The army of the elephants
The same year of his birth, Abraha, the Christian Abyssinian governor of Yemen, marched on Mecca to destroy the Kaaba and redirect Arabian pilgrimage to a cathedral he had built. He brought elephants — the first the Arabs had seen in war. The Meccans, vastly outnumbered, fled into the hills. Then Allah destroyed the army with flocks of birds carrying small stones of baked clay.
The Prophet's father, Abdullah
Abdullah ibn Abdul Muttalib, of the noble Hashim clan of Quraysh, married Aminah bint Wahb shortly before the year of the Elephant. He died on a trade journey to Medina before his son was born, leaving Aminah a young widow.
Birth in Mecca
Muhammad ﷺ was born in Mecca in the month of Rabi' al-Awwal. His grandfather Abdul Muttalib named him Muhammad — meaning 'the praised one' — a name uncommon in Arabia at the time.
Halima Sa'diyya, the wet nurse
Following Arab custom, infants of noble Mecca were sent to be nursed by Bedouin women in the desert, considered healthier than the city. Halima, of the Banu Sa'd tribe, took the orphan child despite reservations, and her household later reported that her flocks and milk increased noticeably during his time with them.
Reflection
The Prophet ﷺ entered the world an orphan, in a fragile clan, in a year his community would forever associate with Allah's protection of the Kaaba. Both circumstances — vulnerability and divine attention — would mark the rest of his life.
Primary sources
- Surah Al-Fil (Quran 105)
- Ibn Hisham, As-Sirah an-Nabawiyyah
- Ibn Sa'd, Tabaqat al-Kubra