The Meal at the House of Jābir

Miracles have been a theme of the ghazawāt. What are the miracles that happened in Ghazwat al-Khandaq?

When the Muslims were digging the trench, Jābir ibn ʿAbdullāh saw the condition of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). People were tying one stone to their stomachs, and he had two stones tied to his stomach. So he goes back to his wife and he tells her, "I've seen the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) in an intolerable condition. Do you have any food for him?" She said, "All that I have is some barley and a small goat." Jābir goes and slaughters the goat, and he tells his wife to prepare some dough for baking bread. And while the meat was cooking and she was baking the bread, he goes to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) and tells him, "I have some food for you, so you can come along with one or two of your companions." The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) asked him, "How much food do you have?" He told him. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said, "Oh, that's plenty. Tell your wife not to move the soup" — the meat was cooked in soup — "not to move the meat or the soup from its place until I come."

And then the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) stands up and, to the amazement of Jābir, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said, "O Muhājirūn, O Anṣār, Jābir has prepared some food for you." Jābir has told the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) to come along with one or two, and the Messenger of Allah has invited the entire camp: everyone is invited to Jābir's house. So Jābir runs back home, very embarrassed. What in the world are we going to do? And when you invite people and there's not enough food, that's very embarrassing. So he goes to his wife and tells her, "You know what? The Messenger of Allah is coming along with all of Ahl al-Khandaq; everyone is coming." He was worried. So she said, "Did he ask you how much food we have?" He said, "Yes." "And you told him?" He said, "Yes." She said, "Allah and His Messenger know best." Jābir said, "Those words comforted me." He knows best; you already told him how much food you have.

The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) comes in, and he would pour the soup and the meat, and then he would crush bread over it; so he was doing the dishing. And he told the Ṣaḥābah to come in and not crowd each other: come in in groups. Because they were very hungry; there could have been a stampede. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) told them: slow down, come in in groups. They would come in in groups of ten. The Messenger of Allah would prepare the food for them and bring it to them; they would eat and then they would leave; another ten would come in, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) would prepare the meal for them, and so on and so forth.

In one narration, it says that eight hundred people ate from that meal^*****, and when they were done, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) went back, and the pot was full as it was, and the bread was still baking in the oven. So the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) told the wife of Jābir to feed her neighbours. This was a miracle of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him): increasing the food, takthīr al-ṭaʿām.