it. The Prophet ﷺ was uneasy that a masjid was being built when the Muslims badly needed funds. He asked them why they had built it, and then said, "We are busy now preparing for travel. Insha'Allah, when I come back." He made no promise. The masjid was used for about a month, and the Prophet ﷺ never prayed in it. On the way back from Tabuk, Allah revealed verses 9:107 to 109. They exposed it as a masjid built to cause harm, to spread disbelief, to divide the believers, and to serve as a lookout for a man who had already fought against Allah and His Messenger ﷺ, meaning Abu Amir. The verses forbade the Prophet ﷺ ever to stand in it. He sent Ammar ibn Yasir and other companions to tear it down and burn it to the ground. Abu Amir never came back. The Prophet ﷺ had prayed against him, "May you die a stranger," and he died in Rome with no family or friends around him. Verse 9:108 praises "the masjid that was built upon taqwa from the very first day." Scholars have differed on which masjid this means. Some say Masjid Quba, and an authentic hadith has the Prophet ﷺ swear that it was his own masjid in Madinah. Sheikh Yasir Qadhi holds that the correct view takes in both. The verse describes every masjid built on sincere taqwa, or God-consciousness.

Placed here because: Built before the army left; pulled down as it returned.

After about fifty to sixty days away, and perhaps as long as three months, the Prophet ﷺ returned to Madinah from Tabuk. A companion named al-Sa'ib RA was a child at the time. He later recalled, in a report in Sahih al-Bukhari, that he was among the children who ran out to Thaniyat al-Wada' to welcome the Prophet ﷺ home. The name means "the hill of farewell." The hill lay to the north of Madinah, and families walked travelers there to say goodbye. Other reports add that the women and children came out singing a famous poem, Tala'a al-badru alayna ("The full moon has risen over us, from Thaniyat al-Wada'"). Al-Bayhaqi records it in his Dala'il al-Nubuwwah. He places it under this return from Tabuk and also under the Hijrah, noting that scholars usually mention it at the Hijrah. A report from Ibn Aisha that mentions the poem has a broken chain. Ibn al-Qayyim held that the poem belongs to this return, because Thaniyat al-Wada' lies on the road to Syria. On arriving, the Prophet ﷺ went to his masjid and prayed two rak'at (units of prayer). Almost immediately he began receiving the people who had stayed behind from the expedition. Among them was Ka'b ibn Malik RA.

Placed here because: The last stage of the return.

When the siege of Ta'if was lifted, the Prophet ﷺ told his Companions to leave the Thaqif alone. He said, "Let them be, they will come to us." Less than a year later, they came. By then they were the last pagan tribe in the Hejaz. What brought them was fear as much as faith. Urwah ibn Mas'ud had been the greatest of their chiefs. The Qur'an pairs him with al-Walid ibn al-Mughira as one of the two great men of the two cities. Urwah had embraced Islam on the road home from the siege, and gone back to call his people to it. But they shot him from the dark as he gave the adhan from his roof. His blood was on their hands, and they knew what that meant. Ibn Ishaq records the long argument that followed. No chief would go to Madinah alone to answer for the killing. In the end they agreed that all six or seven of them would go together, with their followers. They set out in Ramadan of the ninth year. Their kinsman al-Mughira ibn Shu'ba met them outside the city. He ran towards the mosque to tell the Prophet ﷺ. On the way, Abu Bakr stopped him. He begged Mughira, by Allah, to let him be the one to carry the good news. Every Companion wanted to be the man who made the Prophet ﷺ happy. Mughira went back to the delegation. He taught them how to greet the Prophet ﷺ and what to call him. They ignored all of it. They greeted him in the way of the days of ignorance before Islam, and called him by his name. There was no faith in them yet. The Prophet ﷺ overlooked every discourtesy. He had a tent put up for them inside the mosque, and treated them as honoured guests. By Arab custom, the two leaders would not meet until talks had been held through a go-between. Theirs was Khalid ibn Sa'id ibn al-As, a distant cousin of the Prophet ﷺ. The delegates were so afraid because of what they had done that they would not touch the food until Khalid had eaten first. Through him the bargaining went on for ten days. They asked whether they could have a treaty at all. They were told they could, if they became Muslims. They had heard that riba, the taking of interest, was forbidden, and all their wealth came from riba. The answer was that they would keep their principal. They asked whether they could keep zina, sex outside marriage, since they were merchants and often away from home. They were told that Allah had forbidden it. They asked whether they could at least keep wine. Ta'if was a city of vineyards and cold nights. Again they were told that Allah had forbidden it. The delegates talked it over among themselves. None of them could go home and tell Ta'if that riba, zina and wine were all gone. But if they went home without an agreement and another army came, they would be finished within a month. Then one of them pointed out that the people around this man had given up all three. If they could do it, he said, so could the Thaqif. Next came the question of al-Lat, their idol. It was the second greatest idol in Arabia after Hubal, and it was to be destroyed. They asked for it to be left for three years. Then they asked for two years, then one, and then fewer and fewer months. Every time the answer was no. Then they said they could not be the ones to destroy it. The Prophet ﷺ said, "You don't have to. We will take charge of that." Then they turned to the prayer. They asked to be excused from bowing, because of the cold. The Prophet ﷺ said, "There is no good in any religion that has no salah in it." They asked to be excused from wudu, because Ta'if gets very cold, and again the answer was no. Finally they asked to be excused from zakat and jihad. This time the Prophet ﷺ said, "Okay, you are forgiven from zakat and jihad." But a few days later, when they were leaving, he said, "They shall give zakat and they shall go for jihad." In time they did both. Scholars differ on what this means. Some say the Prophet ﷺ knew that faith would enter their hearts and lead them to both, so this was special to him. Others take it as a precedent for a Muslim leader to accept imperfect conditions from new Muslims for a time. Around the tenth day they became Muslims. They fasted the last five days of Ramadan with him. They were very anxious to get it right. When Bilal brought them their suhur, they said the sun had already risen. He told them the Prophet ﷺ was still eating. When he brought their iftar, they said the sun had not yet set. He told them he had come only after the Prophet ﷺ had broken his own fast. The youngest of them was Uthman ibn Abi al-As. He had believed before the rest of them. He spent the fortnight away from the elders' tent, learning the Qur'an from the Prophet ﷺ and the religion from Abu Bakr. When they left, Abu Bakr proposed him as their leader, and the Prophet ﷺ appointed him. They went home and told Ta'if that it must accept Islam. Mughira and Abu Sufyan were sent to break al-Lat. At the first blow, Mughira pretended to drop dead, to show the people how foolish they were. A mosque was built where the idol had stood. Wahshi, the man who had killed Hamzah, had fled to Ta'if before the conquest of Makkah. He became a Muslim at about the same time.

Placed here because: Ramadan 9 AH, two months after the army came home.

During their negotiations with the Prophet ﷺ, the Thaqif accepted that their idol al-Lat would be destroyed, but asked not to be the ones to do it. Al-Lat was the second most prestigious idol of the pagan Arabs after Hubal. The Prophet ﷺ sent al-Mughira ibn Shu'ba RA, who was their own kinsman, together with Abu Sufyan ibn Harb RA, to destroy it. The whole tribe gathered anxiously, with the women crying and the elders wailing. Mughira first played a prank on them. He struck the idol, cried out, and fell on his face as if al-Lat had struck him down. The crowd rejoiced, thinking their idol had defended itself. Then Mughira jumped up and mocked them for believing it. The idol's caretaker warned that the earth would swallow anyone who reached its base. Mughira carried on and demolished al-Lat completely, down to the ground. The Prophet ﷺ then sent word to Uthman ibn Abi al-As RA to build a mosque where the idol had stood. The treasures kept in its sanctuary were taken to the Bayt al-Mal, the public treasury, and the Prophet ﷺ distributed them to the poor and needy.

Placed here because: Shortly after the Thaqif delegation.

Abdullah ibn Ubayy ibn Salul was the leader of the munafiqun (hypocrites) of Madinah. He was the last surviving senior leader of Yathrib from before Islam. The other chiefs of the Aws and Khazraj had either died in the Wars of Bu'ath or left the city within a year or two of the Prophet ﷺ arriving. Ibn Ubayy accepted Islam only hesitantly after Badr, under social pressure. He soon showed where his loyalty really lay. At Uhud he turned back with a third of the army. At the Battle of the Trench he went around trying to terrify the Muslims. After the expedition against the Banu al-Mustaliq, he said that the honourable would drive the lowly out of Madinah, meaning the Muhajirun, the emigrants from Makkah. Surah al-Munafiqun was revealed about this. He also started the Slander of Aisha RA. More than once, Umar ibn al-Khattab RA asked the Prophet ﷺ for permission to execute him. The Prophet ﷺ always refused. He did not want people to say that Muhammad ﷺ killed his own followers. Around a month after the return from Tabuk, Ibn Ubayy fell fatally ill. He asked the Prophet ﷺ to visit him on his deathbed, and even asked him ﷺ to seek forgiveness for him. Umar RA asked why the Prophet ﷺ would visit such an enemy of Allah. The Prophet ﷺ replied that he hoped Allah would use the visit to bring other people to Islam. Soon afterwards, Ibn Ubayy died. There are two reports about who asked the Prophet ﷺ for a shirt to use as a shroud. One says Ibn Ubayy asked for it himself before he died. The more authentic report says his son, Abdullah ibn Abdullah ibn Ubayy RA, a sincere believer, asked for it after his death. Both may be true. The Prophet ﷺ did give his shirt, and the son also asked him ﷺ to lead the funeral prayer. The body was brought to the masjid. As the Prophet ﷺ stood up to pray, Umar RA held on to his lower garment. He listed Ibn Ubayy's many wrongs and asked whether Allah had not already forbidden praying for the hypocrites. The Prophet ﷺ replied that Allah had given him a choice rather than a prohibition. He was referring to the verse which says that even if he asked forgiveness for them seventy times, Allah would not forgive them [Quran, 9:80]. He said that if he knew asking seventy-one times would win forgiveness, he would ask seventy-one times. The Prophet ﷺ then prayed over him and went with the body to the grave. According to Tarikh al-Tabari, he ﷺ went down into the grave himself and helped to bury him.

Placed here because: ~ Late 9 AH; no month is given.

Within a few hours of Abu Bakr RA leaving Madinah to lead the Muslims on Hajj, Allah revealed the opening two and a half pages of Surat al-Tawba. These verses were addressed to the pagans of Arabia. Someone suggested to the Prophet ﷺ that he simply send the verses on to Abu Bakr. The Prophet ﷺ replied that no one would convey these verses on his behalf except someone from his own household. So he chose Ali ibn Abi Talib RA, who had not been part of the original group. Ali RA was to ride out, catch up with Abu Bakr RA, and announce the verses to the people during the Hajj. Surat al-Tawba was one of the very last surahs to be revealed, and it opens without the Basmala ("In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful"). Its first verse declares a bara'ah, a complete disassociation of Allah and His Messenger ﷺ from the pagans with whom the Muslims had made treaties. With this, those treaties were cancelled. Verse 2 gives the pagans four months in which they may travel freely and settle their affairs. Verse 3 names the Day of the Greater Hajj (10 Dhul Hijjah) as the day this disassociation would be announced publicly. It also tells the pagans that repenting is the better path. Verse 4 makes an exception. If a pagan group had a treaty with a fixed end date and had never broken faith with the Muslims, their treaty was to be honoured until it ran out. Verse 5 is often called the "Verse of the Sword." It says that once the sacred months have passed, the pagans are to be fought, captured and besieged wherever they are found. But if they repent, establish prayer and give zakat, they are to be let go. Verse 6 follows straight after. It says that any pagan who asks for protection must be given it, allowed to hear the Qur'an, and then escorted safely to a place where he is secure.

Placed here because: Dhul Qa'dah 9 AH, within hours of Abu Bakr RA's departure for Hajj.

By the end of the 9th year of the Hijrah, Thaqif had accepted Islam, the expedition to Tabuk was over, and the matter of Najran had been settled. The Prophet ﷺ then sent Abu Bakr al-Siddiq RA from Madinah to Makkah at the head of an official delegation of 300 Muslims. Their task was to prepare the way for the Prophet ﷺ's own Hajj the following year, Hajjat al-Wada', the only Hajj he ever performed. The Prophet ﷺ did not go himself. He explained to Abu Bakr RA that the mushrikun (idol-worshippers) still performed tawaf around the Ka'bah naked, and that he did not wish to perform Hajj until that was ended. This was the only year in which pagans and an official Muslim delegation performed Hajj and tawaf side by side. Since the Prophet ﷺ had not yet shown the correct rites of Hajj, Abu Bakr RA performed them in the old way. Soon after the delegation left, the opening verses of Surat al-Tawba were revealed. Ali ibn Abi Talib RA caught up with the delegation at Dhu al-Hulayfah, riding the Prophet ﷺ's own camel. Abu Bakr RA asked him whether he had been sent to take command over him. Ali RA replied that Abu Bakr RA was still the amir (leader), and that he had come only to recite Surat al-Tawba. At Mina, Ali RA and Abu Hurairah RA recited the opening of Surat al-Tawba to the pagans and Muslims gathered there. They then made four announcements. No one but a believer would enter Jannah. No one would ever again perform tawaf naked. After this year, no mushrik would perform Hajj again. And any existing treaty with the pagans would last four more months and then end, unless it already had its own fixed term.

Placed here because: Dhul Hijjah 9 AH.