Home > Sira > The journey of young Mohamed to Syria with Abu Talib and Bahira
The journey of young Mohamed to Syria with Abu Talib: the monk Bahira at Bosra, the unexpected meal, the seal of prophethood between the shoulders, al-Khara’iti’s version with the seven Romans, Ibn Kathir’s reservations and the youth with Abu Talib, from Ibn Ishaq, at-Tirmidhi and al-Bayhaqi.
Updated on 07 September 2026 at 11:07 PM
Ibn Ishaq said: Abu Talib then set out with a trading caravan toward Syria. When he was ready to depart and the caravan began to move, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) wept over him, as it is related: Abu Talib was moved to pity for him and said: “By Allah, I shall go out with him and never leave him, and he shall never leave me,” or words to that effect. So he went with him.
When the caravan halted at Bosra, in the land of Syria, there was there a monk named Bahira, in his monastery: he held the Christians’ knowledge, and that monastery had never ceased to have a monk toward whom their knowledge was transmitted, from a book : as it is related : inherited generation after generation. Caravans often passed by him without his speaking to them or honoring them, until that year: when they halted near his monastery, he prepared for them an abundant meal, because : as it is related : of something he saw from his monastery: he had seen the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) in the caravan at their approach, and a cloud shading him amid the people. Then they approached and halted in the shade of a tree near him; he looked at the cloud shading the tree, its branches bending over the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) until he sheltered beneath it. Seeing that, Bahira descended from his monastery, having ordered the meal prepared, then sent to them: “I have prepared for you a meal, O assembly of Quraysh: I wish you all to come, great and small, slave and free.”
A man of them said to him: “By Allah, Bahira, you have today an affair! You never did this with us, and we often passed by you: what is the matter today?” Bahira said to him: “You have spoken truly: it was so; but you are guests, and I wished to honor you and prepare you a meal whereof you all eat.” They gathered to him; the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) stayed behind the people, because of his young age, among the baggage under the tree. Bahira, seeing them, saw not the sign he knew and recognized, and said: “O assembly of Quraysh, let none of you fail my meal.” They said: “O Bahira, none fails you who should come save a boy, the youngest of us, left in our baggage.” He said: “Do not: call him, let him join this meal with you.” A man of Qurayz among the people said: “By al-Lat and al-Uzza, it would be cowardice in us that Muhammad ibn Abdallah fail a meal among us!” Then he rose to him, embraced him in his arm and seated him with the people. Bahira, seeing him, began gazing at him intensely and examining things of his body that he found of his description.
When the people finished their meal and dispersed, Bahira came to him and said: “O boy, I ask you by al-Lat and al-Uzza to inform me of what I ask you.” If Bahira said that to him, it is because he had heard his people swear by them; it is claimed the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said to him: “Question me not by al-Lat and al-Uzza: by Allah, nothing has ever disgusted me as much as them.” Bahira said to him: “By Allah, then: answer me of what I ask you.” He said to him: “Ask me of what pleases you.” Bahira questioned him of his sleep, his appearance and his affairs, and the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) informed him, which accorded with what Bahira held of his description. Then he looked at his back and saw the seal of prophethood between his two shoulders, at its described place. When he finished, he turned to his uncle Abu Talib: “What is this boy to you?” He said: “My son.” Bahira said: “He is not your son: this boy should not have his father living.” He said: “He is my brother’s son.” Bahira said: “What became of his father?” He said: “He died, his mother pregnant with him.” Bahira said: “You have spoken truly: return your nephew to his country and guard him against the Jews. By Allah, were they to see him and recognize in him what I recognized, they would wish him evil: there will be for your nephew a great affair. Hasten to return him to his country.” His uncle Abu Talib departed swiftly with him until he brought him back to Mecca after finishing his trade in Syria.
Ibn Ishaq said: it is claimed : in what the people relate : that Zourayr, Tamam and Daris, People of the Book, had seen the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) as Bahira saw him in that journey wherein he was with his uncle Abu Talib, and that they wanted to seize him: Bahira turned them from him, reminding them of Allah and what they found in the Book of his mention and description, and that were they to unite for what they wanted, they would not reach him until they recognized what he had said and confirmed it: they left him and turned away.
Younous ibn Boukayr related, from Ibn Ishaq, that Abu Talib said therein three qasidas: such is that text related by Ibn Ishaq without isnad, whose like came through an ascribed, authenticated path. The hafiz Abu Bakr al-Khara’iti related: Abbas ibn Muhammad ad-Douri related to us, from Qourrad Abu Nuh, from Younous, from Abu Ishaq, from Abu Bakr ibn Abi Moussa, from his father: Abu Talib departed for Syria, with him the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) among elders of Quraysh. When they had overlooked the monk : meaning Bahira : they descended and pitched their tents: the monk came out to them, whereas before they passed by him without his coming out or turning to them. He descended while they pitched their tents, weaving among them until he came and took the Prophet’s (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) hand and said: “This is the master of the worlds.” In al-Bayhaqi’s version, an addition: “This is the messenger of the Lord of the worlds: Allah will send him as mercy for the worlds.” Elders of Quraysh said to him: “How do you know?” He said: “When you appeared over the pass, there remained no tree nor stone but it fell prostrate: they prostrate only for a prophet; and I recognize him by the seal of prophethood beneath the cartilage of his shoulder.” Then he returned and prepared for them a meal.
When he brought it to them : he being at the camels’ grazing : he said: “Send him to me.” He advanced, a cloud shading him. When he drew near the people, he said: “Look: a cloud covers him.” When he drew near the people, he found them having preceded him to the tree’s shade; when he sat, the tree’s shade inclined over him. He said: “Look at the tree’s shade inclining over him.” While he stood among them appealing to them that they take him not to the Romans : for were the Romans see him they would recognize him by the description and kill him : he turned and behold: seven men of the Romans advancing. He faced them and said: “What brings you?” They said: “We learned this prophet goes forth in this month: no road remained but people were dispatched to it, and we were informed of his news to this route of yours.” He said: “Have you left behind anyone better than you?” They said: “No: we were informed of his news to this route.” He said: “Have you then seen an affair Allah wills to decide : can any of the people turn it?” They said: “No.” He said: “Then pledge him allegiance,” and they stayed with him. The monk said: “I conjure you by Allah: which of you is his guardian?” They said: “Abu Talib.” And he kept appealing to him until he returned him, and Abu Bakr sent Bilal with him, and the monk provisioned him with cakes and oil.
Thus related it at-Tirmidhi, from Abu al-Abbas al-Fadl ibn Sahl al-A’raj, from Qourrad Abu Nuh; likewise al-Hakim, al-Bayhaqi and Ibn Asakir, through the chain of Abu al-Abbas Muhammad ibn Ya’qoub al-Asamm, from Abbas ibn Muhammad ad-Douri. And thus related it more than one hafiz, from the hadith of Abu Nuh Abd ar-Rahman ibn Ghazwan al-Khuza’i, their freedman, called ad-Dabbi, known as Qourrad: he settled in Baghdad; he is among the trusty men whose relation al-Boukhari compiled, whom a majority of imams and hafiz authenticated, and I have seen none criticizing him. There remains, however, in this hadith of his strangeness: at-Tirmidhi said: hassan gharib, we know it not but this way; Abbas ad-Douri said: there is none in the world relating it but Qourrad Abu Nuh, and Ahmad ibn Hanbal and Yahya ibn Ma’in heard it from him for its strangeness and his sole transmission, as al-Bayhaqi and Ibn Asakir related.
Ibn Kathir notes: among its oddities, it falls under the mursal relations of the Companions: Abu Moussa al-Ash’ari arrived only in the year of Khaybar, the seventh of the Hijra : without minding Ibn Ishaq’s statement counting him among the emigrants from Mecca to Abyssinia. In any case, the account is mursal: this story did occur, and the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) was, per some, twelve years of age. Perhaps Abu Moussa had received it from the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) and was more able to transmit it, or received it from a senior Companion, or this story was famous and known, taken by way of wide diffusion. The second oddity: the cloud is not mentioned in a hadith sounder than this. The third: the words “and Abu Bakr sent Bilal with him”: were he (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) then twelve years old, Abu Bakr would then have been nine or ten, and Bilal less: where then was Abu Bakr, and where was Bilal? Both are strange : unless it be said this occurred while the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) was older, either his journey being later, or the view of his being twelve not being preserved: it is al-Waqidi alone who mentions it in that detail, and as-Souhayli cited some saying he was then nine. Allah is most knowing.
al-Waqidi related, from Muhammad ibn Salih, Abdallah ibn Ja’far and Ibrahim ibn Ismail ibn Abi Habiba, from Dawud ibn al-Husayn, that they said: when the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) reached twelve years, his uncle Abu Talib took him to Syria in the trading caravan, and they alighted at the monk Bahira, who said to Abu Talib in secret what he said and ordered him to keep him: Abu Talib returned him with him to Mecca. The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) grew up with Abu Talib: Allah raised him, protected him and guarded him from the affairs of jahiliyya and its defects, for the honor intended him, until he became the best of his people in manliness, the finest of character, the noblest of interaction, the best of neighbors, the greatest in forbearance and trustworthiness, the most truthful in speech, the farthest from obscenity and harm: he was never seen jesting ill or racing anyone, until his people named him al-Amine (the trustworthy), for what Allah had gathered in him of righteous qualities. Abu Talib guarded him, protected him, aided him and supported him until he died.
Muhammad ibn Sa’d related, from Khalid ibn Khidash, from Mu’tamir ibn Sulayman, that he heard his father narrate, from Abu Majlaz: when Abdallah died, Abd al-Muttalib : or Abu Talib, Khalid hesitated : devoted himself to Muhammad: he never traveled any journey but he was with him. He headed toward Syria and alighted at a station: a monk came to him therein and said: “Among you is a righteous man,” then said: “Where is this boy’s guardian?” He said: “Here am I, his guardian,” or it was said: “This one is his guardian.” The monk said: “Keep this boy and take him not to Syria: the Jews are envious, and I fear them for him.” He said: “It is not you who says that, but Allah who says it”: and he returned him, saying: “O Allah, I deposit Muhammad with Thee.” Then he died.