Muhammad a Prophet For all Humanity
9. The Prophetic Method
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prejudice in this treatment of them. After besieging
the town for three weeks, he ordered his army to
retreat. On his return from Ta’if, the Prophet
reached Ji’ranah, where the spoils of the Battle of
Hunayn had been stored. Here the Prophet had an
opportunity to take reprisals against the Thaqifs
ally, Hawazin. But he did quite the opposite,
accepting an appeal from a delegation of that tribe
for the release of all their six thousand prisoners.
His magnanimous treatment of them—he not only
set them free, but also gave them clothes and
provisions for their journey—was bound to make
an impression on them. And it did: the whole of the
Hawazin tribe, won over by the Prophet’s
unbounded generosity, accepted Islam.
The effects of this event were also felt in Ta’if. The
Hawazin and the Thaqif were two branches of one
large tribe. The Thaqif felt much more threatened
by the Hawazin’s conversion to Islam than they had
been by the siege of their city. The severance of the
Hawazin from their alliance was a mortal wound,
which they knew would render them incapable of
doing battle with the Muslims:
