Insulting and Harming the Messenger

The second form, or the second response, that the people of Quraysh showed was insulting and harming the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). In Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, Abū Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates the story of Abū Jahl. He came to some of the leaders of Quraysh who were sitting next to the Kaʿbah, and he told them: "Are you allowing Muhammad to rub his face in the dirt?" — that was his evil way of saying sujūd — "Are you allowing Muhammad to rub his face in the dirt? If I see him do that, I will trample his neck. If I see him do that, I will trample over his neck and rub his face in the dirt."

The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) came and started to pray — the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) would pray publicly in front of anyone. So the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was praying right there in front of the Kaʿbah, and Abū Jahl and his friends saw this, so Abū Jahl stood up to go and fulfil his threat. He walked up to Muhammad (peace be upon him), and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was in sujūd, and suddenly they saw Abū Jahl falling back, waving his hands like someone trying to repel a danger about to befall him. Abū Jahl came back and they asked him what happened.

"What happened to you? What was wrong?" He said, "What do you mean, what happened? Didn't you see what happened?" They said, "No, we didn't. There was nothing." "Oh — what you saw is you falling on your back and waving your hands." Abū Jahl said there was a trench in front of him, and there was fire, and wings, and terror. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said, "Those were the angels. If he had come any closer to me, they would have torn him into pieces." The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) continued with his sujūd as if nothing had happened.

Then his daughter Fāṭimah (may Allah be pleased with her) saw what happened to her father, and it's very hurtful for children to see their parents being humiliated. Psychiatrists in Palestine say that this affects the psychology of children in Palestine when they see their fathers and mothers abused and kicked and hit by Israeli soldiers. So there is an entire generation of children growing up seeing their parents go through all of this abuse, and this psychiatrist was saying that it leaves some very dangerous marks and scars on their personalities. It's very detrimental, especially for children, to see their parents go through humiliation.

So Fāṭimah al-Zahrāʾ (may Allah be pleased with her) saw this happening to her father, and her father continued in sujūd, so she ran up to him and started picking all of that dirt off her father's shoulders — the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). When he finished his ṣalāh, he made a duʿāʾ, and he made this duʿāʾ publicly in front of the people of Quraysh. He said, "O Allah" — and named Abū Jahl, ʿUtbah ibn Rabīʿah, Shaybah ibn Rabīʿah, al-Walīd ibn ʿUtbah, Umayyah ibn Khalaf, and ʿUqbah ibn Abī Muʿayṭ. He made duʿāʾ against seven — only six are named here. The seventh — ʿAbdullāh ibn Masʿūd, the narrator of the hadith, said, "I forgot who the seventh was."

So the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) made duʿāʾ against them, and this was a very rare thing — that the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) would make duʿāʾ against people. But it got so bad that the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was so hurt, he made duʿāʾ against them, and he made it in front of the Kaʿbah. ʿAbdullāh ibn Masʿūd said, "I have seen with my own eyes all of these men killed in the Battle of Badr — all of them." That was the fulfilment of the duʿāʾ of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). They all died on the battlefield.

These are only a few examples; many others could be given that illuminate this point further.