Yet such a reading runs counter to the special protection Allah granted His Prophet. How could it be imagined when the Prophet ﷺ had already forbidden Zayd even to touch an idol, and he himself had never touched one before his mission? How, then, could he have been content to slaughter in the idol’s name? This is impossible.

The second explanation is that the animal was actually slaughtered for Allah, but it happened to take place at a site where the people customarily sacrificed before an idol.

I say: This is sound, for actions are judged only by their intentions.

Zayd, for his part, acted on what was outwardly apparent while the inward reality was for Allah alone. The Prophet ﷺ may have kept silent and refrained from clarifying the matter to ward off harm. For although we know of his aversion to idols, we also know that before his prophethood he did not openly denounce them among Quraysh, nor did he publicly declare his loathing of them prior to being sent.

The prevailing view is that Zayd—may Allah have mercy on him—died before the Prophet’s commissioning. Ibn Ishaq ⦗1⦘ relates that Waraqah ibn Nawfal mourned him with the following verses:

“You were guided aright and richly blessed, son of ʿAmr; indeed, you avoided a blazing furnace of scorching fire.

By taking as your religion a Lord beyond compare and by abandoning the idols of the tyrant gods as they stood,⦗2⦘

and by attaining the faith you had long sought, never heedless of your Lord’s oneness,

you have settled in an honored abode, sustained therein with noble favor, carefree.⦗3⦘

Indeed, a person may yet be overtaken by his Lord’s mercy even were he beneath the earth in seventy valleys.”

Moreover, ʿUrwah counted Saʿid ibn Zayd among the combatants of Badr, saying: “He returned from Syria after Badr, spoke with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and the Prophet allotted him his share and his reward.” ⦗4⦘

Likewise, this was also reported by Musa ibn—