(the wife of the Prophet) The commencement (of the Divine Inspiration) to Allah's Apostle was in the form of true dreams in his sleep, for he never had a dream but it turned out to be true and clear as the bright daylight. Then he began to like seclusions, so he used to go in seclusion in the cave of Hira where he used to worship Allah continuously for many nights before going back to his family to take the necessary provision (of food) for the stay. He come back to (his wife) Khadija again to take his provision (of food) likewise, till one day he received the Guidance while he was in the cave of Hira. An Angel came to him and asked him to read. Allah's Apostle replied, "I do not know how to read." The Prophet added, "Then the Angel held me (forcibly) and pressed me so hard that I felt distressed. Then he released me and again asked me to read, and I replied, 'I do not know how to read.' Thereupon he held me again and pressed me for the second time till I felt distressed. He then released me and asked me to read, but again I replied. 'I do not know how to read.' Thereupon he held me for the third time and pressed me till I got distressed, and then he released me and said, 'Read, in the Name of your Lord Who has created (all that exists), has created man out of a clot, Read! And your Lord is the Most Generous. Who has taught (the writing) by the pen, has taught man that which he knew not." (96.1-5). Then Allah's Apostle returned with that experience; and the muscles between his neck and shoulders were trembling till he came upon Khadija (his wife) and said, "Cover me!" They covered him, and when the state of fear was over, he said to Khadija, "O Khadija! What is wrong with me? I was afraid that something bad might happen to me." Then he told her the story. Khadija said, "Nay! But receive the good tidings! By Allah, Allah will never disgrace you, for by Allah, you keep good relations with your Kith and kin, speak the truth, help the poor and the destitute, entertain your guests generously and assist those who are stricken with calamities." Khadija then took him to Waraqa bin Naufil, the son of Khadija's paternal uncle. Waraqa had been converted to Christianity in the Pre-lslamic Period and used to write Arabic and write of the Gospel in Arabic as much as Allah wished him to write. He was an old man and had lost his eyesight. Khadija said (to Waraqa), "O my cousin! Listen to what your nephew is going to say." Waraqa said, "O my nephew! What have you seen?" The Prophet then described whatever he had seen. Waraqa said, "This is the same Angel (Gabriel) who was sent to Moses. I wish I were young." He added some other statement. Allah's Apostle asked, "Will these people drive me out?" Waraqa said, "Yes, for nobody brought the like of what you have brought, but was treated with hostility. If I were to remain alive till your day (when you start preaching). then I would support you strongly." But a short while later Waraqa died and the Divine Inspiration was paused (stopped) for a while so that Allah's Apostle was very much grieved.

When Abu Dhar received the news of the Advent of the Prophet he said to his brother, "Ride to this valley (of Mecca) and try to find out the truth of the person who claims to be a prophet who is informed of the news of Heaven. Listen to what he says and come back to me." So his brother set out and came to the Prophet and listened to some of his talks, and returned to Abu Dhar and said to him. "I have seen him enjoining virtuous behavior and saying something that is not poetry." Abu Dhar said, "You have not satisfied me as to what I wanted." He then took his journey-food and carried a waterskin of his, containing some water till be reached Mecca. He went to the Mosque and searched for the Prophet and though he did not know him, he hated to ask anybody about him. When a part of the night had passed away, `Ali saw him and knew that he was a stranger. So when Abu Dhar saw `Ali, he followed him, and none of them asked his companion about anything, and when it was dawn, Abu Dhar took his journey food and his water-skin to the Mosque and stayed there all the day long without being perceived by the Prophet, and when it was evening, he came back to his retiring place. `Ali passed by him and said, "Has the man not known his dwelling place yet?" So `Ali awakened him and took him with him and none of them spoke to the other about anything. When it was the third day. `Ali did the same and Abu Dhar stayed with him. Then `Ali said "Will you tell me what has brought you here?" Abu Dhar said, "If you give me a firm promise that you will guide me, then I will tell you." `Ali promised him, and he informed `Ali about the matter. `Ali said, "It is true, and he is the Apostle of Allah. Next morning when you get up, accompany me, and if I see any danger for you, I will stop as if to pass water, but if I go on, follow me and enter the place which I will enter." Abu Dhar did so, and followed `Ali till he entered the place of the Prophet, and Abu Dhar went in with him, Abu Dhar listened to some of the Prophet's talks and embraced Islam on the spot. The Prophet said to him, "Go back to your people and inform them (about it) till you receive my order." Abu Dhar said, "By Him in Whose Hand my life is, I will proclaim my conversion loudly amongst them (i.e. the pagans)." So he went out, and when he reached the Mosque, he said as loudly as possible, "I bear witness that None has the right to be worshipped except Allah, and Muhammad is the Apostle of Allah." The People got up and beat him painfully. Then Al-Abbas came and knelt over him ((to protect him) and said (to the people), "Woe to you! Don't you know that this man belongs to the tribe of Ghifar and your trade to Sha'm is through their way?" So he rescued him from them. Abu Dhar again did the same the next day. They beat him and took vengeance on him and again Al-Abbas knelt over him (to protect him).

From Sa`d bin Mu`adh: Sa`d bin Mu`adh was an intimate friend of Umaiya bin Khalaf and whenever Umaiya passed through Medina, he used to stay with Sa`d, and whenever Sa`d went to Mecca, he used to stay with Umaiya. When Allah's Apostle arrived at Medina, Sa`d went to perform `Umra and stayed at Umaiya's home in Mecca. He said to Umaiya, "Tell me of a time when (the Mosque) is empty so that I may be able to perform Tawaf around the Ka`ba." So Umaiya went with him about midday. Abu Jahl met them and said, "O Abu Safwan! Who is this man accompanying you?" He said, "He is Sa`d." Abu Jahl addressed Sa`d saying, "I see you wandering about safely in Mecca inspite of the fact that you have given shelter to the people who have changed their religion (i.e. became Muslims) and have claimed that you will help them and support them. By Allah, if you were not in the company of Abu Safwan, you would not be able to go your family safely." Sa`d, raising his voice, said to him, "By Allah, if you should stop me from doing this (i.e. performing Tawaf) I would certainly prevent you from something which is more valuable for you, that is, your passage through Medina." On this, Umaiya said to him, "O Sa`d do not raise your voice before Abu-l-Hakam, the chief of the people of the Valley (of Mecca)." Sa`d said, "O Umaiya, stop that! By Allah, I have heard Allah's Apostle predicting that the Muslim will kill you." Umaiya asked, "In Mecca?" Sa`d said, "I do not know." Umaiya was greatly scared by that news. When Umaiya returned to his family, he said to his wife, "O Um Safwan! Don't you know what Sa`d told me? "She said, "What has he told you?" He replied, "He claims that Muhammad has informed them (i.e. companions that they will kill me. I asked him, 'In Mecca?' He replied, 'I do not know." Then Umaiya added, "By Allah, I will never go out of Mecca." But when the day of (the Ghazwa of) Badr came, Abu Jahl called the people to war, saying, "Go and protect your caravan." But Umaiya disliked to go out (of Mecca). Abu Jahl came to him and said, "O Abu Safwan! If the people see you staying behind though you are the chief of the people of the Valley, then they will remain behind with you." Abu Jahl kept on urging him to go until he (i.e. Umaiya) said, "As you have forced me to change my mind, by Allah, I will buy the best camel in Mecca. Then Umaiya said (to his wife). "O Um Safwan, prepare what I need (for the journey)." She said to him, "O Abu Safwan! Have you forgotten what your Yathribi brother told you?" He said, "No, but I do not want to go with them but for a short distance." So when Umaiya went out, he used to tie his camel wherever he camped. He kept on doing that till Allah caused him to be killed at Badr.

The Prophet (saws) said: The supplication which gets the quickest answer is that made by one distant Muslim for another.

She never saw the Prophet (saws) fasting the whole month except Sha'ban which he combined with Ramadan.

The Prophet (saws) said: Blood-wit for every wound which lays bare a bone is five camels.

The Messenger of Allah (saws) was shrouded in three garments of white Yemeni stuff, among which was neither a shirt nor a turban.

Malik said, "The generally agreed-on way of doing things in our community is that any setting-free which a man makes in a bequest that he wills in health or illness can be rescinded by him when he likes and changed when he likes as long as it is not a tadbir. There is no way to rescind a tadbir once he has made it.

"As for every child born to him by a slave-girl who he wills to be set free but he does not make mudabbara, her children are not freed with her when she is freed. That is because her master can change his will when he likes and rescind it when he likes, and being set free is not confirmed for her. She is in the position of a slave-girl whose master says, 'If so- and-so remains with me until I die, she is free.' " (i.e. he does not make a definite contract.)

Malik said, "If she fulfils that, that is hers. If he wishes, before that, he can sell her and her child because he has not entered her child into any condition he has made for her.

"The bequest in setting free is different from the tadbir. The precedent of the sunna makes a distinction between them. Had a bequest been in the position of a tadbir, no testator would be able to change his will and what he mentioned in it of setting free. His property would be tied up and he would not be able to use it."

Malik said about a man who made all his slaves mudabbar while he was well and they were his only property, "If he made some of them mudabbar before the others, one begins with the first until the third of his property is reached. (i.e. their value is matched against the third, and those whose value is covered are free.) If he makes the mall mudabbar in his illness, and says in one statement, 'So-and-so is free. So-and-so is free. So-and-so is free if my death occurs in this illness,' or he makes them all mudabbar in one statement, they are matched against the third and one does not begin with any of them before the others. It is a bequest and they have a third of his property divided between them in shares. Then the third of his property frees each of them according to the extent of his share.

"No single one of them is given preference when that all occurs in his illness."

Malik spoke about a master who made his slave a mudabbar and then he died and the only property he had was the mudabbar slave and the slave had property. He said, "A third of the mudabbar is freed and his property remains in his possession."

Malik said about a mudabbar whose master gave him a kitaba and then the master died and did not leave any property other than him, "A third of him is freed and a third of his kitaba is reduced, and he owes two-thirds."

Malik spoke about a man who freed half of his slave while he was ill and made irrevocable his freeing half of him or all of him, and he had made another slave of his mudabbar before that. He said, "One begins with the slave he made mudabbar before the one he freed while he was ill. That is because the man cannot revoke what he has made mudabbar and cannot follow it with a matter which will rescind it. When this mudabbar is freed, then what remains of the third goes to the one who had half of him freed so as to complete his setting-free entirely in the third of the property of the deceased. If what is left of the third does not cover that, whatever is covered by what is left of the third is freed after the first mudabbar is freed . "

The Prophet (saws) said: The mill of Islam will go round till the year thirty-five, or thirty-six, or thirty-seven; then if they perish, they will have followed the path of those who perished before them, but if their religion is maintained, it will be maintained for seventy years. I asked: Does it mean seventy years which remain or seventy years which are gone by? He replied: It means (seventy years) that are gone by.

Abu Dawud said: Those who recorded Khirash, the name of a narrator, are wrong. (The correct name is Hirash)

Yahya related to me from Malik that Ibn Shihab said that he had heard Said ibn al-Musayyab, Humayd ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Awf, Ubaydullah ibn Abdullah ibn Utba ibn Masud, and Sulayman ibn Yasarall say, that they had heard Abu Hurayra say that he had heard Umar ibn al-Khattab say, "If a woman is divorced by her husband once or twice, and he leaves her until she is free to marry and she marries another husband and he dies or divorces her, and then she marries her first husband, she is with him according to what remains of her divorce."

Malik said, "That is what is done among us and there is no dispute about it."