It is likewise reported from Wahb ibn Kaysān that he heard ʿUbayd ibn ʿUmayr relate the same account to ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Zubayr. This shows that the worshippers of Quraysh were in the habit of withdrawing to Ḥirāʾ for devotion. Abū Ṭālib alludes to this in his famous ode:
By Thawr, and by Him who fixed Thabīr in its place,
and by one who climbs to Ḥirāʾ—and who descends.
This is the correct wording of the verse, as affirmed by al-Suhaylī, Abū Shāmah, and our teacher, the ḥadīth master Abū ʾl-Ḥajjāj al-Mizzī—may Allah have mercy on him. Some transmitters garbled it as: “…who climbs to Ḥir and descends,” which is feeble and incorrect. Allah knows best.
Ḥirāʾ may be pronounced with either a short or a long final vowel and may be declinable or indeclinable. It is a mountain at the upper end of Mecca, three miles away, on the left of one travelling toward Minā. Its summit leans over, overlooking the Kaʿbah, and the cave lies in that bend. How apt are the lines of Ruʾbah ibn al-ʿAjjāj:
No—by the Lord of the tranquil, sheltered abodes,
and by the jutting ledge of the inclined Ḥirāʾ!
In the ḥadīth the term taḥannuth is explained as “acts of worship,” which is a gloss by meaning. Morphologically, however, al-Suhaylī says it originally signifies “to enter into sin (ḥinth).” I have encountered a few verbs whose forms bear the opposite sense, namely “to leave or shun” something. Thus taḥannatha means “he kept away from sin,” and likewise: taḥawwaba, taḥarraja, taʾaththama, and tahajjada—meaning to abandon sleep for prayer—as well as tanajjasa and taqadhdhara. Abū Shāmah has cited these examples.
Ibn al-Aʿrābī, when asked whether yatahannath means “he worships,” replied, “I do not recognize that; the correct form is yatahannaf, from al-ḥanīfiyyah, the religion of Abraham—peace be upon him.”
Ibn Hishām notes that Arabs say both taḥannuth and taḥannuf, substituting fāʾ for thāʾ, just as they say jadath and jadaf. Ruʾbah likewise said:
If only my stones were among the ajdāf,
intending ajdāth (graves). He also reported from Abū ʿUbaydah that Arabs sometimes say fummā in place of thummā. I would add that some Qur’anic exegetes, regarding the phrase fūmihā, interpret it as thūmihā—“its garlic.”