First Pledge of Aqabah

In approximately 620 CE, six men from the Khazraj tribe of Yathrib encountered the Prophet ﷺ at Zamzam or near Mina during the pilgrimage season. When they heard his message, they said to each other: 'By Allah, this is the prophet the Jews have been warning us about — let us not let them reach him before us.' Their Jewish neighbors in Yathrib had for years referenced the coming of a final prophet in terms meant as a social warning; the effect was to prepare the Khazraji mind to recognize him when they met him. All six accepted Islam. They returned to Yathrib and spread the message. The following year's pilgrimage season brought twelve men and two women from Yathrib to the pass of al-Aqabah near Mina. They met the Prophet ﷺ at night and pledged an oath on terms that would later be known as the 'women's pledge' — not yet a pledge of war, but a pledge of faith and conduct: not to associate anything with Allah, not to steal, not to commit fornication, not to kill their children, not to bring a false accusation, and not to disobey the Prophet ﷺ in what is right. The Prophet ﷺ told them that those who fulfilled the pledge would be rewarded by Allah; those who fell short and were punished in this world, that was their atonement. After the pledge, the Prophet ﷺ sent Musab ibn Umayr with the delegation as the first formally appointed teacher of Islam in Yathrib. Musab lived in the house of Asad ibn Zurara and spent approximately a year teaching the Quran, leading prayers, and presenting Islam. His most significant achievement was the conversion of Sa'd ibn Muadh and Usayd ibn Hudayr — the two leading men of the Banu Abd al-Ashhal clan — which triggered the conversion of their entire clan in a single evening. Musab also established the first Jumu'ah prayer in Yathrib. When he returned to Mecca with the next delegation the following year, he brought seventy-three men and two women who would make the Second Pledge of Aqabah — the pledge that made the Hijra possible. The First Pledge of Aqabah was the pivot between the Meccan and Medinan phases of the mission.