Utbah ibn Rabi‘ah had said, “Would you be willing, today, to turn back from (fighting) your cousin and take those who are with you?”

He replied, “Could he not find someone other than you to deliver the message?”

I answered, “No—and I would never be messenger for anyone but him.”

Ḥakīm (the narrator) continues: I hastened back to Utbah so I would miss none of what was happening. I found him reclining against Imāʾ ibn Raḥdah al-Ghifārī, who had given the idolaters ten she-camels. Just then Abū Jahl arrived, malice written on his face, and said to Utbah, “Has your belly swollen?”

Utbah retorted, “You will soon find out.”

Abū Jahl drew his sword and struck the flank of his horse with it. Imāʾ ibn Raḥdah remarked, “What an ill omen this is!” At that moment the battle erupted.

The Messenger of Allah ﷺ had already arranged his Companions in the finest order. Al-Tirmidhī reports—on the authority of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf—that he said, “The Messenger of Allah ﷺ aligned us on the night before Badr.”

Imām Ahmad likewise relates, through the isnād of Ibn Luhayʿah, from Yazīd ibn Abī Ḥabīb, from Aslam Abū ʿImrān, who heard Abū Ayyūb say: “We formed ranks on the Day of Badr, but a group of us moved forward ahead of the line. The Prophet ﷺ looked at them and said, ‘Stay with me! Stay with me!’” Ahmad alone transmits this report, and its chain is sound.

Ibn Isḥāq further says: Ḥabbān ibn Wāsiʿ ibn Ḥabbān told me, on the authority of elders of his tribe, that on the Day of Badr the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was straightening the ranks of his Companions, holding in his hand a staff with which he adjusted them. He passed by Sawād ibn Ghaziyyah, an ally of Banū ʿAdī ibn al-Najjār, who was protruding slightly from the line, so he tapped him in the stomach with the staff and said, “Stand in line, O Sawād!”

Sawād protested, “O Messenger of Allah, you have hurt me. Allah has sent you with truth and justice, so allow me retaliation.”

The Prophet ﷺ uncovered his own stomach and said, “Take your retaliation.”

Sawād embraced him and kissed his stomach. The Prophet ﷺ asked, “What made you do that, O Sawād?”

He replied, “O Messenger of Allah, what you see (the battle) is at hand, and I wanted the last thing I ever touch to be your skin.” The Messenger of Allah ﷺ then prayed for him and spoke well of him.

Ibn Isḥāq also relates: ʿĀṣim ibn ʿUmar ibn Qatādah told me that ʿAwf ibn al-Ḥārith—the son of ʿAfrāʾ—said, “O Messenger of Allah, what makes the Lord laugh at His servant?”

He answered, “Plunging his hand into the enemy while bare-headed.”

So ʿAwf removed the coat of mail he was wearing and cast it aside. He then took up his sword and fought until he was killed—may Allah be pleased with him.