over its udder, then supplicated until the milk descended. Abū Bakr brought a broad wooden bowl, and the Prophet ﷺ milked the goat: he first gave Abū Bakr to drink, then milked again and gave the shepherd to drink, then milked a third time and drank himself.

The shepherd said, “By Allah, who are you? For by Allah, I have never seen the like of you.”

He replied, “Will you keep the matter secret if I tell you?”

“Yes,” the man answered.

He said, “I am Muḥammad, the Messenger of Allah.”

The shepherd exclaimed, “Are you the one Quraysh claims has abandoned their religion?”

He said, “That is indeed what they say.”

The man declared, “I bear witness that you are a Prophet, that what you have brought is the truth; no one could do what you have just done except a Prophet. I will follow you.”

The Prophet ﷺ said, “You will not be able to do that today, but when news reaches you that I have prevailed, come to us.”

Abū Yaʿlā al-Mawṣilī (1) transmitted this ḥadīth through Jaʿfar ibn Ḥumayd al-Kūfī, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Iyād ibn Laqīṭ.

Abū Nuʿaym (2) also recorded here the account of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd, saying: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Jaʿfar narrated to us; Yūnus ibn Ḥabīb narrated to us; Abū Dāwūd (3) narrated to us; Ḥammād ibn Salamah narrated from ʿĀṣim, from Zirr, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd, who said:

“I was a young lad in Mecca tending the sheep of ʿUqbah ibn Abī Muʿayṭ when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and Abū Bakr—having fled from the idolaters—came by and said, ‘Young man, do you have any milk we might drink?’

“I replied, ‘I am trusted with the flock and cannot give you any.’

“They asked, ‘Do you have a ewe lamb upon which no ram has yet mounted?’

“I said, ‘Yes,’ and brought one to them. Abū Bakr restrained her while the Messenger of Allah ﷺ took hold of the udder, invoked Allah, and the udder filled with milk. Abū Bakr produced a hollowed-out stone (4) and the Prophet ﷺ milked into it. He drank, Abū Bakr drank, and they gave me to drink.

“Then he said to the udder, ‘Shrink back,’ and it shrank. Some time later (5) I came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and said, ‘Teach me some of this good speech,’ meaning the Qur’an.

“He replied, ‘You are a gifted youth.’ I then learned seventy surahs from his own mouth, and no one could dispute with me regarding them.”

His statement in this isnād, “having fled from the idolaters,” does not refer to the time of the Hijrah; rather, it was on another occasion before the Emigration. Ibn Masʿūd had embraced Islam early, migrated to Abyssinia, and returned to Mecca, as mentioned earlier. This story of his is authentic, firmly established in the sound collections and elsewhere. Allah knows best.

ʿAbd Allāh, the son of Imām Aḥmad (6), said: Muṣʿab ibn ʿAbd Allāh (7)—the Zubayrī—narrated to us; he said, “My father related to me, from Fāʾid…”