to Madinah. Safwān ibn Umayyah said to them, “Do not do it; the people are now battle-ready (1), and we fear they may wage a new fight unlike the one that has just occurred. Turn back.” So they turned back.
When news reached the Prophet ﷺ at Ḥamrāʾ al-Asad that they had thought of returning, he said, “By Him in Whose hand is my soul, stones have already been designated for them; had they come at daybreak, they would have perished like yesterday, now gone.”
The narrator continues: On that same journey—before the Prophet ﷺ re-entered Madinah—he captured Muʿāwiyah ibn al-Mughīrah ibn Abī al-ʿĀṣ ibn Umayyah ibn ʿAbd Shams, the maternal grandfather of ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Marwān (his mother being ʿĀʾishah bint Muʿāwiyah), together with Abū ʿUzzah al-Jumahī. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ had previously taken Abū ʿUzzah prisoner at Badr and then released him. Abū ʿUzzah now pleaded, “O Messenger of Allah, give me another chance.” The Prophet replied, “No, by Allah! You will not wipe your cheeks in Mecca boasting, ‘I deceived Muhammad twice.’ O Zubayr, strike his neck.” Al-Zubayr executed him.
Ibn Hishām (2) relates—on the authority of Ibn al-Musayyab—that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “A believer is not stung from the same hole twice. O ʿĀṣim ibn Thābit, strike his neck,” and he did so.
Ibn Hishām (3) also reports that ʿUthmān secured safe-conduct for Muʿāwiyah ibn al-Mughīrah on condition that he not stay beyond three days. When the term expired, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ sent Zayd ibn Ḥārithah and ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir, saying, “You will find him at such-and-such a place; kill him.” They did so—may Allah be pleased with them.
Ibn Isḥāq (4) said: When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ returned to Madinah, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ubayy—so al-Zuhrī told me—had a standing post he would assume every Friday, something no one questioned because of the honor he enjoyed among his clan. Whenever the Messenger of Allah ﷺ sat to deliver the Friday sermon, Ibn Ubayy would stand and declare: “People, this is the Messenger of Allah in your midst. Allah has honored you and strengthened you through him, so support him, assist him, listen to him, and obey him.” He would then sit.
After the affair of Uhud, when the people came back, he rose to do what he normally did, but the Muslims grabbed his garments from every side, saying, “Sit down, enemy of Allah! By Allah, you are not fit for this after what you have done.” He went out, stepping over people’s necks, muttering, “By Allah, it is as though I uttered something dreadful merely because I rose to reinforce his authority.”
Outside the mosque, some men of the Anṣār met him and said, “Woe to you, what is the matter?” He replied, “I stood to strengthen his authority, and men from among his Companions leapt at me, pulling and rebuking me, as though I had said something monstrous just for standing up.” They said, “Woe to you! Go back so the Messenger of Allah ﷺ may ask forgiveness for you.” He answered, “By Allah, I do not care that he ask forgiveness for me.”
Ibn Isḥāq (5) then cited the verses revealed concerning the events of Uhud in Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, beginning with: “And [remember] when you left your household early to post the believers at their battle stations; Allah is All-Hearing, All-Knowing” (Āl ʿImrān 3:121), continuing through a total of sixty verses. He commented on them, and we have expanded upon the matter in our Tafsīr to sufficient length. Ibn Isḥāq then proceeded to