to his usual practice. The reason was that he acted on God’s instructions. The terms of the agreement were:
• Both parties have agreed to a complete truce for a period of ten years, during which all people will enjoy peace and security and will not attack one another.
• Moreover, if anyone from the Quraysh joins Muhammad without permission from his guardian or chief, he shall be returned to the Quraysh.
• If anyone from those in the camp of Muhammad joins the Quraysh, they are not required to return him.
• Both sides agree that they harbour good intentions towards each other.
• No theft or treachery shall be condoned.
• Whoever wishes to enter into an alliance with Muhammad may do so, and whoever wants to enter into an alliance with the Quraysh may do so.
• It is further agreed that you, Muhammad, shall return home this year without entering Makkah. At the end of one year, we shall evacuate Makkah for you so that you may enter it with your followers to stay for three days only. You shall carry only the armament necessary for a traveller – namely, your swords in their sheaths. You shall not carry any other arms.
When these terms were agreed upon, two things occurred that were to have important effects. Firstly, the tribe of Bakr declared its alliance with the Quraysh, and the tribe of Khuzāʿah declared its alliance with the Prophet. The second was the arrival of Abū Jandal, Suhayl’s own son, who was a Muslim and jailed by his father. He had managed to escape from jail and hoped to join the Muslims. Suhayl demanded his immediate return. The Prophet appealed to Suhayl to grant Abū Jandal his freedom, but Suhayl refused. The Prophet explained to Abū Jandal that honouring their commitments was characteristic of the Muslims in all situations. Hence, he was handed back to his father. The Muslims returned to Madinah without completing their rituals. They were highly disturbed, but the Prophet reassured them that the results would soon be in their favour.
The Ḥudaybiyah peace agreement was concluded in the final few weeks of the sixth year of the Prophet’s Hijrah (his immigration to Madinah), 628 CE. This was a turning point in the fortunes of the Islamic message and the Muslim state. However, in order to take events in their chronological order, we need to speak first of the Battle of Khaybar. Khaybar is a city to the north west of Madinah, and it was inhabited by an entirely Jewish population. This city was constructed as a series of forts, and was surrounded by a large area of farmland, with a variety of crops and plenty of date trees. When the Jewish tribes of Madinah were evacuated after they had violated their covenant with the Muslim state, many of them moved to Khaybar, while some went to Syria and other places. In Khaybar, the Jews were agitating for revenge against the Muslims, particularly after the evacuation of the Qurayẓah tribe, as this left only a few small tribes of Jews in Madinah. They felt that had the allied forces been more determined, they would have achieved the victory they aimed for, and put an end to Islam. The Jews of Khaybar therefore renewed their alliance with the Ghaṭafān tribe, who was party to the original alliance. When the Prophet received intelligence of the new grouping he sent a delegation to Khaybar to persuade the Jews that they would be ill advised to try to take on the Muslim state. However, the mission was unsuccessful. Therefore, the Prophet ordered his 1400 Companions who were with him at al-Ḥudaybiyah to mobilize. He aimed for Khaybar, taking precautions not to alert the Jews there.
The Jews were surprised to see the Muslim army at their doorstep. They went into their forts, which were well supplied. The Prophet tried to avoid fighting, but the Jews were unwilling to come to an agreement and a battle ensued. This was a difficult situation, as the Muslims had to besiege one fort and take it before they moved to the next. The victory was total, and eventually the Jews surrendered, agreeing to evacuate the city and go elsewhere. However, after a few days they came up with an offer to remain and attend to the farms, taking half their produce, while the Muslims took the other half. The Prophet agreed to this, on condition that the Muslims could evacuate them whenever they wished. The Prophet then made similar agreements with several other Jewish communities in northern Arabia. These agreements were entered into peacefully, with no fighting. The Prophet never wanted to fight anyone; although when war was the other party’s intention, he never shrank from engagement.
When the Battle of Khaybar was over, the Prophet received his cousin, Jaʿfar ibn Abī Ṭālib, who had just returned from Abyssinia with the last of those Muslims who had travelled there fifteen years earlier. They returned after the Prophet sent a letter to Negus to repatriate them after their mission was over. They brought with them a large delegation of Abyssinian Muslims.
With the neutralization of the major threats, the Prophet could now press ahead with his main task. He was God’s Messenger to all mankind, and it was part of his mission to make the Divine message known to all nations. After the events of Khaybar, he felt he should attend to this task. He chose a number of his Companions who combined the right temperament with courage, wisdom and resourcefulness. He sent them with messages to the heads of neighbouring states, including the Emperors of Persia and Byzantium as well as the rulers of Egypt, Syria, Bahrain and Abyssinia. He called on these leaders to accept Islam and to allow their people to listen to the Divine message. The two most hostile responses were from the governor of Syria, who killed the Prophet’s emissary, and the Persian Emperor, who tore up the Prophet’s letter and sent a warrant for his arrest. The Byzantine Emperor sent a friendly response, and the Egyptian ruler sent a gift with his friendly response. Both recognized that a final message from God was promised, but they feared that they would lose their power if they were to accept Islam. Only the Negus of Abyssinia and the ruler of Bahrain accepted Islam. These letters might have not produced an immediate favourable result, but they certainly made Islam known in vast areas of the old world: across Asia, Europe and Africa, the three continents known at the time. Moreover, these letters were a prelude to what the future would bring. Islam moved into vast areas of all these countries, but this had to wait until the Prophet’s successors started to mount their campaigns.
The seventh year of the Islamic calendar also witnessed a great deal of activity in the advocacy of Islam among the Arabian tribes. The Prophet’s Companions could now move in peace to visit tribes across Arabia. Muslim historians tell us that in the two years that followed the peace agreement of al-Ḥudaybiyah, almost everyone with a clear mind who was approached with the Islamic message gave a positive response. This was manifested in the fact that the number of people who went with the Prophet when he concluded the Ḥudaybiyah peace agreement and then on the Khaybar campaign were only 1400; whereas two years later, an army of 10,000 traversed the desert with him.
Another significant development which started a short while after the Ḥudaybiyah agreement, but had progressive consequences, was the arrival in Madinah of Abū Buṣayr, an ordinary tribesman from the Quraysh. He declared himself a Muslim and wanted to join the Muslim community. However, his clan sent a messenger for his extradition, as the agreement allowed. The Prophet had no option but to honour the agreement. Abū Buṣayr went back with the man (and his servant) who the Quraysh had sent to ask for the extradition. On the way, he managed to get hold of his captor’s sword and kill him. Abū Buṣayr did not harm the servant, but the servant fled to Madinah and reported what happened to the Prophet. As Abū Buṣayr could neither join the Muslim community nor return to Makkah, he fled into the desert, but stayed close to the route of the Quraysh’s trade caravans. He began to raid these caravans and cause them problems. Soon after, he was joined by a number of Muslims who fled Makkah. These formed a brigade that attacked the trade caravans, to the great dismay of the Quraysh. Within a short period, the chiefs of the Quraysh appealed to the Prophet to take them. They thus abandoned the condition in the peace agreement that required the Prophet to hand back any Muslim who came from Makkah to join him.
In the tenth month of that year, the Prophet and his Companions were due to visit Makkah for the mini-pilgrimage, as agreed with the Quraysh in the Ḥudaybiyah peace treaty. The Prophet and his Companions went ahead, taking with them their sacrificial animals. However, they took some armaments as a precaution. According to the agreement, they should have no arms other than their individual swords, however the Prophet feared a situation of treachery. He therefore took other armaments, keeping them at some distance from Makkah with a contingent of 200 of his Companions. These delayed their