and Majestic—sent Muhammad ﷺ to both species, humankind and jinn, and made it incumbent upon them to believe in him and in what he brought, to obey him, to deem lawful whatever Allah and His Messenger have declared lawful, to deem unlawful whatever Allah and His Messenger have declared unlawful, to love what Allah and His Messenger love, and to abhor what Allah and His Messenger abhor. Whoever, from either mankind or jinn, has had the proof of Muhammad’s mission established against him yet still does not believe in him, deserves the punishment of Allah, just as do the other disbelievers to whom a messenger was sent. This is a principle unanimously acknowledged by the Companions, the Followers who excelled them, the leading scholars of the Muslims, and all the diverse groups among the Muslims—Ahl al-Sunnah wa-l-Jamāʿah and others altogether.”
4- Among his ﷺ unique distinctions is the Noble Qur’an, whose miraculous nature compelled both mankind and jinn to submit; the most eloquent disputants among humans and jinn recoiled from challenging it, and the masters of rhetoric of every religion admitted their inability to produce even the shortest surah like it. The details of this have been set out earlier.
5- Another of his ﷺ special virtues is the miʿrāj, the Ascension through the highest heavens, up to the Lote-Tree of the Ultimate Boundary, to the point where he heard the scraping of the Pens, until he was “two bow-lengths away, or even nearer.”
As for the privileges granted to him alone, excluding his community, al-Qurṭubī said in his Tafsīr: “Allah, Exalted, singled out His Messenger with specific legal rulings in the realms of obligations, prohibitions, and permissions that no one else shares with him. They are an honor above the community, a divine gift, and a rank uniquely his. Certain acts were made obligatory for him that were not made obligatory for others; certain things were forbidden to him that were not forbidden to them; and certain matters were made lawful for him that were not made lawful for them. Some of these points are agreed upon, while others are disputed.”
He then listed these special rulings, among them night vigil (tahajjud). It is said that standing in prayer at night was obligatory for him until he died, because of Allah’s words: “O you who are wrapped up, stand in prayer at night, save a little” 1. The explicit legal position, however, is that it was first obligatory for him and was later abrogated by His words: “And during a part of the night, keep vigil by it in supererogatory prayer for you” 2. Another of his exclusive qualities is that whenever he performed a deed, he established it permanently.