Muhammad: Seal of the Prophets — Page 20
MUHAMMAD : SEAL OF THE PROPHETS 20 The significance of this event is that the birth of the infant whom God intended to bring up under His care so that in due time he might become the recipient of the comprehensive and universal divine guidance for man, was approaching. Through him, the Ka’a ba would be restored to the worship of the One True God, for which it had been originally built. God Almighty would, therefore, not suffer any harm to be done to the Ka’aba or to Mecca, which was about to be honoured as just mentioned. Some months previous to the invasion of Abraha, Abdul Muttalib had affianced his then youngest son, Abdullah, who was twenty - four years of age, to Amina, the niece of Wahb of Bani Zuhra, under whose guardianship she lived. The marriage took place, and not long after Abdullah left his wife, who was with child, and set out on a mercantile expedition to Syria. On his way back, he fell ill at Medina, and was left behind by the caravan with his father’s maternal relatives. When Abdul Muttalib learnt of Abdullah’ s illness he dispatched his eldest son, Harith, to take care of his brother. Arriving in Medina, Harith found that Abdullah had died about a month after the departure of the caravan. Amina was thus widowed only after a few months of her marriage before giv ing birth to her child. The child was born on 20 April 570. As soon as Abdul Muttalib was informed of the blessed event, he visited Amina, took the baby in his arms, went to the Ka’aba and, standing beside the Holy House, gave thanks to God. The child was called Muhammad, according to a dream of Amina. The word means ‘one greatly praised’. It was not the custom for the better class of women at Mecca to suckle their children. They procured nurses for them, or gave