Delegations and the Farewell Ḥajj

After the conquest, deputations arrived continually — Thaqīf, Banū Tamīm, ʿAbd al-Qays, Najrān and many others — to give allegiance and learn the dīn. Teachers and collectors of zakāh were sent out with them. Abū Bakr رضي الله عنه led the Ḥajj of the ninth year, and Sūrat at-Tawbah's opening was proclaimed at Minā, ending the arrangements of shirk at the Sacred House.

• 110:1–3 — Victory, crowds entering, and the command to glorify and seek forgiveness.

• An-Naṣr's 'people entering the religion of Allah in crowds' is describing this exact period.
• Every delegation left with a teacher — expansion and instruction moved together.

Ibn Hishām, al-Sīrah; Ibn Kathīr, al-Bidāyah wa-n-Nihāyah

Sixty men of Najrān came, prayed their own prayer in the mosque with his permission, and argued about ʿĪsā عليه السلام. When the argument was exhausted, the Qur'an offered mubāhalah — both sides invoking Allah's curse on the liars. They declined, made a treaty with protection for their churches and lives against a yearly payment, and went home. Thaqīf of Ṭāʾif, who had stoned him years earlier, came to accept Islam and asked to keep their idol al-Lāt a while and to be excused the prayer; he refused both, and said there is no good in a religion without prayer.

• 3:61 — The verse of mubāhalah.

• Debate was allowed to run its full length before any line was drawn.
• Conditions on the core of the religion — the prayer, the idols — were never negotiable, even for a whole city.

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 4380; Ibn Hishām; ar-Raḥīq al-Makhtūm, al-Mubārakpūrī

Ibrāhīm, his son by Māriyah رضي الله عنها, died in infancy in 10 AH. He ﷺ wept and said: 'The eye weeps and the heart grieves, and we do not say except what pleases our Lord. We are grieved by your parting, Ibrāhīm.' The sun eclipsed that day and people said it was for the boy's death. He led the eclipse prayer and told them plainly: the sun and moon are two signs of Allah, eclipsed for no one's death or life — when you see it, pray and call upon Allah.

• Grief and submission are not opposites; he wept and did not complain.
• He corrected a superstition that flattered him, on the day he had most reason to let it stand.

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 1043, 1303; Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2315; ar-Raḥīq al-Makhtūm, al-Mubārakpūrī

In the tenth year he ﷺ performed the only Ḥajj of his prophethood. At ʿArafah he declared blood and property inviolable, abolished the blood feuds and ribā of jāhiliyyah beginning with those of his own family, charged the people concerning women, and said, 'I have left among you that which, if you hold to it, you will never go astray: the Book of Allah.' After each section he asked, 'Have I conveyed?' and they said yes, and he raised his finger to the sky: 'O Allah, bear witness.' There 'Today I have perfected for you your religion' was revealed.

• 5:3 — 'Today I have perfected for you your religion and completed My favour upon you.'

• The reforms began with his own clan's claims — he applied the ruling to himself first.
• 'Have I conveyed?' is the question the whole seerah has been building towards, and the answer obliges us.

Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 1218