The Sermon at the Door and the General Amnesty

Shaykh Yasir Qadhi explains:

With the House cleansed and its doors thrown open, the Prophet ﷺ stood on the steps of the Kaʿbah and faced the crowd, more than twelve thousand: the ten thousand Muslims and the Quraysh of Mecca, believers and pagans together. He gave a short sermon: لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا اللَّهُ وَحْدَه، نَصَرَ عَبْدَه، وَصَدَقَ وَعْدَه، وَهَزَمَ الأَحْزَابَ وَحْدَه, "There is no god but Allāh alone; He aided His servant, fulfilled His promise, and defeated the confederates alone." He declared every claim and rank of Jāhiliyyah abolished, keeping only two of its offices: the sidānah (custodianship of the Kaʿbah's key, the right of Banū ʿAbd al-Dār) and the siqāyah (watering the pilgrims, the charge of Banū Hāshim). The pride of Jāhiliyyah, its tribal hierarchy, was gone: كُلُّكُمْ مِنْ آدَم وَآدَمُ مِنْ تُرَاب, "all of you are from Ādam, and Ādam is from dust," and he recited يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ إِنَّا خَلَقْنَاكُم مِّن ذَكَرٍ وَأُنثَىٰ… إِنَّ أَكْرَمَكُمْ عِندَ اللَّهِ أَتْقَاكُمْ (49:13), henceforth the only rank is taqwā.

❧"Go, You Are Free"

Then, with the Quraysh who had persecuted him for twenty years gathered helpless before him, he asked, مَا تَظُنُّونَ أَنِّي فَاعِلٌ بِكُمْ, "What do you think I will do to you?" They said, "Good, a noble brother, the son of a noble brother." And he gave the words that crown the Sīrah: اذْهَبُوا فَأَنْتُمُ الطُّلَقَاء، لَا تَثْرِيبَ عَلَيْكُمُ اليَوْمَ، يَغْفِرُ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ وَهُوَ أَرْحَمُ الرَّاحِمِين, "Go, for you are free; no blame is on you today; may Allāh forgive you, the Most Merciful of the merciful", the very words of Yūsuf to his brothers (12:92). At Ṭāʾif, alone and stoned, he had forgiven; here, at the head of an army, he forgave again. This is Raḥmatan lil-ʿālamīn, and it shows that this religion was never about bloodshed but about the worship of Allāh, sometimes by strictness, far more often by mercy.