Abu Jahl. They halted at Abu Bakr’s door, and I went out to them. “Where is your father?” they asked. I replied, “By Allah, I do not know where my father is.” Abu Jahl—vulgar and malicious as he was—raised his hand and slapped my cheek so hard that my earring flew off.

Yahyā ibn ʿUbbād ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Zubayr told me that his father related from his grandmother, Asmāʾ bint Abī Bakr, who said: When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ set out and Abū Bakr went with him, Abū Bakr took all of his money—five or six thousand dirhams—and left with it. My grandfather Abū Quḥāfah, whose sight had gone, came in and said, “By Allah, I think he has deprived you of his wealth as well as himself.” I said, “No, Father, he has left us abundant good.” I then gathered some stones, placed them in a niche of the house where my father used to keep his money, covered them with a cloth, took my grandfather’s hand and said, “Put your hand on this money.” He laid his hand on it and remarked, “There is no harm; if he has left this for you, he has done well, and this will suffice you.” Yet, by Allah, he had left us nothing—I only wished to reassure the old man.

Al-Zuhrī told me that ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mālik ibn Jaʿsham related from his father, from his uncle Surāqah ibn Mālik ibn Jaʿsham, who said: When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ left Mecca as an emigrant, Quraysh placed a bounty of one hundred camels upon him for anyone who could bring him back. While I was sitting, a man of our tribe came and said, “By Allah, I have just seen three riders pass by; I think they are Muhammad and his companions.” I motioned to him to keep silent and said, “They are only such-and-such people looking for a lost animal.” He replied, “Perhaps.” After a short while I rose, went into my house, and the events unfolded as I have already described.

She (Asmāʾ) also related: We spent three nights not knowing in which direction the Messenger of Allah ﷺ had gone, until a being from the jinn came from the lower part of Mecca