The Year of Sadness (2/2)

The place where the Prophet (Peace be upon him) had found peace was not as empty as it had seemed. Every man of Quraysh hoped for riches enough to buy a garden and a house on the green hill of Ta'if to which he might escape when the heat of Mecca was at its fiercest, and this orchard was not owned by a man of Thaqif but was part of a property that belonged to the Shamsite leaders 'Utbah and Shaybah, who were even now seated in a corner of their garden adjoining the vineyard. They had seen what had happened, nor were they without  feelings of indignation  at the way in which the rabble of Thaqif had  ventured   to  treat   a  man  of  Quraysh, who was, moreover,  like themselves, of the sons of 'Abdu  Manaf,  As to the differences which had come between  them, were not these now almost at an end? They had last seen Muhammad (Peace be upon him) at the deathbed of Abu Talib; and now he was without a protector, and clearly in desperate straits. Feeling they could afford to be generous, they called a young Christian slave of theirs named 'Addas, and said to him: "Take a cluster of these grapes and put them on this platter. Then give it to that man, and bid him eat thereof." 'Addas did as they had ordered and when the Prophet (Peace be upon him) put his hand to the grapes he said: "In the name of God." 'Addas looked keenly into his face; then he said: "Those words are not what the people of this country say." "From what country art thou?" said the Prophet (Peace be upon him).  "And what is thy religion?"   "I am a Christian,"   he said, "of the people of Nineveh."  "From the city of the righteous man Jonah, the son of Matta,” said the Prophet (Peace be upon him).  "How knowest thou aught of Jonah the son of Matta?"  said 'Addas,  "He is my brother," was the answer.  "He was a Prophet, and I am a Prophet."  Then 'Addas bent over him and kissed his head and his hands and his feet.

When they saw this, the two brothers exclaimed, each to the other, as if with one voice: "So much for thy slave! Already hath he been corrupted!" And when ‘Addas came back to them, leaving the Prophet (Peace be upon him) to eat in peace, they said: "Out upon thee, 'Addas! What made thee kiss that man's head and his hands and his feet?" He answered:  "Master, there is nothing on earth better than this man. He hath told me of things that only a Prophet could know."  "Out upon thee, 'Addas!"  they said. "Let him not seduce thee from thy religion, for thy religion is better than his."

The Prophet (Peace be upon him) left Ta’if and started on his way towards Mecca when he saw that no good was to be gained at this juncture from the tribe of Thaqif. Late  that  night  he  reached  the  valley  of  Nakhlah,  the  half-way  halt between the two townships which had rejected him. At the moment  of his sharpest consciousness of this rejection, his prophethood had been acknowledged by  a man from  far-off  Nineveh;  and  now,  while  he  was standing  in prayer  at Nakhlah,   a company  of the jinn passed by -  seven jinn from  Nasibin  -  and they stopped  spellbound  by the words  he was reciting from the Qur’an. The Prophet (Peace be upon him) knew that he had not been sent to the world of men only. The Revelation had recently affirmed: “We sent thee not save as a mercy for the worlds;”[1] and one of the earlier Surahs, is addressed to the jinn as well as to men, warning them both of Hell as a punishment for evil and promising Paradise to both as a reward for piety. There now came the Revelation: “Say: it hath been revealed unto me that a company of the  jinn  gave  ear,  and  then  said:  Verily  we  have  heard  a  wondrous recitation which guideth unto rightness, and we believe in it.”[2] And another Revelation is told how the jinn thereupon returned to their community and urged them to respond to God's summoner, as they called the Prophet.

The Prophet (Peace be upon him) was unwilling to return to the same conditions which only two days previously had impelled him to leave his home. But if he had a protector,   he could continue to fulfil his mission. The Bani Hashim had failed him, so his thoughts turned to his mother's clan. The situation there was abnormal, for by far the most outstanding and influential man of Zuhrah was Akhnas ibn Shariq, who was not strictly speaking a member of the clan, nor even of Quraysh.  He was in fact of Thaqif, but he had long been a confederate of Zuhrah, and they had come to consider him as their chief. The Prophet (Peace be upon him) had already decided to ask for his help, when he was overtaken by a horseman also on his way to Mecca but travelling faster than himself, so he asked him to do him the favour of going, on his arrival, to Akhnas and of saying to him: "Muhammad (Peace be upon him) saith: Wilt thou give me thy protection, that I may deliver the message of my Lord?" The horseman was well  disposed,  and  even  undertook   to  return  with  the  answer,  which proved to be negative, for Akhnas simply remarked that a confederate had no power to speak in the name of the clan with which he was federated and to grant  a protection  which would  be binding  upon them. The Prophet (Peace be upon him), who was by this time not far from Mecca, now sent the same request to Suhayl.  His reply was equally disappointing, though the reason he advanced for his refusal had nothing to do with his opposition to Islam. It was once more a question of tribal principle.  In the Hollow  of Mecca his clan was distinct from all the rest as being descended from' Amir the son of Lu'ayy,[3]  whereas the others were all descended from 'Amir's brother Ka'b. Suhayl simply replied that the sons of' Amir do not give protection against the sons of Ka'b. The Prophet now turned aside from the way that led to the city, and took refuge in the cave of Mount Hira' where he had received the first Revelation. From there he sent his petition to a leader more closely related to himself, Mut'im, the chief of Nawfal, one of the five who had organised the annulment of the ban, and Mut'im immediately agreed. "Let him enter the city," he sent back word; and the next morning, fully armed, together with his sons and his nephews, he escorted the Prophet (Peace be upon him) to the Ka'bah.   Abu  Jahl  asked  them  if  they  had  become  followers  of  Muhammad. "We are giving him protection," they replied; and the Makhzumite could only say: "Whom ye protect, to him we give protection."