بيعة العقبة الثانية

The Second Pledge of Aqabah took place in Dhul-Hijjah of the twelfth year of prophethood (approximately 622 CE) — the final pilgrimage season before the Hijra. Seventy-three men and two women from Yathrib slipped away from their pilgrim encampment at Mina in the middle of the night and gathered with the Prophet ﷺ in the pass of al-Aqabah. The Prophet's uncle al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib came with him, not yet a Muslim but determined to assess whether these people were capable of what they were offering. Al-Abbas addressed the assembly first, warning them that Muhammad ﷺ was protected and honored in his own city — if they were not prepared to defend him as they would defend their own women and children, they should say so now. The delegation responded through their spokesman al-Bara ibn Ma'rur: they were people of war, people of weapons, and they were ready. The Prophet ﷺ then described the terms of the pledge: to hear and obey in ease and hardship, to spend in times of ease and difficulty, to command what is right and forbid what is wrong, and to fight alongside him without counting the cost. He asked what they would receive in return. The answer: Paradise. The Yathribis stretched out their hands and pledged. Seventy-three men shook the Prophet's ﷺ hand; the two women pledged verbally. The Prophet ﷺ then appointed twelve naqibs — nine from the Khazraj, three from the Aws — to oversee their peoples' commitment to the oath. The pledge was made in secrecy, but the Quraysh learned of it the next day. The Yathribi leaders who had not attended genuinely knew nothing of the details and said so; the Quraysh could not act on partial information. Over the following weeks, Muslims began migrating to Yathrib in small groups. The Prophet's ﷺ own Hijra came months later, after the Quraysh convened the council that decided on assassination. The Second Pledge of Aqabah was the moment at which Islam became a political entity with a territorial base — the compact that made Medina — the first Islamic state — possible, and transformed Islam from a community of believers into a political entity with a territorial base, a governing compact, and a military capacity.