Muhammad: Seal of the Prophets — Page 155
MUHAMMAD : SEAL OF THE PROPHETS 155 even during the night. They wondered whether they would survive till such time when they might be able to sleep in peace at night, without any fear in their hearts except the fear of God. Their condition at the time is described in the Holy Quran as follow s (8:27): Call to mind the time when you were few in numbers and were accounted weak in the land, and were afraid of being despoiled by people, and He provided you with shelter, and supported you with His help, and provided you with good things, that you may be grat eful. In Medina, the position of the Muslims at that time was, in some respects, even more precarious than it had been in Mecca, for in Mecca tribal custom and conventions afforded them, at least to those of them who belonged to some tribe or the other, a degree of security, but in Medina they were not only subject to the menace of Quraish but were also afraid of the devices and designs of the disaffected, and were not entirely reassured with regard to the attitude of the Jews. In the first year after the Migration the first child born to an Emigrant was Abdullah bin Zubair, whose birth was an occasion of joy for the Emigrants. Zubair bin Awam, the father of the baby, was a first cousin of the Holy Prophet, and was married to Asm aa, the eldest daughter of Abu Bakr. She was the mother of the baby. Abdullah grew up a devoted and erudite Muslim who played an important role in the early history of Islam. The Holy Prophet and the Muslims were grieved in that year by the death of two prominent leaders of Ansar, Kulthum bin Hadam, with whom the Holy Prophet had resided in Qaba, and