50 Fun Facts About Seerah

The Arabic word sirah, used for the Prophet's biography, comes from a verb with what meaning?

To travel is the root sense: sirah comes from the verb sara, so a person's sirah is their journey through life, from birth to death.

Which ruler, by Muslim accounts, tore up the Prophet's letter and told his Yemeni vassal to seize its sender?

Khosrow II of Persia, furious that a subject had written his name first, tore the letter to pieces; the Prophet answered, 'May God tear apart his kingdom.'

Of what metal was the seal ring the Prophet had made for his letters, engraved 'Muhammad, Messenger of God'?

Silver was the metal, and Muhammad ordered that no duplicate of the seal ever be made; the ring was later lost down a well in Medina.

On the Mi'raj, which prophet kept sending Muhammad back to plead for fewer daily prayers until fifty became five?

Moses, met in the sixth heaven, warned that fifty prayers a day were too many, and Muhammad went back and forth nine times.

What, by the seerah, finally broke the confederates' siege of Medina after the trench had stalled their cavalry?

A violent wind blew out the besiegers' campfires and stripped them of warmth, while the Muslim camp lay sheltered from it.

From where did Bilal give the call to prayer on the day Mecca surrendered, to the dismay of some Quraysh watching?

From the Kaaba's roof: a Quraysh man asked al-Harith ibn Hisham, 'Do you not see where this slave has ascended?'

What did the Prophet's daughter Zaynab send to ransom her husband after Badr, moving her father to waive the payment?

An onyx necklace that Khadijah had given her as a wedding present was among the ransom, and on seeing it the Prophet refused any cash for his son-in-law.

What does the opening verse of Surah 48 call the Hudaybiyyah truce, which many companions first took for a humiliation?

A clear triumph is the verdict of 48:1, for the truce let Muslims and Meccans mix in safety, and Islam spread faster than it had by arms.

The 629 clash at Mu'tah, the Muslims' first against Byzantine forces, took place in which present-day country?

Jordan holds the site, near modern Karak east of the Jordan River, where the army's commanders fell in turn and Khalid ibn al-Walid drew it off.

Which title did the Prophet give Khalid ibn al-Walid, the convert who drew the army out of Mu'tah?

Sword of God, Sayf Allah, is the title, bestowed after he took command at Mu'tah when the three appointed leaders had fallen and brought the army home.

Which Byzantine emperor received the Prophet's letter, carried by Dihya al-Kalbi by way of Bosra?

Heraclius, fresh from retaking Jerusalem from the Persians, was the addressee, though some scholars doubt the letter ever reached him.

Which valley battle of 630 against the Hawazin and Thaqif is named outright in the Quran, in Surat at-Tawbah?

Hunayn is one of the few battles the Quran names, verse 9:25 recalling how the Muslims' great numbers at first availed them nothing.

With what words, echoing Joseph's to his brothers, did the Prophet release the Meccans gathered before him in 630?

Go your way, you are freed, he told them, after quoting Joseph's 'No reproach on you this day' (Quran 12:92) to a city that had fought him for years.

Which surah holds the verse 'Today I have perfected for you your religion', said to have come down at Arafat?

Al-Ma'idah carries it as verse 3, and a Jew told Umar that had it been revealed to them they would have made that day a festival.

Whose usury did the Prophet cancel first in the Farewell Sermon, ahead of every other claim in Arabia?

Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, his uncle, held the first usury claim abolished, and the first blood-feud he cancelled was likewise a Hashimite one.

Roughly how many companions does tradition say gathered in Medina to make the Farewell Pilgrimage with the Prophet?

About 100,000 companions converged on Medina to go with him, and heard the sermon at Arafat on the ninth of Dhu al-Hijjah.

What title, drawn from Quran 33:6, do Muslims give each wife of the Prophet, none of whom could remarry after him?

Mothers of the Believers, Umm al-Mu'minin, is the title, and the Quran calls any wish to marry his widows a major offence.

Which daughter of the Prophet died of illness in Medina on the very day news of the victory at Badr arrived?

Ruqayyah, wife of Uthman and mother of his son Abdullah, died on 17 Ramadan 2 AH as the rider bringing word of Badr reached Medina.

Whom did the Prophet marry soon after Khadijah's death, a widow whose husband had died after returning from Abyssinia?

Sawdah bint Zam'ah became his second wife in the Ramadan of the tenth year of his mission, having migrated to Abyssinia with her first husband, As-Sakran ibn Amr.

Which wife of the Prophet married him by proxy while in Abyssinia, the Negus paying her dower of 400 dinars?

Umm Habiba, Ramla bint Abi Sufyan, wed him in exile after her first husband turned Christian there, and the Negus hosted the wedding feast.

Which Abyssinian woman, a slave in the household of the Prophet's parents, later married his adopted son?

Umm Ayman, Barakah, was freed when the Prophet married Khadijah, and he himself arranged her marriages, first to Ubayd ibn Zayd and later to Zayd ibn Harithah.

Which young commander did the Prophet set over the last army he raised, sent toward Byzantine Balqa to answer Mu'tah?

Usama ibn Zayd, son of the adopted son killed at Mu'tah, led the force Abu Bakr insisted on dispatching after the Prophet's death.

What name did the oath take that the companions swore at Hudaybiyyah when their envoy Uthman was rumoured killed?

Pledge of the Tree, Bay'at al-Shajara, is its name, sworn under a tree by nearly 1,400 companions and praised in Quran 48:18.

Under the Hudaybiyyah terms, how many days could the Muslims stay in Mecca at the next year's pilgrimage?

Three days was the limit, the Quraysh agreeing to vacate the city, and in 629 the Muslims duly made the pilgrimage they had been denied.

Which convert, sent back under the treaty, escaped to the coast and raided Meccan caravans bound for Syria?

Abu Basir was joined on the shore by some seventy others, and by tradition Quraysh themselves soon asked to be rid of the return clause.

Banu Bakr's attack on which tribe, newly allied to the Muslims, broke the truce and led to the march on Mecca?

Khuza'a's people, attacked at al-Wateer and pursued even into the sanctuary, sent forty riders to Medina to seek the Prophet's help.

To whom did the Prophet return the Kaaba's key after the conquest, decreeing that his descendants keep it for ever?

Uthman ibn Talha received it back as custodian of the Kaaba, and the decree kept the key with his descendants, the Banu Shayba, for the centuries that followed.

Which Badr veteran's secret letter warning Quraysh of the march was seized, yet the Prophet forbade Umar to kill him?

Hatib ibn Abi Balta'a was spared because, the Prophet said, God may have looked upon the people of Badr and forgiven them whatever they did.

Which Ghatafan convert, his faith still secret, set the Banu Qurayza and Quraysh at odds during the siege of Medina?

Nu'aym ibn Mas'ud told the Qurayza to demand Quraysh hostages, then told Abu Sufyan the Qurayza had defected, and the alliance cracked.

Which mosque, raised beside Quba by men who shunned it, did the Prophet have destroyed on his return from Tabuk?

Masjid al-Dirar, the 'mosque of dissent' of Quran 9:107, was burned after a revelation stopped the Prophet from leading prayer there.

Which Medina-born scholar, later in the pay of the caliph al-Mansur, compiled the earliest full life of the Prophet?

Ibn Ishaq, who died around 767, gathered oral traditions in Medina, and his text survives mainly through Ibn Hisham's later edition.

What did the first two Muslim centuries more often call the Prophet's life-story, the genre of al-Waqidi's famous book?

Maghazi, literally 'stories of military expeditions', was the older name; today it counts as the part of the sirah covering the campaigns.

Which English convert and London manuscripts keeper wrote 'Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources' in 1983?

Martin Lings, also known as Abu Bakr Siraj ad-Din, won prizes for the book from the governments of Pakistan and Egypt.

Which Meccan pact of about 590, sworn to defend the wronged who lacked clan protection, did the young Muhammad join?

Hilf al-Fudul was formed a month after the Fijar wars ended, and its ideal of justice for the clanless came to shape Islamic ethics.

In whose house near the Kaaba, entered unseen from a narrow street, did the first Muslims secretly meet, pray and learn?

Al-Arqam ibn Abi al-Arqam, a young man of Makhzum, owned the house, and in Medina the Prophet later granted him a house in the Zurayq quarter.

Up which hill did the Prophet climb to call out the Quraysh chiefs for his first public warning?

Safa, the hill where the pilgrims' walk begins, is where he climbed to summon the chiefs, the start of public preaching after years of quiet.

When the Quraysh boycott of Banu Hashim collapsed, what alone was left of the pact in the Kaaba after termites ate it?

In Your name, O God, Bismika Allahumma, was all that survived, and the Prophet told Abu Talib of it before Quraysh fetched the sheet.

Which Christian slave from Nineveh brought the Prophet grapes in an orchard at Ta'if after the town drove him out?

Addas, from the town of Jonah, was startled to hear the Prophet say bismillah over the grapes and call his prophet a brother.

Which surah do chronologies such as Ibn Kathir's place second among the revelations, after the first verses of al-Alaq?

Al-Muddaththir opens 'O you who are wrapped up', and al-Muzzammil, 'The Enwrapped One', is the surah it is most often confused with.

Which Medina mosque, built in 2 AH by Sawad ibn Ghanam, is named for what happened there during a noon prayer?

Masjid al-Qiblatayn, 'mosque of the two qiblas', marks where the command came on 15 Sha'ban 2 AH to turn from Jerusalem toward Mecca.

Which Ansari asked at Badr whether the campsite was revealed or merely chosen, then had the army moved to a better well?

Al-Hubab ibn al-Mundhir's plan had the other wells blocked or destroyed, so that the Meccans had to come to the Muslims' well for water.

Which Khazraj chief, remembered as 'leader of the hypocrites', turned back with 300 men on the march to Uhud?

Abdullah ibn Ubayy took a third of the force home, leaving about 700, and the Quran censured the withdrawal.

Which tracker chasing the Prophet on the Hijrah, his horse sinking in the sand, begged a blessing and turned back?

Suraqa ibn Malik's horse sank again and again, and he went home promising to stop anyone else who followed the two travellers.

Who guided the Prophet and Abu Bakr from the cave toward Medina by back routes, a hired tracker still a pagan?

Abdallah ibn Arqat, also written Ibn Urayqit, was trusted though not a Muslim, and led them on camels Abu Bakr had bought in advance.

Which Ansari of Banu Najjar, who paid for the Prophet's Mosque land, lies buried beneath the walls of Constantinople?

Abu Ayyub, by tradition the Prophet's first host in Medina, asked to be carried as deep into enemy land as possible; Mehmed the Conqueror later raised his tomb there.

What were the poor companions called who lived inside the Prophet's Mosque in Medina, with little income in hard years?

Ahl al-Suffa, 'people of the bench', had little income in years of boycott and war, and their circle lasted about nine years.

Which poet, pardoned after reciting 'Banat Su'ad' before the Prophet, received his mantle, the original Burda?

Ka'b ibn Zuhayr's ode so moved the Prophet that he wrapped his own cloak around him, a relic tradition says was preserved, unlike al-Busiri's dream-given Burda.

How many camels did Abd al-Muttalib finally offer to redeem his son Abdullah, on whom the divination arrows had fallen?

100 camels were reached by adding ten at each cast of the lots, and Abdullah, the Prophet's future father, was spared the vow made at Zamzam.

Which ruler of Yamamah, seized near Medina and tied to a pillar of the mosque, was released and then embraced Islam?

Thumama ibn Uthal, chief of the Banu Hanifa, was set free after days in the mosque and became a Muslim, then went on to Mecca as a pilgrim.

What is the pilgrimage of Dhu al-Qi'dah 7 AH called, made under the truce a year after the Muslims were turned back?

Umrah al-Qaza, the 'make-up' pilgrimage of 629, saw the Quraysh withdraw from Mecca for the agreed time as the treaty required.