The Idol of Thaqīf

The people of Thaqīf came to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) and accepted Islam. And it says in the narration that they tried to negotiate with the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) to leave their idol, their major idol, for a year. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) refused. They said: then leave it for a month — because they were worried that the common people among them would be shocked, and would not be able to handle seeing their so-called god fall down into rubble, fall to pieces; so they wanted to take it slowly with the people. So they said: we will accept Islam, but we do not want our idol destroyed until a year from now, so that we can take it step by step with the people. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) refused. They said: a month — he refused; a week — he refused; a day — he refused. And they tried their best to negotiate with the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), but the Messenger of Allah made it clear that he was not going to approve such a thing: for a false god to stand for one more moment was unacceptable.

So then they said: if that is the case, then we are not going to bring it down; send somebody from your side to do it. So the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) sent Abū Sufyān and al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah, who was from Thaqīf. They both went, and people started saying: wait for the diseases; wait for leprosy; wait for — they were threatening, and they were serious: they were threatening al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah that the gods would destroy him. So it says that he wanted to make fun of this belief of theirs, so he struck the idol with his axe and then pretended to fall down. So they all started screaming and shouting, happy that the gods had struck back at al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah. And then he stood up and said: you are fools; this is nothing but a piece of stone. And he started breaking it into pieces.