A Dream Three Nights Running

Recall that the well of Zamzam was now unknown, because Jurhum had erased all of its marks and filled it in. Zamzam had not been known for about three hundred years, since Khuzāʿah had ruled over Makkah for about three hundred years. Adding to that the time from Quṣayy ibn Kilāb all the way down to ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, that comes to three hundred years plus. So the well of Zamzam was lost for over three hundred years.

ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib saw a dream. Someone came to him and told him: "Dig Ṭaybah." Ṭaybah means pure. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, in his dream, responded and said: "What is Ṭaybah?" He didn't hear anything back. That was the end of the dream. The following night, the same voice came to him and told him: "Dig the precious one." ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib said: "What is the precious one?" He didn't hear an answer back. The third night, the voice came to him and told him: "Dig Zamzam." ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib asked: "And what is Zamzam?" The voice told him: it will never fail or dry up; it will water the grand pilgrims; it lies between the dung and the blood, near the nest of the crow with the white leg, and the ants' nest.

So these were symbols, and ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib was unable to decode all of them at first. He had heard a voice in his dream telling him that Zamzam would never run out of water, that it would provide for the grand pilgrimage, that it would be sufficient to provide water for them. But then it went on to say: between the dung and the blood, and the crow with the white leg, and the nest of ants. So all of this was obscure to ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib.

ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, the next day, was going around the Kaʿbah, and he saw dung and blood — there had been a camel slaughtered in that place, and they had left its insides there, and the blood was on the other side. And then he saw a crow with a white leg in the same area, and there was a colony of ants. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib realised: this is where the well of my grandfather is. So he called his son al-Ḥārith, and they started digging.

Zamzam — as anyone who has been to Makkah knows — is not far from the Kaʿbah. So here were ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib and his son, digging right next to the Kaʿbah. Obviously, this angered the people of Quraysh — what was he doing, digging right next to the Kaʿbah? So they told him: "What are you doing?" ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib continued working, and they kept on protesting, and he kept digging with his son al-Ḥārith. At the time, ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib only had one son, so they were digging and digging, and the people were wondering: what's going on, what is this man digging for, what is he looking for? So they left him alone, and then suddenly they heard ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib shout, praising Allah (swt), and they came rushing — and to their amazement, they found that ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib had uncovered the rim of the well of Zamzam.

So now all of the leaders of Quraysh came in and said: "This is the well of our grandfather, it belongs to all of us — let's share it." ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib said: "Wait a minute. I was the one who saw the dream. I was the one who uncovered it. It belongs to me and me alone." They said: "No way. We are all descendants of Ismāʿīl (peace be upon him), so it belongs to all of us." ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib refused to give up, and they kept on insisting.