Bani Hashim lane in Makkah onMonday morning, the ninth of Rabi'
Al-Awwal, the same year of the Elephant Event, and forty years of the
reign of Kisra (Khosru Nushirwan), i.e. the twentieth or twenty-second
of April, 571 A.D., according to the scholar Muhammad Sulaimân
Al-Mansourpuri, and the astrologer Mahmûd Pasha.
Ibn Sa'd reported that Muhammad's mother said: "When he was born,
there was a light that issued out of my pudendum and lit the palaces
of Syria." Ahmad reported on the authority of 'Arbadh bin Sariya
something similar to this.
It was but controversially reported that significant precursors
accompanied his birth: fourteen galleries of Kisra'spalace cracked and
rolled down, the Magians' sacred fire died down and some churches on
Lake Sawa sank down and collapsed.
His mother immediately sent someone to inform his grandfather
'Abdul-Muttalib of the happy event. Happily he cameto her, carried him
to Al-Ka'bah, prayed to Allâh and thanked Him. 'Abdul-Muttalib called
the baby Muhammad, a name not then common among the Arabs. He
circumcised him on his seventh day as was the custom of the Arabs.
The first woman who suckled him after his mother was Thuyebah, the
concubine of Abu Lahab, with her son, Masrouh. She had suckled Hamzah
bin 'Abdul-Muttalib before and later Abu Salamah bin 'Abd Al-Asad
Al-Makhzumi.
BABYHOOD:
It was the general custom of the Arabs living in towns to send their
children away to bedouin wet nurses so that they might grow up in the
free and healthy surroundings of the desert whereby they would develop
a robust frame and acquire the pure speech and manners of the
bedouins, who were noted both for chastity of their language andfor
being free from those vices which usually develop in sedentary
societies.
The Prophet (Peace be upon him)was later entrusted to Haleemah bint
Abi Dhuaib from Bani Sa'd bin Bakr. Her husband was Al-Harith bin
'Abdul 'Uzza called Abi Kabshah, from the same tribe.
Muhammad(Peace be upon him) had several foster brothers and sisters,
'Abdullah bin Al-Harith, Aneesah bint Al-Harith, Hudhafah or Judhamah
bint Al-Harith (known as Ash-Shayma'), and sheused to nurse the
Prophet (Peacebe upon him) and Abu Sufyan binAl-Harith bin
'Abdul-Muttalib, the Prophet's cousin. Hamzah bin 'Abdul-Muttalib, the
Prophet's uncle, was suckled by the same two wet nurses, Thuyeba and
Haleemah As-Sa'diyah, who suckled the Prophet (Peace be upon him).
Traditions delightfully relate how Haleemah and the whole of her
household were favoured by successive strokes of good fortune while
the baby Muhammad (Peace be upon him) lived under her care. Ibn Ishaq
states that Haleemah narrated that she along with her husband and a
suckling babe, set out fromher village in the company of some women of
her clan in questof children to suckle. She said:
It was a year of drought and famine and we had nothing to eat. I rode
on a brown she-ass. We also had with us an old she-camel. By Allâh we
could not get even a drop of milk. We couldnot have a wink of sleep
during the night for the child kept cryingon account of hunger. There
wasnot enough milk in my breast and even the she-camel had nothing to
feed him. We used to constantly pray for rain and immediate relief. At
length we reached Makkah looking for children to suckle. Not even a
single woman amongst us accepted the Messenger of Allâh (Peace be upon
him) offered to her. As soon as they were told that he was an orphan,
they refused him. We had fixed our eyes on the reward that we would
get from the child's father.An orphan! What are his grandfather and
mother likely to do? So we spurned him because of that. Every woman
who came with me got a suckling and whenwe were about to depart, I
said to my husband: "By Allâh, I do not like to go back along with the
other women without any baby. I should go to that orphan and I must
take him." He said, "There is no harm in doing so and perhaps Allâh
might bless us through him." So I went and took him because there was
simply no other alternative left for me but to take him. When I lifted
him in my arms and returned to my place I put him on my breast and to
my great surprise, I found enough milk in it. He drank to his heart's
content,and so did his foster brother andthen both of them went to
sleep although my baby had not been able to sleep the previous night.
My husband then went to the she-camel to milk it and, to his
astonishment, he found plenty ofmilk in it. He milked it and we drank
to our fill, and enjoyed a sound sleep during the night. The next
morning, my husband said: "By Allâh Haleemah,
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