Seerah Trivia
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50 free Seerah trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
The seerah is the life of the Prophet Muhammad as Muslim tradition has told it for fourteen centuries: his early years in Mecca, the first followers and the pressure they faced, the migration to Medina, the treaties and expeditions, the embassies he sent across the known world, and the pilgrimage and sermon that closed his mission. Most people know the headline events. This quiz goes one layer further, to the people and details behind them. The fifty questions follow the story in rough order, from the meaning of the word seerah itself to the scholars who first wrote it down, and they ask about the clauses of a treaty, the carriers of a letter, the name a mosque was given, and the companions whose single act changed a chapter. Every question carries a hint inside it, so a player who knows the period can reason toward an answer, and every explanation adds something worth keeping. It suits students revising the seerah, weekend Islamic-school teachers looking for a ready round, and anyone who has read a biography of the Prophet and wants to see how much stayed with them. Play it online, or print it for a halaqa or a family evening.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The Arabic word sirah, used for the Prophet's biography, comes from a verb with what meaning?
To travel
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.
Q 02Which ruler, by Muslim accounts, tore up the Prophet's letter and told his Yemeni vassal to seize its sender?
Khosrow II of Persia
Khosrow II of Persia, angry that a subject had written his name first, tore the letter up, and he was later deposed and executed on his own son's orders.
Q 03Of what metal was the seal ring the Prophet had made for his letters, engraved 'Muhammad, Messenger of God'?
Silver
Silver was the metal, and the ring passed from the Prophet to Abu Bakr, Umar and then Uthman, who dropped it into the well of Aris, where it was never found.
Q 04On the Mi'raj, which prophet kept sending Muhammad back to plead for fewer daily prayers until fifty became five?
Moses
Moses warned that Muhammad's people could not bear fifty prayers a day, and once five remained, Muhammad said he was too ashamed to ask his Lord again.
Q 05What, by the seerah, finally broke the confederates' siege of Medina after the trench had stalled their cavalry?
A violent wind
A violent wind, recalled in Quran 33:9, blew out the besiegers' fires in the bitter cold, and the confederate armies withdrew.
Q 06From where did Bilal give the call to prayer on the day Mecca surrendered?
From the Kaaba's roof
From the Kaaba's roof, on the Prophet's order: Bilal, once tortured by his master in Mecca for his faith, called the conquered city to prayer.
Q 07What did the Prophet's daughter Zaynab send to ransom her husband after Badr, moving her father to waive the payment?
A necklace
A necklace Khadijah had given Zaynab at her wedding was among the ransom, and on seeing it the Prophet asked the Muslims to free her husband and return it, and they agreed.
Q 08What does the opening verse of Surah 48 call the Hudaybiyyah truce?
A clear triumph
A clear triumph is the verdict of 48:1, though Umar and other companions first disliked the truce's terms; it let Muslims and Meccans mix in safety, and Islam spread.
Q 09The 629 clash at Mu'tah against Byzantine forces took place in which present-day country?
Jordan
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.
Q 10Which title did the Prophet give Khalid ibn al-Walid, the convert who drew the army out of Mu'tah?
Sword of God
Sword of God, Sayf Allah, is the title tradition says the Prophet gave him after Mu'tah, where he took command once three appointed leaders had fallen.
Q 11Which Byzantine emperor, by Muslim accounts, received the Prophet's letter, carried by Dihya al-Kalbi by way of Bosra?
Heraclius
Heraclius, by the hadith, then questioned the Meccan trader Abu Sufyan about the Prophet, though historians doubt any envoy ever reached him.
Q 12Which valley battle of 630 against the Hawazin and Thaqif is named outright in the Quran, in Surat at-Tawbah?
Hunayn
Hunayn is one of the few battles the Quran names, verse 9:25 recalling how the Muslims' great numbers at first availed them nothing.
Q 13With what words did the Prophet release the Meccans gathered before him in 630?
Go your way, you are freed
Q 21Which Abyssinian woman, a slave in the household of the Prophet's parents, later married his adopted son?
Umm Ayman
Umm Ayman, Barakah, was freed when the Prophet married Khadijah, and he himself arranged her first marriage, to a man of the Khazraj.
Q 22Which young commander did the Prophet set over the last army he raised, sent toward Byzantine Balqa to answer Mu'tah?
Usama ibn Zayd
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.
Q 23What name did the oath take that the companions swore at Hudaybiyyah when their envoy Uthman was rumoured killed?
Pledge of the Tree
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.
Q 14Which surah holds the verse 'Today I have perfected for you your religion', said to have come down at Arafat?
Al-Ma'idah
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.
Q 15Whose usury did the Prophet cancel first in the Farewell Sermon, ahead of every other claim in Arabia?
Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib
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.
Q 16Roughly how many companions does tradition say gathered in Medina to make the Farewell Pilgrimage with the Prophet?
About 100,000
About 100,000 companions converged on Medina to go with him, and heard the sermon at Arafat on the ninth of Dhu al-Hijjah.
Q 17What 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
Mothers of the Believers, Umm al-Mu'minin, is the title, and Quran 33:53 told believers to ask the Prophet's wives for anything from behind a screen.
Q 18Which daughter of the Prophet died of illness in Medina on the very day news of the victory at Badr arrived?
Ruqayyah
Ruqayyah was being nursed by her husband Uthman on the Prophet's order while the army fought at Badr, and he was granted a share of the spoils as if he had fought.
Q 19Whom did the Prophet marry soon after Khadijah's death, a widow who had emigrated to Abyssinia?
Sawdah bint Zam'ah
Sawdah bint Zam'ah wed him in Ramadan of the tenth year of his mission, and she later gave up her turn with him to Aisha.
Q 20Which wife of the Prophet married him by proxy while in Abyssinia, the Negus paying her dower?
Umm Habiba
Umm Habiba, Ramla bint Abi Sufyan, was wed to him in absentia, and the Negus hosted a lavish wedding feast before she left for Medina.
Pledge of the Tree, praised in Quran 48:18, alarmed Quraysh into releasing Uthman and sending an envoy to negotiate a truce.
Q 24Which Quraysh envoy had 'Messenger of God' struck from the Hudaybiyyah treaty?
Suhayl ibn Amr
Suhayl ibn Amr said Quraysh rejected Muhammad's prophethood, so the Prophet agreed to sign simply as Muhammad son of Abdullah.
Q 25Which convert, sent back under the treaty, escaped to the coast and raided Meccan caravans bound for Syria?
Abu Basir
Abu Basir was joined on the shore by other converts who fled Mecca, and by tradition Quraysh themselves soon asked to be rid of the return clause.
Q 26Banu Bakr's attack on which tribe, newly allied to the Muslims, broke the truce and led to the march on Mecca?
Khuza'a
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.
Q 27To whom did the Prophet return the Kaaba's key after the conquest?
Uthman ibn Talha
Uthman ibn Talha got the key back after a revelation told the Prophet to return trusts to their owners.
Q 28Which 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
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.
Q 29Which Ghatafan convert, his faith still secret, set the Banu Qurayza and Quraysh at odds during the siege of Medina?
Nu'aym ibn Mas'ud
Nu'aym ibn Mas'ud told the Qurayza to demand Quraysh hostages, then told Abu Sufyan the Qurayza had defected, and the alliance cracked.
Q 30Which mosque, raised beside Quba, did the Prophet have destroyed on his return from Tabuk?
Masjid al-Dirar
Masjid al-Dirar, the 'mosque of dissent' of Quran 9:107, was burned after a revelation stopped the Prophet from leading prayer there.