Shuʿbah transmitted through ʿAdī ibn Thābit, who heard ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yazīd relate from Zayd ibn Thābit: “When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ set out for Uḥud, some of those who had gone with him turned back. The Companions therefore split into two parties: one said, ‘We shall fight them,’ while the other said, ‘We shall not fight them.’ Then the verse was revealed: ‘So what is the matter with you that you are two groups concerning the hypocrites?’ (al-Nisāʾ 4:88). The Messenger of Allah ﷺ commented, ‘This city is wholesome; it expels impurity just as the furnace removes the dross from silver.’ Agreed upon.

Ibn Abī Najīḥ narrated from Mujāhid regarding the verse, ‘Allah will not leave the believers in the state you are in until He separates the vile from the wholesome’ (Āl ʿImrān 3:179). He said, ‘He distinguished them on the Day of Uḥud.’

Al-Bakkāʾī narrated from Ibn Isḥāq, who said: Part of the account of Uḥud—as related to me by al-Zuhrī, Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā ibn Ḥibbān, ʿĀṣim ibn ʿUmar, al-Ḥuṣayn ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān and others, each conveying a portion that I have woven together here—is that when the idolaters of Quraysh suffered the loss of those cast into the pit at Badr and their lamentations followed them back to Mecca, and when Abū Sufyān ibn Ḥarb returned with the caravan, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Rabīʿah, ʿIkrimah ibn Abī Jahl and Ṣafwān ibn Umayyah—together with other Qurayshites whose fathers, sons or brothers had been killed—went to Abū Sufyān and to those who had goods invested in that caravan. They said, ‘People of Quraysh, Muhammad has wronged you and has slain your noblest men. Help us with this wealth so that we may wage war against him; perhaps we can avenge those of our kin he has struck down.’ Thus they rallied for war against the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, aided by Abū Sufyān, the owners of the caravan, the allied clans (aḥābīsh), and those of the Kinānah tribes and the people of Tihāmah who answered their call.