Page:The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930).pdf/27

 and the booty enormous, for many of the hostile tribes had brought out with them everything that they possessed.

The tribe of Thaqîf were among the enemy at Ḥuneyn. After that victory their city of Ṭâ'îf was besieged by the Muslims, and finally reduced. Then the Prophet appointed a governor of Mecca, and himself returned to Al-Madînah to the boundless joy of the Ansâr, who had feared lest, now that he had regained his native city, he might forsake them and make Mecca the capital.

In the ninth year of the Hijrah, hearing that an army was again being mustered in Syria, the Prophet called on all the Muslims to support him in a great campaign. The far distance, the hot season, the fact that it was harvest time and the prestige of the enemy caused many to excuse themselves and many more to stay behind without excuse. Those defaulters are denounced in the Koran. But the campaign ended peacefully. The army advanced to Tabûk, on the confines of Syria, and there learnt that the enemy had not yet gathered.

Although Mecca had been conquered and its people were now Muslims, the official order of the pilgrimage had not been changed; the pagan Arabs performing it in their manner, and the Muslims in their manner. It was only after the pilgrims' caravan had left Al-Madînah in the ninth year of the Hijrah, when Al-Islâm was dominant in North Arabia, that the Declaration of Immunity, as it is called, was revealed. The Prophet sent a copy of it by messenger to Abû Bakr, leader of the pilgrimage, with the instruction that Ali was to read it to the multitudes at Mecca. Its purport was that after that year Muslims only were to make the pilgrimage, exception being made for such of the idolaters as had a treaty with the Muslims and had never broken their treaty nor supported anyone against them. Such were to enjoy the privileges of their treaty for the term thereof, but when their treaty expired they would be as other idolaters. That proclamation marks the end of idol-worship in Arabia.

The ninth year of the Hijrah is called the Year of Deputations, because from all parts of Arabia deputations came to Al-Madînah to swear allegiance to the Prophet and to hear the Koran. The Prophet had become, in fact, the emperor of Arabia, but his way of life remained as simple as before.