“This is the Prophet who has been sent; he comes with the revealed truth,”[373] telling of Muhammad’s (UWBP) messengership.

Another  is the well-known  incident  which caused ‘Abbas b. Mardas to accept Islam:  there  was  an  idol  called  Dimar,  which  one  day  called  out:  “Dimar  was worshipped  before the declaration of Muhammad;  that misguidance  can no longer continue.”[374]

Before he accepted Islam, ‘Umar heard an animal sacrificed to an idol exclaim: “O sacrificer, the means of success are at hand: an eloquent man proclaiming,  ‘No god but God!’”[375]

There are very many more examples like these, which have been accepted as authentic and narrated in reliable books.

And just as soothsayers,  gnostics, invisible  jinns, and even idols and sacrifices told of Muhammad’s  (UWBP)  messengership,  and each instance was the cause of people coming to believe in him, so too inscriptions on stones over and in graves, and on gravestones, like “Muhammad, a worker of righteousness, the trustworthy,” were the means of some people coming to believe.[376]  Because, in the time shortly before Muhammad (Upon whom be blessings and peace) lived, there were only seven men bearing that name, and not one of them deserved the epithet of righteous and trustworthy.[377]

The Third Kind

These are irhasat including the wondrous events which occurred at the time of, and  in  conjunction  with,  the  birth  of  God’s  Noble  Messenger  (Upon  whom  be blessings  and  peace).  There  were  also  events  that  occurred  before  his  prophetic mission which were miracles. They were many and we shall mention a few examples that became famous, have been accepted by the authorities on Hadiths, and whose authenticity have been established.

------------------------------

[373] Bayhaqi, Dala’il al-Nubuwwa, ii, 255; Halabi, al-Sirat al-Halabiya, i, 325; Ibn Kathir, al-Bidaya wa’l-Nihaya, ii, 337; al-Haythami, Majma’ al-Zawa’id, viii, 242; ‘Ali al-Qari, Sharh al-Shifa’, i, 747; Suyuti, al-Khasa’is al-Kubra, i, 252-71.

[374] al-Haythami, Majma’ al-Zawa’id, viii, 246; Ibn Kathir, al-Bidaya wa’l-Nihaya, ii, 341-2; Bayhaqi, Dala’il al-Nubuwwa, i, 118; al-Shifa’ (Tahqiq: M. Emin Kara Ali et al.), i, 598.

[375] Bukhari, Manaqib al-Ansar, 35; al-Sa’ati, al-Fath al-Rabbani, xx, 2030.

[376] Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa’ i, 467; ‘Ali al-Qari, Sharh al-Shifa’ i, 749; Halabi, al-Sirat al-Halabiya i, 354.

[377] Halabi, al-Sirat al-Halabiya i, 131-4.