The Seal of the Prophets

Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)

Allah’s Messenger and the final Prophet, sent as a mercy to the worlds. His life, character and sayings, grounded in the Qur’an and Shia sources.

مُحَمَّدٌ رَسُولُ ٱللَّهِ صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم

Medina visiting guide Salawat and ziyarat

Allah’s Messenger and the final Prophet

Muhammad ibn ʿAbd Allah (PBUH) is Allah’s Messenger and the Seal of the Prophets: the final Prophet, after whom no prophet comes. In Shia belief he is the first of the Fourteen Infallibles, protected from error in receiving and conveying revelation and in every part of his life. His greatest miracle is the Qur’an. [WikiShia]

He was born into the idol-worshipping society of Mecca, yet never worshipped an idol. Chosen as a prophet at forty, he preached for thirteen years in Mecca despite persecution, then migrated to Medina, where he built the community of believers. He told his followers to hold fast to the Qur’an and his Ahl al-Bayt (AS), and on several occasions, including Ghadir, he named Imam Ali (AS) as his successor. [WikiShia]

His life

c. 570 CE · 17 Rabiʿ al-Awwal
Birth in Mecca
He was born in Mecca to ʿAbd Allah ibn ʿAbd al-Muttalib and Amina bint Wahb, in what Ibn Hisham and others call the Year of the Elephant. Since he passed away in 632 CE at sixty-three, his birth fell in 569 or 570 CE. Most Shia scholars give the date as 17 Rabiʿ al-Awwal; Sunni sources give the 12th. [WikiShia]Cited there: Shahīdī, Tārīkh-i taḥlīlī-yi Islām, p. 38; Āyatī, Tārīkh-i payāmbar-i Islām, p. 43
Before his mission he was known among the Quraysh as honest and trustworthy, al-Amin. Even those who later opposed him did not call him a liar. They rejected the revelation, not the man. [WikiShia]Cited there: Ṭabrisī, Majmaʿ al-bayān, vol. 3, p. 294
610 CE · 27 Rajab
The mission begins
He often spent a month in solitary worship in the cave of Hiraʾ above Mecca. According to the Twelver Shia, his mission began there on 27 Rajab, when the first verses of Surat al-ʿAlaq were revealed: “Read in the name of your Lord who created.” He was forty years old. [WikiShia]Cited there: Āyatī, Tārīkh-i payāmbar-i Islām, p. 67; Shahīdī, Tārīkh-i taḥlīlī-yi Islām, p. 41
He first taught Islam to his own household. The first woman to believe in him was his wife Khadija, and the first man was Ali ibn Abi Talib (AS), who was then growing up in the Prophet’s (PBUH) care. [WikiShia]Cited there: Shahīdī, Tārīkh-i taḥlīlī-yi Islām, p. 41
622 CE · Rabiʿ al-Awwal, 1 AH
The Hijra to Medina
After thirteen years of preaching and persecution in Mecca, he migrated to Yathrib, which became Medina, the City of the Prophet. Historians differ on the exact days. Many contemporary historians put his arrival at Quba on 12 Rabiʿ al-Awwal, 1 AH (24 September 622). The migration later became the starting point of the Islamic calendar. [WikiShia]
Where his camel stopped, the Muslims built a house for him and a simple mosque of sun-dried mud brick: the beginning of al-Masjid an-Nabawi. [WikiShia]Cited there: Jaʿfarīyān, Āthār-i Islāmī-yi Mecca wa Medina, p. 202
632 CE · 10 AH
The final Hajj and Ghadir
On his return from his final Hajj, at Ghadir Khumm, he declared Imam Ali (AS) his successor. About two months later he passed away. [WikiShia]
632 CE · 28 Safar, 11 AH
His passing in Medina
During his final illness he addressed the Muslims, urging them to be kind to one another. He also said that anyone he owed should come and claim it, and that he was ready to answer for any wrong he had done anyone. [WikiShia]Cited there: Ibn Saʿd, al-Ṭabaqāt al-kubrā, vol. 2, p. 255
He passed away at sixty-three, on 28 Safar according to the Shia (some reports give 12 Rabiʿ al-Awwal). Nahj al-Balagha records that his head rested on the chest of Imam Ali (AS). Imam Ali (AS) washed and shrouded him, and he was buried in his own house, which is now within al-Masjid an-Nabawi. [WikiShia]Cited there: Nahj al-balāgha, Sermon 202

His mercy and character

The qualities the Qur’an praises in him, with accounts from those who knew him.

Mercy

He was known for forgiving those who wronged him. He forgave Wahshi, who killed his uncle Hamza, and Abu Sufyan, who had long led the opposition to Islam. [WikiShia]Cited there: Kandhlawī, Ḥayāt al-ṣaḥāba, vol. 2, p. 526

Qur’an 21:107

Character

Imam Ali (AS) described him: whoever met him for the first time was in awe of him, and whoever kept his company came to love him. He gave his companions equal attention, and when he shook someone’s hand he was never the first to withdraw it. [WikiShia]Cited there: Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 16, pp. 237, 260

Qur’an 68:4

Integrity

When he first called the Quraysh, he asked whether they would believe him if he warned of an army behind the hill. They answered that he had never lied to them. Only then did he tell them he was sent as a warner. [WikiShia]

Compassion and gentleness

He spoke to everyone according to their understanding. He was warm with everyone and had a way of making each person feel special to him. [WikiShia]Cited there: Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 16, p. 287

Qur’an 9:128

Simplicity and service

He sat on the ground to eat and slept on a leather mattress stuffed with palm fibre. His diet was mostly dates and barley bread, and months could pass without a fire lit for cooking in his house. Yet after Hunayn he gave away thousands of camels and sheep. When Fatima (AS) brought him barley bread, he told her it was the first food he had eaten in three days. [WikiShia]

Qur’an 33:21

The Prophet (PBUH) in the Qur’an

Each verse is quoted exactly, with our explanation shown separately beneath it.

Quotation

Surat al-Anbiyaʾ, Qur’an 21:107

وَمَآ أَرْسَلْنَٰكَ إِلَّا رَحْمَةًۭ لِّلْعَٰلَمِينَ
“We did not send you but as a mercy to all the nations.”