and concealed my acceptance of Islam from the Jews. I said, “O Messenger of Allah, the Jews are a people given to slander. I would like you to lodge me in one of your houses and hide me from them; then question them about me and they will tell you what standing I enjoy among them before they find out about my Islam. For if they learn of it, they will vilify and malign me.” He went on to relate the rest of the story as above.

He continued: I then made my Islam and that of my entire household public, and my aunt Khālida bint al-Ḥārith also embraced Islam.

Yūnus ibn Bukayr narrated—on the authority of Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, who said: ʿAbd Allah ibn Abī Bakr related to me, from a transmitter, from Ṣafiyyah bint Ḥuyayy—who said:

“No one among the children of my father or my uncle was more beloved to them than I. Whenever I met them, I would hurry toward them, and they would take me into their arms before any of their other children. When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ arrived at Qubāʾ, the village of Banū ʿAmr ibn ʿAwf, my father and my uncle—Abū Yāsir ibn Akhṭab—went to him at daybreak. By Allah, they did not return to us until after sunset. They came back exhausted, sluggish, and despondent, walking slowly. I greeted them as I always did, but, by Allah, neither of them so much as looked at me.

“I then heard my uncle Abū Yāsir say to my father, ‘Is it he?’
“My father replied, ‘Yes, by Allah.’
“‘Do you recognize him from his description and his attributes?’
“‘Yes, by Allah.’
“‘And what have you decided about him?’
“‘Enmity toward him, by Allah, for as long as I live.’

Mūsā ibn ʿUqbah narrated from al-Zuhrī that when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ entered Madinah, Abū Yāsir ibn Akhṭab went to him, listened to him, and spoke with him. He then returned to his people and said, “My people, obey me! Allah has brought you what you were waiting for. Follow him and do not oppose him.”

His brother Ḥuyayy ibn Akhṭab—who was the leader of the Jews at that time, both brothers being from Banū al-Naḍīr—thereupon went to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, sat with him, and listened to him. When he returned to his people, who normally obeyed him, he said, “I have just come from a man toward whom, by Allah, I shall remain an enemy forever.”

Abū Yāsir said to him, “Son of my mother, heed me in this affair, and disobey me in whatever you wish after it; do not destroy yourself!”

He replied, “No, by Allah, I will never obey you.” Satan overpowered him, and his people followed his view.

I say: As for Abū Yāsir—whose given name was Judayy ibn Akhṭab—I do not know what ultimately became of him. But his brother Ḥuyayy ibn Akhṭab, the father of Ṣafiyyah bint Ḥuyayy, drank deeply of hatred toward the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions, and persisted in it—may Allah curse him—until he was put to death in front of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ on the day the fighting men of Banū Qurayẓah were executed, as will be detailed, if Allah wills.