they listened in attentive silence to his words; and when he gave a command they rushed to carry it out. He is served and surrounded with honor, never sullen, never incoherent.

Abu Maʿbad exclaimed, “By Allah, this must be the man of Quraysh they have told us about! I am determined to go with him—indeed I shall do so if I can find a way.”

The next morning a powerful voice was heard in Mecca; the people caught the sound but could not see the speaker. It proclaimed:

May Allah, Lord of mankind, bestow His finest reward
on the two companions who alighted at the tent of Umm Maʿbad.
They halted there with guidance, by which she herself was guided;
truly fortunate is the one who spends a night with Muhammad.
O descendants of Qusay, how much Allah has withheld from you—
deeds beyond compare and glory without rival.
Rejoice, O sons of Kaʿb, in the station of your kinswoman;
her seat now stands as a lookout for the believers.
Ask your sister about her ewe and the vessel she filled;
if you question the ewe itself, it will bear witness.
He called for a barren ewe and it gave pure, frothing milk—
a foaming stream from an udder once dry.
He left the vessel as a sure pledge with her for the milker,
to which he would return at every going out and coming in.

When Ḥassān ibn Thābit heard of this, he responded in verse:

Surely lost are the people from whom their Prophet departed,
and blessed is the one who travels to them night and day.
He left a folk whose sense had failed
and settled with a people illumined by a new light.
Their Lord guided them through him after misguidance;
whoever follows the truth by him is rightly guided.
Can those who stray in folly and blindness
be equal to those by whom every seeker finds guidance?
Upon the people of Yathrib there has alighted
the mounts of guidance, arriving to them most happily.
A Prophet who sees what those around him cannot see,
reciting Allah’s Book in every mosque.
Should he speak one day of something unseen,
its confirmation comes that very day, or by the next morning.
Congratulations, Abu Bakr, on the joy of your good fortune:
whoever Allah grants happiness is truly made happy.