The Journey to Syria and the Monk

When the Prophet ﷺ was a boy of about twelve, Abu Talib prepared a trade caravan for Syria, and the child clung to his uncle, who could not bear to leave him and took him along. At Busra, in the south of Syria, the caravan camped near the cell of a monk called Bahira, a man who had studied the books of his people and had never before troubled himself with passing merchants.

This time he prepared food and invited the whole caravan. His eyes moved among the travellers until they settled on the boy. He questioned him, looked between his shoulders where the books had said a seal would be, and then turned to Abu Talib. What is this boy to you? My son, said the uncle, testing him. He is not your son, said the monk; this boy's father should not be alive. Abu Talib admitted he was his nephew, the father dead before his birth.

Return with him, Bahira said, and guard him. By the description in the books, a great matter awaits this boy. Abu Talib finished his trading quickly and took his nephew home, and watched over him from that day with more than a guardian's care.

The sirah relates this meeting from Ibn Hisham and the historians; scholars accept its core while noting its details are not of the rank of Bukhari and Muslim. What it records matches what the Qur'an states plainly: that the People of the Book recognised the awaited prophet as they recognised their own sons, by the descriptions preserved in their scriptures.