Counsel at Hudaybiyyah

Umm Salamah travelled with the Prophet ﷺ when he set out with some fourteen hundred companions to perform 'umrah, only to be stopped by Quraysh at Hudaybiyyah. A treaty was agreed whose terms seemed to many of the companions a humiliation: they were to return home that year without reaching the Ka'bah.

The Prophet ﷺ told them to slaughter their sacrificial animals and shave their heads, ending their state of ihram. Not one of them moved, though he repeated it three times. They were not rebelling; they were stunned with grief and perhaps still hoping something would change. He went into Umm Salamah's tent and told her what had happened.

She answered, "Messenger of Allah, do you want this done? Then go out and do not say a word to anyone until you have slaughtered your camel and called your barber to shave your head." He did exactly that. When the companions saw him, they knew the matter was settled, and they rose to slaughter their animals and shave one another's heads, crowding so closely in their haste that they nearly hurt one another (Sahih al-Bukhari 2731).

01Why it matters

Umm Salamah understood that grieving people often follow an example more readily than an instruction.

02Reflection

When you want others to do something hard, do you tell them, or do you go first?

03Sources

Sahih al-Bukhari 2731 Sahih · in the two Sahihs
Ibn Hajar, Fath al-BariHistorical report

What the hadith grades mean

Sahih (authentic): an unbroken chain of trustworthy, precise narrators, free of hidden flaws or contradiction. It is acted upon.
Hasan (good): like sahih, but a narrator's precision is slightly lighter. It is also accepted and acted upon. "Hasan sahih" means it reaches sahih by its routes.
Da'if (weak): a break in the chain or a narrator who is not reliable enough. It is not used to establish beliefs or rulings.
Very weak (munkar, matruk): a seriously flawed chain or a narrator accused of lying. It is not relied on at all.
Mawdu' (fabricated): falsely attributed to the Prophet ﷺ. It may not be narrated as his words except to warn against it.
The two Sahihs: every hadith with a full chain in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim is accepted as sahih by the scholars of hadith.
Historical report: biographies and histories (Ibn Ishaq, Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabari) record events with chains that are often incomplete. They are used for the story, not for rulings.
Hadith scholars grade a narration; the four madhhabs do not. Where a hadith carries a ruling, the page shows which schools act on it.

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