Aqaba and the Hijra

The two pledges of Aqaba

At the pilgrimage, around 620, six men of the Khazraj met the Prophet ﷺ at Aqaba and believed in him (Ibn Hisham, I, 429; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 181). Ibn Ishaq introduces their number and their names with “according to what I was told” (Ibn Hisham, I, 429). They hoped that God would unite through him their people, torn apart by enmity; and they had heard their Jewish neighbours speak of a coming prophet (Ibn Hisham, I, 429; research file v1, part 2).

The following year, around 621, twelve men took the first pledge of Aqaba, known as the pledge “of the women”, with no commitment to fight (Ibn Hisham, I, 431, 433; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 183). Ubada ibn al-Samit, who was present, transmitted its terms (Ibn Hisham, I, 433; Bukhari 18). Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, who counts the meeting of the six as a first Aqaba, counts three (Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 181, 183). The Prophet ﷺ sent Mus’ab ibn Umayr back with them to teach the Qur’an (Ibn Hisham, I, 434): “the first to come to us was Mus’ab ibn Umayr”, al-Bara recalls (Bukhari 3925).

At the next pilgrimage, around 622, during the days of Tashriq, seventy-three men and two women took the second pledge; twelve leaders were appointed, nine from the Khazraj and three from the Aws (Ibn Hisham, I, 442-443, 454; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 189-190). The account comes from Ka’b ibn Malik, who was present, through his sons (Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 189). Al-Bara ibn Ma’rur spoke the commitment: “we will protect you from all that we protect our families from” (Ibn Hisham, I, 442).

The permission to fight

Until then, the Prophet ﷺ had not been permitted to fight: he called, endured and forgave (Ibn Hisham, I, 467). The permission came when he was driven out of Mecca:

Ibn Abbas links the revelation of these verses to the moment the Prophet ﷺ was driven out of Mecca (Tirmidhi 3171). Al-Tirmidhi grades this hadith hasan, and notes a version that does not go back to Ibn Abbas. The verse itself points to the moment: permission is given to those “who were driven from their homes”.

Two other views place it elsewhere. Ibn Ishaq sets it just before the departure, at the time of the last pledge of Aqaba, and names this as the first verse “according to what has reached me from Urwa ibn al-Zubayr and other scholars” (Ibn Hisham, I, 467). Al-Nadwi, a modern author, places it after the settlement in Medina (al-Nadwi, p. 293).

The Prophet ﷺ then ordered the believers of Mecca to emigrate: “God has given you brothers and an abode where you will be safe” (Ibn Hisham, I, 468).

The plot

Quraysh held council at Dar al-Nadwa (Ibn Hisham, I, 480; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 207). The Qur’an recalls it:

Ibn Ishaq adds that Iblis, in the guise of an old man from Najd, attended the council (Ibn Hisham, I, 480-481): a detail of his own account, which the Qur’an does not give. Yet these men who plotted his death had entrusted their valuables to him ﷺ: Ali stayed behind to return them (Ibn Hisham, I, 485).

Three nights in the cave

The Prophet ﷺ left with Abu Bakr, on a Monday according to Ibn Abbas, in Ahmad (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 232). They stayed three nights in the cave of Thawr, then took the road with a guide from the Banu al-Dil (Bukhari 3905; Ibn Hisham, I, 486).

In the cave, the Prophet ﷺ said to Abu Bakr: “What do you think of two whose third is God?” (Bukhari 3653). The Qur’an recalls the scene (Ibn Hisham, II, 549):

“The disbelievers drove him out”: thirteen years earlier, Waraqa had foretold it (Bukhari 3).

On the road, Suraqa ibn Malik caught up with them; the account comes from Suraqa himself, transmitted by his family (Bukhari 3906). The episode of Umm Ma’bad and her ewe is not in al-Bukhari’s account (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 251); Ibn Kathir nonetheless calls it “famous, reported through paths that strengthen one another” (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 257). The journey took about fifteen days, by Ibn Kathir’s reckoning (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 257).

The arrival at Quba

The Prophet ﷺ arrived at Quba, among the Banu Amr ibn Awf, on a Monday in Rabi’ I of 1 AH. The day is debated: the 12th according to Ibn Ishaq, the view “well known, that of the majority” (24 September 622), or the 2nd according to al-Waqidi (14 September 622) (Ibn Hisham, I, 492; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 221; Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 290). A Jew who saw him coming cried out to the Arabs that the one they were waiting for had come (Ibn Hisham, I, 492; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, I, 214; Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 250).

He ﷺ stayed at Quba for a few days and founded a mosque there: from Monday to Thursday according to Ibn Ishaq, longer according to the Banu Amr ibn Awf (Ibn Hisham, I, 494); fourteen nights according to Anas (Bukhari 3932); a little over ten nights according to Urwa ibn al-Zubayr, in al-Bukhari (Bukhari 3906). On the way to Medina, among the Banu Salim, he prayed the first Friday prayer he prayed, and gave the first sermon he delivered in Islam (Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, II, 351).

The meaning of the Hijra

The early sources do not build a theory of the Hijra: they convey its meaning through verses and sayings.

• A forced departure. Standing at al-Hazwara, the Prophet ﷺ said to Mecca: “You are the best of God’s land and the most beloved of it to God; had I not been driven out of you, I would not have left” (Tirmidhi 3925, which al-Tirmidhi grades hasan sahih gharib).
• The beginning of a community. Gathered by Umar to fix a calendar, the Companions set aside the birth, the mission and the death, and chose the Hijra (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 287-288). Sahl ibn Sa’d said: “they counted neither from his mission nor from his death, but from his arrival in Medina” (Bukhari 3934). The era was fixed in 16, 17 or 18 AH (Ibn Kathir, al-Sira, II, 287).
• A stage, not a permanent rite. The Prophet ﷺ said: “No hijra after the conquest, but striving and intention” (Bukhari 2783). And he said of the Ansar: “Were it not for the Hijra, I would have been one of the Ansar” (Bukhari 3779).

Al-Nadwi’s reading

Abu al-Hasan al-Nadwi (d. 1999), a modern author, adds no facts to the sources: he offers a reading of them, which we summarise, tying each fact to the early sources.

Why Medina. He sees in the choice of Yathrib a preparation willed by God (al-Nadwi, p. 226-231). The Aws and the Khazraj had come out of their wars exhausted: Aisha says of the day of Bu’ath that God had sent it ahead for His Messenger ﷺ (Bukhari 3777). The city was protected by its lava fields and its palm groves: “a land of palm trees between two lava fields”, which the Prophet ﷺ had been shown in a dream (Bukhari 3905). Its people had never submitted: even in their pagan days, Sa’d ibn Mu’adh recalls, Ghatafan could not hope to eat a single one of their dates, except as hospitality or for payment (Ibn Hisham, II, 223).

The price of the Hijra. For al-Nadwi, the Hijra established that faith comes before homeland, family and property (al-Nadwi, p. 239-240). The sources bear this out: Umm Salama was separated from her husband and her son (Ibn Hisham, I, 469); Suhayb gave up all his wealth to Quraysh, in a report that Ibn Hisham introduces with “it was mentioned to me, from Abu Uthman al-Nahdi, that he said: it has reached me” (Ibn Hisham, I, 477); the Prophet ﷺ loved Mecca, and left it only when driven out (Tirmidhi 3925; Tirmidhi 3926).

How this page connects to the others

• Waraqa foretells the expulsion: The revelation and the first believers.
• The Jews of Yathrib: The witnesses of the expectation.
• What follows: Medina: the community and the pact.
• The dream of the land of palm trees: Fulfilled in his lifetime.

Sources for this page

• Qur’an: Tanzil text (Uthmani); translation of the meaning by the site.
• Hadiths: Bukhari 3, Bukhari 18, Bukhari 2783, Bukhari 3653, Bukhari 3777, Bukhari 3779, Bukhari 3905, Bukhari 3906, Bukhari 3925, Bukhari 3932, Bukhari 3934, Tirmidhi 3171, Tirmidhi 3925, Tirmidhi 3926.
• Ibn Hisham, al-Sira al-nabawiyya, ed. al-Saqqa, al-Abyari and Shalabi, Cairo, 1955, I, 429-494; II, 223, 549.
• Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, Uyun al-athar, Beirut, 1993, I, 181-221; II, 351.
• Ibn Kathir, al-Sira al-nabawiyya, ed. Mustafa Abd al-Wahid, Beirut, 1976, II, 232-290.
• Abu al-Hasan Ali al-Hasani al-Nadwi, al-Sira al-nabawiyya, Dar Ibn Kathir, Damascus and Beirut, 12th ed., 2004, p. 226-240, 293.
• Research file “The message and the Hijra”, v1.0, 2 November 2026, section 4, “The meaning of the Hijra”; research file “The Prophet ﷺ Foretold”, v1.0, part 2.