The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 1) — Page cclxxi
GENERAL INTRODUCTION Uḥud. Rumour had then gone round that the Prophet had been killed by the enemy. Many Muslims lost heart and withdrew from the battle. The verse came from heaven to brace them. It had the same effect on this occasion. Having recited the verse, Abu Bakr added to it a word of his own. He said, "Those amongst you who worship God, let them know that God is still alive, and will ever remain alive. But those amongst you who worshipped Muḥammad, let them know it from me that Muḥammad is dead. " The Companions recovered their balance on hearing this timely speech. 'Umar himself was changed when he heard Abu Bakr recite the verse quoted above. He began to return to his senses, and to recover his lost judgement. By the time Abu Bakr had finished the recitation of the verse 'Umar's spiritual eye was fully opened. He understood that the Prophet had really died. But no sooner had he realized it, than his legs began to tremble and give way. He fell down exhausted. The man who wanted to terrorize Abu Bakr with his bare sword had been converted by Abu Bakr's speech. The Companions felt the verse had been revealed for the first time on that day, so strong and so new was its appeal. In a paroxysm of grief, they forgot that the verse was in the Quran. Many expressed the grief which overtook Muslims on the death of the Prophet, but the pithy and profound expression which Ḥassān, the poet of early Islam, gave to it in his couplet remains to this day the best and the most enduring. He said: 'Thou wast the pupil of my eye. Now that thou hast died my eye hath become blind. I care not who dies now. For I feared only thy death. ' This couplet voiced the feeling of every Muslim. For months in the streets of Medina, men, women and children went about reciting this couplet of Hassan bin Thābit. ccxlv