ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Bakr said:

The People of the Ṣuffah were indigent men, and on one occasion the Prophet ﷺ announced:

“Whoever has food enough for two, let him take a third; and whoever has food enough for four, let him take a fifth—or a sixth,” or words to that effect.

Abu Bakr therefore brought three persons, while the Prophet ﷺ went off with ten and Abu Bakr with three. He (ʿAbd al-Raḥmān) said: “Those three were my father, my mother, and me—I am not sure whether he also mentioned my wife and a servant—our house lying between us and Abu Bakr’s.

Abu Bakr took supper with the Prophet ﷺ, staying until the night prayer was offered; then he left, and waited until the Messenger of Allah ﷺ had taken his own meal. He came home after part of the night had passed.

His wife said to him, ‘What kept you from your guests—or your guest?’

He replied, ‘Did you not serve them supper?’

She said, ‘They refused to eat until you came. We offered it to them, but they held out.’

He said, ‘So I went off and hid.’

Then he said, ‘O Ghunthar!’—and he cursed and reviled—and added, ‘Eat!’

In another wording he said, ‘May it give you no pleasure!’ and he declared, ‘I shall never taste it.’ By Allah, whenever we lifted a morsel, what lay beneath it would swell and become more than the piece taken, until they were all satisfied and the dish contained even more than before. Abu Bakr looked at it and found it still plentiful—indeed, greater than it had been.

He said to his wife—(in another version: ‘What is this?’)—‘O sister of the Banū Firās!’

She replied, ‘No, by the delight of my eyes, it is now three times what it was before.’

Abu Bakr then ate from it, saying, ‘It was only Satan’—meaning the oath he had sworn—took another bite, and carried the rest to the Prophet ﷺ, where it remained overnight.

There was a pact between us and a certain people; when its term expired we renewed it, [1] twelve men accompanied by others—Allah knows how many with each man—being dispatched with them. He said, ‘They all ate from it,’ or words to that effect.

Others report: ‘So we dispersed.’ [2]

This is Bukhārī’s wording; he records it elsewhere in his Ṣaḥīḥ as well, [3] and Muslim relates it through several chains from Abū ʿUthmān ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mull al-Nihdī, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Bakr.

Another ḥadīth from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Bakr on the same theme:

Imām Aḥmad [5] narrated: ʿĀrim told us; Muʿtamir ibn Sulaymān told us, from his father, from Abū ʿUthmān, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Bakr, who said:

We were with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ—one hundred and thirty in all. The Prophet ﷺ asked,

“Does anyone have food?”

A man had about one ṣāʿ of grain, so he kneaded it. Then a tall, shaggy-haired idolater drove a flock of sheep toward us.

The Prophet ﷺ said, “Are they for sale or a gift?”—or he said, “or a present?”

He replied, “For sale.” So he bought them from him… [6]