—like the envoys of Muhammad—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—and of the Messiah—peace be upon him—who were sent to the nations, must either know the language of the people to whom the Messenger—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—dispatched them, or else there must be among those people someone who understands both their language and the language of the Messenger—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—so that he can translate for them. If, among those to whom the Messiah sent his envoys, no one was known to understand Arabic, then inevitably his envoy would address them in their own tongue.

The same held true for the envoys of the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—whom he sent to various nations. When the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—returned from al-Ḥudaybiyyah, he dispatched his messengers to the peoples of the earth: he wrote to the Arab rulers of Yemen, the Ḥijāz, al-Shām, and Iraq; he sent letters to the Christian kings of al-Shām and Egypt—their Copts, their Byzantines, their Arabs, and others; and he wrote to the Magian Persians, the rulers of Iraq and Khurasan.

Muḥammad ibn Saʿd said in al-Ṭabaqāt, under the heading “The dispatch of the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—of envoys with his letters to kings and others, inviting them,” and he recorded the texts of what the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—wrote to various Arabs and non-Arabs. He then said: “Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar al-Aslamī informed us, saying, ‘Maʿmar narrated to me…’”