and other sources relate: “When the Day of Uhud came and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, had withdrawn against the mountain, Ubayy ibn Khalaf caught up with him, crying, ‘Where is Muhammad? May I not survive if he survives!’”

Ibn Ishaq (1) says: “Ubayy ibn Khalaf—as related to me by Salih ibn Ibrahim ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn ʿAwf—used to meet the Messenger of Allah in Mecca and say, ‘Muhammad, I have al-ʿUd—my horse—which I feed every day with one farq (a measured sack) of barley, and I shall kill you while riding it.’ The Prophet would reply, ‘Rather, I shall be the one who kills you, if Allah wills.’”

Musa ibn ʿUqbah (2) reports: “Saʿid ibn al-Musayyib said: When Ubayy drew near the Messenger of Allah, a group of believers stepped in his way, but the Messenger of Allah ordered them to clear a path for him. Musʿab ibn ʿUmayr of the Banu ʿAbd al-Dar then came forward, shielding the Messenger of Allah with his own body, and Musʿab was killed. The Messenger of Allah spotted Ubayy’s collar-bone through a gap between his coat of mail and helmet; he thrust at it with his ḥarbah (short spear). Ubayy fell from his horse, no blood flowed from the wound, yet a rib was broken. When he rejoined Quraysh, with only a small scratch on his neck in which the blood had pooled, he exclaimed, ‘By Allah, Muhammad has killed me!’ They said to him, ‘By Allah, your wits have forsaken you; all that happened was—’