Return to Mecca, the Quraysh's Test, and Abu Bakr Earns the Title Al-Ṣiddīq
storySpeaker note: This covers the return journey to Mecca, the Prophet's ﷺ announcement to the Quraysh, the miracle of the Baitul Maqdis image, and Abu Bakr earning the title Al-Ṣiddīq. This is narrated largely in the first person by the Prophet ﷺ himself.
❧The Return: Remounting Buraq
From Baitul Maqdis (Jerusalem), the Prophet ﷺ remounted Al-Burāq, the same creature that had brought him there. Burāq had been tied at the prophets' post, waiting. This animal serves earthly travel (Mecca to Jerusalem); the Mi'raj itself used the opening of the heavens' doors. Once back in Jerusalem, Burāq was needed for the return to Mecca.
On the return journey, the Prophet ﷺ passed by three Qurashi caravans (these narrations are from Ibn Hisham and are not in the six major hadith collections, but there is no theological problem in noting them):
- He recognized people in the first caravan by name
- He was thirsty; he drank from a communal water urn in the second caravan (public water, not private property)
- In the third caravan, he observed people searching for a lost camel they could not find
He arrived back in Mecca and woke up in the Ḥaram. This is confirmed by Surah Al-Isrāʾ 17:1: "from Masjid al-Ḥarām to Masjid al-Aqṣā", the Ḥaram is both the starting and ending point. Reports saying the Prophet ﷺ was sleeping in his house or in Umm Hāniʾ's house are reconciled by: Jibrīl first took him from wherever he was to the Ḥaram, and the actual Isrāʾ began from the Ḥaram.
❧The Prophet ﷺ in the Haram: Anxiety
The Prophet ﷺ narrated in the first person what happened the next morning. He said: "When I woke up, I felt an anxiety (ḥuzn) about how I was going to tell the people. I knew they would reject me."
Here we see his full humanity. He is the Prophet of Allah, he has just experienced the greatest miracle in human history, and he wakes up anxious and worried about a social situation: how will his people react when he tells them? He feels the same anxiety any human being would feel before making a difficult announcement. Allah had told him to disclose it, the Prophet ﷺ never acted without divine instruction, but the human feeling of dread was real.
He was sitting in the Ḥaram, ḥazīn (sorrowful and anxious).
❧Abu Jahl: The Accidental Witness
Abu Jahl passed by and saw the Prophet ﷺ sitting in that state. He asked sarcastically (kal-mustahziʾ, in the manner of one who is mocking): "What's the matter? Has something happened?"
The Prophet ﷺ answered honestly, even to his worst enemy, he could not be silent or lie: "Yes, something happened."
Abu Jahl: "Hal kāna min shayʾ?, What happened?"
Prophet ﷺ: "Last night I was taken from this masjid to Jerusalem (Usriya bī minal-Masjidil-Ḥarāmi ilal-Masjidil-Aqṣā)."
Abu Jahl was stunned: "And you woke up among us this morning? (Thumma aṣbaḥta bayna aẓhurinā?)"
Prophet ﷺ: "Yes."
The Prophet ﷺ himself narrated: Abu Jahl wasn't sure what to do. Should he mock the Prophet ﷺ right now, alone? Or wait and gather an audience, because once the Prophet ﷺ says this publicly, he can't retract, and Abu Jahl gets to humiliate him in front of everyone. He chose the larger audience.
Abu Jahl began calling out to the Quraysh: "Hayyā maʿshara Banī Kaʿb ibn Luʾayy!, Come, O people of Banī Kaʿb ibn Luʾayy!" (the great-grandfather of the Quraysh). "There is an announcement!" Mecca being a small city, people gathered. They saw this strange pairing, Abu Jahl calling people, the Prophet ﷺ nearby, and were immediately curious.
Abu Jahl turned to the Prophet ﷺ: "Tell them what you just told me. You promised. Don't retract now."
And so the Prophet ﷺ said: "Last night I was taken to Baitul Maqdis (Jerusalem)." [Note: The Mi'raj, the ascension through the seven heavens, was not mentioned to the general Quraysh audience at this point. The Isrāʾ, the earthly leg, is what was announced. The heavenly ascension details were shared with the Muslims.]
❧The Quraysh's Reaction
The crowd reacted in multiple ways simultaneously:
- Some clapped their hands (muṣaffiqūn), an Arab gesture of bewilderment or sardonic disbelief
- Some put their hands on their heads, a gesture of shock: "What is this?"
- Others snickered and laughed
- No one quite knew what to do, because this was a man they had never known to lie. Ever. He was Al-Amīn (the Trustworthy). And yet what he was saying seemed impossible.
One of them stepped forward, someone who had personally visited Jerusalem, and presented the decisive challenge: "Can you describe it for us?"
❧The Prophet ﷺ Gets Terrified, Then Allah Intervenes
The Prophet ﷺ said: "Fa-dhahabtu anʿatu, I began describing it." He answered what he could. But the questions became increasingly specific: the layout of the streets, the souk, specific landmarks. The Prophet ﷺ said: "Iltabasa ʿalayya, I got confused. I couldn't remember all the details."
He said: "And I was overtaken by a kurba (كُرْبَة), a terror, that I had never experienced before." The Arabic word kurba means panic, distress, being seized by terror. "I was more terrified at that moment than I had ever been."
Why? Because from the Quraysh's perspective, this was the perfect trap: if he truly went there, he can describe it perfectly. But he went at night, prayed, and left. He didn't study every alley and building like a surveyor. Now he was being asked to describe things he didn't know with certainty, in front of a hostile crowd.
Then Allah intervened.
The Prophet ﷺ said: "While I was standing there terrified, I saw Baitul Maqdis rise up before me, until it descended to just beyond the house of ʿAqīl ibn Abī Ṭālib." (ʿAqīl was the Prophet's cousin who lived in the family home in Mecca where the Prophet ﷺ had grown up, essentially "my old house.") The image of Jerusalem rose before the Prophet ﷺ, visible only to him, right there in front of him.
"And no question they asked me except that I looked at Baitul Maqdis appearing to me and answered. Every single question they asked, I answered by looking at the image before me."
The Quraysh could see nothing, no image in the air, no sign. All they saw was the Prophet ﷺ calmly answering every question. Until eventually one of them said: "As for his descriptions of Jerusalem, they are accurate. He has answered everything correctly."
❧The Three Caravans: Additional Evidence
The Prophet ﷺ then offered additional proof, the three caravans he had seen on his way back (from the Ibn Hisham narration):
- First caravan: belonged to such-and-such people, returning soon because they were the closest to Mecca
- Second caravan: a group searching for a lost camel (the one he had passed and observed looking for it); "you can ask them about that camel"
- Third caravan: "I drank from their communal water urn; you can verify this"
And he specified where each caravan was, so Abu Jahl could calculate when they would arrive.
Abu Jahl, perhaps half-believing himself by now, said: "Given where you say you saw them, the first caravan should be arriving..." And while they were still debating this, news arrived at the gathering: the caravan was entering Mecca. It was exactly as described.
Abu Jahl was face to face with miraculous evidence and had no intellectual response. He declared: "Hādhā siḥr mubīn, This is clear sorcery!" That is always the last refuge of those who cannot refute: they call the truth magic.
❧The Murtadd Claim, Rejected
Ibn Hisham (writing decades later) mentions without an isnād (chain of narrators) that when news of the Isrāʾ spread among the Muslims, some of them "irtaddū", left the religion.
Scholars reject this claim for two reasons:
1. Not a single authentic hadith from the Meccan era mentions any individual becoming murtadd. This would be an extraordinary event impossible to conceal in the historical record.
2. It directly contradicts Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī. In the 7th year of the Hijrah, the Prophet ﷺ wrote a letter to Heraclius (the Byzantine Emperor). Heraclius summoned Abu Sufyan, still a non-Muslim at the time, and asked him about 20 questions about the Prophet ﷺ, wanting to evaluate the sincerity and staying power of this movement. One question: "Has anyone of his faith ever left the faith after having embraced it?" Abu Sufyan, who would have gladly mentioned any apostasy, said: "No, this has never happened." Heraclius replied that this is the sign of a true faith: it enters the heart and never exits. This is in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī. Ibn Hisham's unsupported claim directly contradicts it.
Therefore, no Muslims became murtadd because of the Isrāʾ wal-Miʿrāj. The Ibn Hisham report is not relied upon.
❧Abu Bakr As-Siddiq Earns His Title
The news reached Abu Bakr ibn Abī Quḥāfah رضي الله عنه before the Prophet ﷺ could tell him personally. One of the Quraysh came rushing to Abu Bakr, perhaps thinking to destabilize him: "Do you know what your companion has just said? He claims to have gone to Jerusalem, a month's journey there, a month's journey back, and returned, all in one single night!"
Abu Bakr's response was careful: "If he said that, then it must be true." He did not blindly say "of course he did it!" He said: I trust the source completely, if Muḥammad ﷺ said this, then I accept it as true.
The man was incredulous: "Atuṣaddiquhu fī mithli hādhā?, You believe him in a claim like this?!"
Abu Bakr: "Uṣaddiquhu fīmā huwa aʿjabu min dhālik (أُصَدِّقُهُ فِيمَا هُوَ أَعْجَبُ مِنْ ذَٰلِكَ), I believe him in something even more amazing than this. He claims that the waḥy (Divine Revelation) comes to him from above the seven heavens instantaneously. Which is more miraculous, going to Jerusalem and back in one night, or that Allah 'Azza wa Jall communicates directly with him at any moment through Jibrīl?"
The logic is unassailable: if you already believe the greater miracle (Allah communicating with a human being), then a lesser miracle (a night journey) presents no difficulty. Abu Bakr's faith was rooted in the foundation, not just in the surface. He had already accepted the greatest miracle; this was merely a lesser consequence of it.
"Fa-summiya bi-dhālika aṣ-Ṣiddīq (فَسُمِّيَ بِذَٰلِكَ الصِّدِّيق), And because of this, he was given the title Al-Ṣiddīq." From this moment, Abu Bakr ibn Abī Quḥāfah was known as Abu Bakr Al-Ṣiddīq, "the Great Affirmer of Truth." Not just someone who believed the Prophet ﷺ about a journey, but someone whose understanding of faith was so deep that no miracle, regardless of how extraordinary, could shake or surprise him.