Al-Layth ibn Saʿd likewise transmitted this report from Abū al-Zubayr, from Jābir: a servant of Ḥāṭib came complaining and said, “O Messenger of Allah, Ḥāṭib will certainly enter the Fire.” The Messenger of Allah ﷺ replied, “You are mistaken; he will never enter it, for he was present at Badr and at al-Ḥudaybiyyah.” Muslim has recorded it (1).

Muslim also relates (2) through several chains from Ibn Jurayj, who said: Abū al-Zubayr informed me that he heard Jābir say: Umm Mubashshir told me that she heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say in the presence of Ḥafṣah, “No one—if Allah so wills—of the People of the Tree, those who pledged their allegiance beneath it, will enter the Fire.” Ḥafṣah objected, “Indeed they will, O Messenger of Allah.” He rebuked her, whereupon she recited: “There is not one of you but will pass over it” (Maryam 19:71). The Messenger of Allah ﷺ answered, “Allah, exalted be He, has also said: ‘Then We shall save those who were mindful of Him and leave the wrongdoers there on their knees’” (Maryam 19:72).

Al-Bukhārī said (4): ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Muʿādh reported to us—my father reported to us—Shuʿbah reported to us—from ʿAmr ibn Murrah, who said: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Awfā told me, “The Companions of the Tree numbered one thousand three hundred, and the tribe of Aslam made up one eighth of the Emigrants.” Muḥammad ibn Bashshār corroborated him: Abū Dāwūd narrated to us—Shuʿbah narrated to us. Al-Bukhārī cites this report in suspended form from ʿUbayd Allāh.

Muslim has also recorded it (5) through ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Muʿādh, from his father, from Shuʿbah, and through Muḥammad ibn al-Muthannā, from Abū Dāwūd, from Isḥāq ibn Ibrāhīm, from al-Naḍr ibn Shumayl—both routes from Shuʿbah—with the same wording.

Al-Bukhārī further said (6): ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us; Sufyān narrated to us, from al-Zuhrī, from ʿUrwah, from Marwān and al-Miswar ibn Makhramah, who said: “In the year of al-Ḥudaybiyyah the Prophet ﷺ set out with a company of his Companions numbering more than thirteen hundred; when he reached Dhū’l-Ḥulayfah he garlanded the sacrificial animals, marked them, and entered the state of iḥrām from there.” Al-Bukhārī alone transmits this version, and its complete wording will appear later.

The point is that all of these reports conflict with Ibn Isḥāq’s view that the Companions at al-Ḥudaybiyyah were seven hundred. Allah knows best, but he seems to have deduced that figure on his own: since the sacrificial camels were seventy and, in his reckoning, each covered ten people, he concluded that the pilgrims in iḥrām were seven hundred. Yet it is by no means necessary that each person offer a sacrifice, or even that they all be in iḥrām. Indeed, it is authentically established that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ dispatched a detachment—including Abū Qatādah—and Abū Qatādah did not enter iḥrām until he hunted a wild onager. He and his companions ate from it and carried some of its meat to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ along the way. He asked, “Did any one of you order that it be hunted, or point it out?” They replied, “No.” He said, “Then eat what remains of its meat.”