The Year of Delegations

With Makkah conquered and Hunayn won, the resistance of Arabia collapsed. The tribes had been waiting to see what Quraysh, the custodians of the Ka'bah, would do; when Quraysh entered Islam, the rest followed. The ninth and tenth years became known as the Year of Delegations, as tribe after tribe sent envoys to Madinah declaring their Islam and pledging loyalty.

They came from every corner: the people of Ta'if, who had once stoned him; the proud delegation of Banu Tamim; the Christians of Najran, who came to debate and were received with such fairness that the Prophet ﷺ let them pray in his own mosque; envoys from Yemen, Oman, Bahrain, and the far tribes. The Qur'an had foretold exactly this in Surah an-Nasr: when you see the people entering the religion of Allah in crowds.

Among the delegations came men whose courtesy the Prophet ﷺ praised, and he sent teachers back with them, Mu'adh ibn Jabal (ra) to Yemen with the timeless instruction: you are going to a people of the Book; let the first thing you call them to be the worship of Allah alone; and beware the supplication of the oppressed, for there is no barrier between it and Allah. Da'wah, even in the hour of total dominance, remained invitation and gentleness, not coercion.

Within a span that would have seemed impossible during the years of hiding in the house of al-Arqam, the peninsula that had united to destroy the believers was largely united upon their faith. The man who had begun with one wife and a handful of followers now guided most of Arabia, and the religion was poised, after his lifetime, to reach the empires whose kings had received his letters.