Bilal's Adhan from the Kaʿbah

Shaykh Yasir Qadhi explains:

After the sermon, the Prophet ﷺ ordered Bilāl to climb atop the Kaʿbah and give the adhān, the first ever from the holiest place on earth. The voice that had cried أَحَدٌ أَحَد, "One, One," under torture in Mecca's valleys was now raised above the Quraysh to proclaim لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا اللَّه: he who stood firm in humiliation was honoured in the hour of ʿizzah. This is the maxim الْجَزَاءُ مِنْ جِنْسِ الْعَمَل, the reward is of the same kind as the deed.

❧The Three at the Kaʿbah

Nearby stood three of the Qurayshī elite. ʿAttāb ibn Asīd said he was glad his father had died before seeing "this black man" raised over them. Al-Ḥārith ibn Hishām, full brother of Abū Jahl, sneered, "If I thought him true I would follow him." And Abū Sufyān, a Muslim of only a few hours, said, "I will say nothing; if I did, these very pebbles would tell him", proof that he believed in the prophethood even as his soul had not yet submitted, for faith comes in levels (as Sūrat al-Ḥujurāt tells the Bedouins, وَلَمَّا يَدْخُلِ الْإِيمَانُ فِي قُلُوبِكُمْ). Later, passing them as he left the Ḥaram, the Prophet ﷺ recounted each man's words back to him, letter for letter. Al-Ḥārith said at once, "You must be a prophet, no one heard us," and took the shahādah; ʿAttāb too accepted.

❧What Became of al-Ḥārith

Al-Ḥārith's Islam grew strong. As a newcomer he dared ask what even Abū Bakr and ʿUmar were too much in awe to ask, كَيْفَ يَأْتِيكَ الْوَحْي, "how does the revelation come to you?", and the Prophet ﷺ answered (Bukhārī) that at times it came like the ringing of a bell, hard upon him, and at times Jibrīl came as a man. He died a martyr at Yarmūk against the Romans, one of the three, with ʿIkrimah ibn Abī Jahl and ʿAyyāsh ibn Abī Rabīʿah, who each waved the water on to the next dying man until all three died and the cup was never drunk.