When the elders of the Quraysh heard these statements, they were disturbed. After long discussions of two days and two nights, they agreed to send in the command of Sohail bin Umroah a delegation for Hudaybiyyah, who after having necessary talks with the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) should compose "a non-aggression pact" between the Muslims and the Makkans.

When the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) saw Sohail bin Umroah coming towards them, he said to his companions that their task had become "Sahl", i.e. easy. In Arabic Sohail is derived from Sahl. After several rounds of talks between the two parties, the day came when truce was to be enacted. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) called for his son-in-law, Ali^R.A bin Abi Talib to prepare the document of the agreement.

Ali^R.A took the pen and began writing, "In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful".

Here Sohail bin Umroah immediately interrupted and said, "I do not know the Gracious and the Merciful". Ali^R.A should write, "With the name of Allah", as since ages all our Arabian agreements begin with this name.

Ali^R.A asked the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), "O Prophet of Allah, what should I do?"

The Prophet Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied, "O Ali, write, "with the name of Allah".

The son-in-law of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) started writing at his command, "This agreement takes place between Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) of Allah and Sohail bin Umroah".

Sohail bin Umroah once again interrupted and forbade him to write it and said, "We do not accept you as Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) of Allah and if we did, then why would we have stopped you from entering Makkah? Thus initiate this agreement as, "This accord takes place between Muhammad bin Abdullah and Sohail bin Umroah".

Ali^R.A looked at the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) who said, "O Ali, write the same as Sohail says, so that his consent remains". Sohail did not raise any other objection, as the basic principles of the truce had already been agreed upon. Ali^R.A who himself was a great scholar, a decent calligrapher and among the eminent of Islam, began writing the truce in the following words:

"In the name of Allah. This Accord takes place between Muhammad bin Abdullah and Sohail bin Umroah according to which the Quraysh acknowledge that war will remain suspended among the Muslims and the Quraysh for ten years".

"In these ten years, if anyone joins the Muslims, without permission of the Quraysh, it is compulsory for the Muslims to return him to the Quraysh, but if anyone leaves the Muslims to join the Quraysh, they will not return him to the Muslims".

"During these ten years, neither of the parties will attack nor hurt the other’s life or property".

"During this decade, the Quraysh will be permitted to form allies at their free will with anyone they like, and establish open alliance. Similarly, the Muslims will be allowed the same right of entering new relations with their free will for alliances".

"The Muslims will not be allowed to enter Makkah and offer pilgrimage this year, but they can come the next year for this purpose. However, the condition is that they will not stay in Makkah for more than three days and will not bring with them any arsenal except swords".

This truce that took place in the seventh Hijrah year between the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) and the Quraysh has continued a subject of debate for the Islamic historians. The Muslims of that time were greatly hurt by it. So much so that some of them considered this Truce as their defeat and humiliation.

The Muslims were wearing Ahram and had even marked the camels with Saleeqah. They were waiting desperately to enter Makkah and circumambulate the Holy Ka’bah. Some of the Muslims were the inhabitants of Makkah. They yearned to enter their native city and kiss its soil. They were sure that their wishes would be materialised, but one clause of this Truce ruined their hopes. All the Muslims, whether Ansars or Mohajirs were enraged in their hearts. They held great devotion for their Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), therefore they did not dare utter anything.

Umar bin Khatab was so straight forward and truthful that he could not hide his feelings. Whatever came to his mind he would always bring to his tongue. He went to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) and asked, "O Prophet of Allah! Had not you said that we would go to Makkah and circumambulate the Holy Ka’bah?" the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied, "Certainly O Umar^R.A! I said that, but when did I say that we would enter Makkah this year?"

"Then when will we go to Makkah and circumambulate the Holy Ka’bah?" asked Umar^R.A. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied, "Allah willing, you shall visit Makkah the next year and be able to circumambulate it".

Sohail bin Umroah, who had led the Quraysh delegation to sign the Truce from their side, had a son named Abu Jandal. He had become Muslim without letting his father know about it.

It was two days after the Truce of Hudaybiyyah, that Abu Jandal ran away from Makkah and joined the Muslims. He told them that he had become a Muslim and was their religious brother. When he reached them, Sohail bin Umroah followed in his wake. He addressed the Muslims, "According to the Pact between us, if anyone escapes the Quraysh and seeks shelter with you, it is your obligation to hand him over to us, therefore, my son, Abu Jandal should be handed over to me". The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) could not keep Abu Jandal with him and was bound by pact to return him. If they had not done so, then the pact would stand annulled. They returned Abu Jandal to his father. The new convert pleaded, "O Prophet of Allah! My father will kill me".

Consoling him the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) said, "Abu Jandal, do not be afraid, Allah will protect you". Abu Jandal escaped death and remained alive. After this incident, a wave of rage spread amongst the Muslims. First they were deprived of the pilgrimage, now their religious brother was refused help. If they had not alleged to obey their Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) whether they understood him or not, then it was quite probable that they would have passionately demolished the whole scheme. It was Bayt-e-Ridhwan that did not let them stray and thus their restlessness could not exceed the limits of internal rage and grief.

The common Muslims lacked the political foresight of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace). They could not understand the extent of benefits the ten-year Truce of Hudaybiyyah had brought them. Through this accord the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) relieved Madinah of its economic siege, and the Medinite caravans could travel again. The Muslims also gained the opportunity of forming alliance at their own free will with anyone whom they pleased. The greatest enemy of the Muslims was the Quraysh, it provided a respite against them as well.

The common Muslims were at a loss to understand the great political benefits that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had acquired without bloodshed or losing anything. Emotionally, they were considering refusal from entering Makkah, their defeat and insult. In particular, they were much hurt by the fact that they had to return Abu Jandal to the Quraysh whose cruelty they had witnessed so often. It was their principle to help the refugee with their life and property, irrespective of who he was. Abu Jandal had escaped, after the agreement had been signed, therefore it was no insult for the Muslims to return him. Rather it proved that the Muslims were true to their words under every condition. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) observed that the Muslims were extremely aggrieved. He asked them to assemble once again at Hudaybiyyah and addressed them, "This pact, which has taken place between us and the Quraysh, is a Fath-e-Mubeen", a victory which is sudden and brilliant, so why do you grieve".

At the time of the treaty of Hudaybiyyah, a verse was revealed upon the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) which is included in the 48^th Surah of the Holy Qur’an;

Some Islamic scholars argue that this verse was revealed at the conquest of Makkah which occurred after the Truce of Hudaybiyyah, while others opine that it is related to the conquest of Khaybar. However, according to some religious scholars it is for all the Islamic victories and it includes the political victory of Hudaybiyyah.

Before the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had completed his statement, one of the Muslims said in an aggrieved tone; "We have been deprived of the pilgrimage and now we cannot circumambulate the Holy Ka’bah!" the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied, "If you offer your pilgrimage from here, Allah will accept your pilgrimage. This deed will be as good as if you have circumambulated the Holy Ka’bah. I shall also offer pilgrimage from here and we shall sacrifice our camels here. I shall have my head shaven and come out of Ahram. You also do the same. Have your heads shaven and come out of Ahram after me".

Another person from the Muslims wanted further elaboration, "O Prophet of Allah! Tell us about Abu Jandal’s return to the Quraysh and also tell us what sort of agreement is this that we cannot claim our people who flee away from here, but we are bound to return those who escape the Unbelievers?"

The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied with great fortitude, "Abu Jandal has been returned in accordance to the recent pact, therefore there lies no insult or humility in it for the Muslims. Besides, I am sure no harm will come to Abu Jandal. It is Allah’s will that he will remain alive. If he is killed, he shall have eternal felicity because he will be a "Shaheed" and a Shaheed after death goes straight to Paradise. He is exalted to a great and magnanimous status. Why we have not stressed that Makkans should return those who run away from us, is because a person who revokes Islam is not from us and therefore we have no longer any relation with him. Such a person will not be beneficent and helpful to us, rather he would be treacherous and an apostate. This accord is a glorious victory, it will keep us safe from Quraysh’s intrigues for the next ten years. In these ten years, undaunted by the malice of the Quraysh, we can convert tribes living in the territories of Madinah to Islam. We can also form alliances and friendship with anyone we please. The immediate benefit of this Truce is that Madinah that was hitherto under economic siege, will be freed again and we can make ourselves economically strong".

The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied, "You say it right, I have dictated myself to be written as Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) bin Abdullah but not because I am not the Apostle of Allah. We, the Muslims have neither been degraded by this nor any harm has come to us. I have not caused myself to be written as Rasool-Allah in lieu of the Quraysh desire. Their wish was a childish demand and if we had not accepted it, we also would have committed a childish act. I therefore accepted what they wanted and by this acceptance, we did not lose anything, instead we were successful in achieving our aim, which was to put aside the danger of the Quraysh. We can now preach Islam without hesitation. We should try to make ourselves strong and firm".

Umar^R.A was still struggling with his feelings. He could not resist saying, "O Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) of Allah! Is not our religion righteous and that of the unbelievers false? If so then why should a truthful religion adopt a lenient attitude before a false one and accept its every statement?" After some period, Umar^R.A bin Khatab himself came to realise the benefits of the truce of Hudaybiyyah and understood the great political victory the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had won for the Muslims. Under the peaceful shadow derived from this truce, the Muslims swiftly propagated their religion and led many tribes to enter Islam.

When they were heading north, i.e. towards Madinah, another Muslim met them in the way who had run away from Makkah, He joined them and sought refuge. At first, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) did not give any reply, as he thought it might be a trick and the Quraysh might have deliberately sent him to them to judge their sincerity. On investigation, it was found, that this person was really a Muslim and his name was Abu Baseer. Distressed by the Quraysh atrocities he had joined the Muslims. He had not yet breathed a sigh of relief that two men of Quraysh also came there and said, "O Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), according to the recent accord, Abu Baseer should be handed over to us".

This time Umar^R.A stepped ahead and said, "O Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) of Allah! This time does not send this person back. He has come to seek refuge from us. We will not let him fall in the hands of the Quraysh, even if it costs us our lives!".

The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) replied decisively that they were bound by the pact and therefore he could not violate it. At this reply, the two persons from Makkah, tied Abu Baseer on a camel and gradually disappeared before their eyes.

Abu Baseer was a strong and a brave man. On the way he broke away the ropes and freed himself. He climbed down his camel and killed one of his captives, whereas the other ran away. Abu Baseer joined the Muslims again and asked for portage. This time not only he had escaped from the Quraysh, but had murdered one of them, and now he could be inquired for blood-money for the deceased.

The next day, the person who had escaped alive, reached the Muslim caravan and demanded Abu Baseer to be handed over. Again the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) ordered Abu Baseer to go with him, but before the Quraysh representative could take him, Abu Baseer escaped from him again.

Instead of returning to Makkah, he decided to take refuge in the vast desert. He had now committed a murder and going to Makkah would have jeopardised his life. He could also not join with the Muslims to go to Madinah. Muslims had become bound by the treaty of Hudaybiyyah and would have to return him if the Quraysh asked them for him. An Arab poet Sanfara, puts Abu Baseer’s thoughts in the following words:

"O brothers! Follow me not, As I am out in wilderness, And as I seek new friends there!"

"O Friends! Look for me, as loneliness is my fate. I will seek my way in the Dark Night, and from today my friends shall be leopards of the desert, cunning wolves and long-haired badgers! With whom I will have to live!"

However, after escaping from the Quraysh, Abu Baseer reached a region called "Zulmarrwah". He decided to stay and live at this place. After a few days, Abu Jandal also managed to escape from Makkah and joined Abu Baseer at Zulmarrwah. Another Muslim, Utbah bin Sa’ad, also escaped from Makkah and reached there. Gradually there started arriving Muslims from Makkah to this place. These men formed a separate Islamic group. The activities of these men did not fall in the jurisdiction of the recent pact as Zulmarrwah was neither part of Makkah nor was under Islamic sovereignty, therefore their liability did not rest with the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace). A year had not passed that the Muslims increased to a considerable number at Zulmarrwah. They formed a permanent army of their own and started to recover booty by intercepting Makkan caravans to meet their needs. Gradually these Muslims teased the Quraysh so much that they surrendered. They requested the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) to call the Muslims of Zulmarrwah to Madinah. They would not require them to return to Makkah under the pact. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) asked the Quraysh to request him in writing as a proof. Thus the clause of the accord of Hudaybiyyah, which the Muslims considered humiliating to them, automatically stood nullified.

By their own hands, the Quraysh provided a written proof that if a person escaped Makkah to join the Muslims, he was not to be returned to them. It was only then that the common Muslims realised they had been in the wrong. The "Truce of Hudaybiyyah" was indeed a great victory.

When the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) returned to Madinah after the treaty of Hudaybiyyah, severe drought engulfed Makkah. In Arabia, there was a tribe whose dominions were considered a store-house of eatables. This tribe was "Yamamah". All people of this tribe had entered Faith. For the same reason, the Chief of the tribe imposed a restriction on selling eatables to Makkah. With the coming of drought, the Makkans looked forward to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) and requested him to intercede and tell the tribe’s Chief to allow eatables to be sold to them. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) accepted their request and instructed the chieftain of Yamamah to remove restriction on selling goods to the Makkans. Besides, this gesture, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) himself sent five hundred gold coins to Makkah to be distributed among the poor and the needy.

When Abu Sufyan heard that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had sent gold coins to Makkah, he felt that the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) intended to win the hearts of Makkans and poor by so doing. In addition to the five hundred coins, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had also sent an ample supply of dates to Abu Sufyan with the message that for the price of these dates, he could sell them leather or hides. Abu Sufyan had some leather for sale. In famine struck city of Makkah, where everyone, was searching for a piece of bread or dates to satisfy his hunger, no one was interested in buying leather from Abu Sufyan. Abu Sufyan tried to return the dates back, but he could not do so, as the Makkans had come to know about that. They were dying from hunger, so they did not let Abu Sufyan return the dates. Abu Sufyan had to accept the dates and sell leather in exchange.

Affection for the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) surged in the hearts of the Makkans when they knew that the dates had been sent by the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace). The Quraysh, who were among the elite of Makkah and had contrived their malice against the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) - were not moved by this gesture.

The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) knew the Quraysh were his enemies, still he endeavoured to maintain healthy mutual ties with them. He considered such relations essential for the propagation of Islam. A prophet loves Allah so much that he is always ready to bequeath everything for Him. In the Jewish "Talmud" is written that Allah expects His prophet to hold Him dear by heart and soul and to sacrifice everything that is his in His way, from his name to his life".

The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had received the news that Abu Sufyan‘s daughter, the wife of Abdullah bin Hajjash, Umm-e-Habibah, had become a widow. Abdullah bin Hajjash was a Hanif, who, along with his wife had migrated to Abyssinia (Habsha). He revoked Islam while he was in Abyssinia. When he died leaving Umm-e-Habibah as widow, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) decided to ask her hand in marriage. He knew that by this marriage, he would become son-in-law to Abu Sufyan. Once this relationship with the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) was established, then all the people of Banu Umayyah would become his near relations. They would thus not be able to express their malice against him. She was in Abyssinia and the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) in Madinah. He was thinking that after her return, Abu Sufyan and the people of Banu Umayyah would not let her marry him thus he sent a person to Abyssinia as his advocate for this matrimony.

It was also likely that on her entering the lands of Arabia, the Quraysh might intercept and stop her from going to Madinah to become the Prophet’s (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) wife. The Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) of Allah dictated a letter that was to be presented to Najashi - the ruler of Abyssinia. The instructions were that the emissary was to contact Umm-e-Habibah and ask her consent for the marriage. If the answer was affirmative, then the letter was to be given to Najashi. In the said letter, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) had asked the king of Abyssinia to read the matrimonial rites of Umm-e-Habibah, who lived in the King’s domains.

Umm-e-Habibah gave her consent. Najashi while observing the Prophet’s (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) instructions read out the matrimonial rites for her in the name of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) in absentia. After a few days, Abu Sufyan‘s daughter, now the Prophet’s (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) wife left Abyssinia for Madinah.

The Quraysh had come to know of this relationship but they were helpless in stopping Umm-e-Habibah from reaching Madinah. She had now become the wife of the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace). All the Arabs knew that a wife could not be stopped from going to her husband.

This relationship played a key role in converting Quraysh to Islam. As Umm-e-Habibah was Abu Sufyan’s daughter she had links with all the eminent Quraysh families. Whenever Abu Sufyan opened his mouth against Islam, he was forced to recall that he was going to oppose a person related to his own family and thus had to remain quiet.

On the other hand, the accord of Hudaybiyyah offered great opportunity to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) to counteract the Jewish intrigues against the Muslims. The Makkans were now compelled to stay neutral in any Muslim friendship or strife so the Muslims could take the Jews to task without fear from the Makkans. That was another benefit derived from the accord of Hudaybiyyah.