The
Prophet ordered his followers to sound the battle-call, gave his flag
to Ali,—the Arab token of appointing a commander-in-chief,—and for
twenty-five days invested the habitations of the enemy. This hapless
tribe was exterminated, sentence of death being passed upon them by Sa’ad
ibn Ma’az, an Ausi whom they constituted their judge because he belonged
to an allied tribe. Six hundred men were beheaded in the Market-place
of Al-Madinah, their property was plundered, and their wives and
children were reduced to slavery.
“Tantane relligio potuit suadere malorum!”
The Masjid Mashrabat Umm Ibrahim, or Mosque of the garden of Ibrahim’s
mother, is a place where Mariyah the Copt had a garden, and became the
mother of
[p.47] Ibrahim, the Prophet’s second son.[FN#35] It is a small building
in what is called the Awali, or highest part of the Al-Madinah plain,
to the North of the Masjid Benu Kurayzah, and near the Eastern Harrah
or ridge.[FN#36]
Northwards of Al-Bakia is, or was, a small building called the Masjid
al-Ijabah—of Granting,—from the following circumstance. One day the Prophet
stopped to perform his devotions at this place, which then belonged to
the Benu Mu’awiyah of the tribe of Aus. He made a long Dua or
supplication, and then turning to his Companions, exclaimed, “I have
asked of Allah three favours, two hath he vouchsafed to me, but the
third was refused!” Those granted were that the Moslems might never be
destroyed by famine or by deluge. The third was that they might not
perish by internecine strife.
The Masjid al-Fath (of Victory), vulgarly called the “Four Mosques,” is
situated in the Wady Al-Sayh,[FN#37] which comes from the direction of
Kuba, and about half a mile to the East of “Al-Kiblatayn.” The largest is
called the Masjid al-Fath, or Al-Ahzab—of the Troops,—and is alluded to in
the Koran. Here it is said the Prophet prayed for three days during the
Battle of the Moat, also called the affair “Al-Ahzab,” the last fought with
the Infidel Kuraysh under Abu Sufiyan. After three days of devotion, a
cold and violent blast arose, with rain
[p.48] and sleet, and discomfited the foe. The Prophet’s prayer having
here been granted, it is supposed by ardent Moslems that no petition
put up at the Mosque Al-Ahzab is ever neglected by Allah. The form of
supplication is differently quoted by different authors. When Al-Shafe’i
was in trouble and fear of Harun al-Rashid, by the virtue of this
formula he escaped all danger:
