Sa’ad ibn Ali Vaqas...

Sa’ad ibn Ali Vaqas, who is confined with the others, writes, 'Hunger has brought on such dizziness that, if at night I kick at a soft and wet material, without even realizing it, I put it in my mouth and suck it. Two years later, I still do not know what it was.' One can see, under these conditions, what passes for the family of the Prophet, even if history said nothing. All of this family bears the difficulties of hunger, loneliness and poverty for the sake of the Prophet.

The Prophet personally assumes responsibility for them. When a child cries from the pain of hunger, whenever a sick person cries from lack of medicine and lack of food, whenever an aged person, man or woman, reaches their limits of bearing difficulties and pressures suffered from three years of hunger, physical torture and the tortures of this valley, they hide all they bear within themselves. The light and blood drained from their faces, they deny any pro­blems when confronting Muhammad.

At the same time, in spite of all of the difficulties, they remain loyal and generous in faith and love. All of this shows the expressions of the spirit, of faith and human life which greatly affected the sensitive heart of the Prophet. Know for sure that whenever food arrives in the dark­ness of the night and it is given into the hands of the Pro­phet to be spread among the people, the share of his wife and daughter is the least of all, in order that they not fear for their lives.

The family of Muhammad in this compound consists of Khadijah and his small daughter, Fatima, her sisters, Umm Khulthum and Roqiyyeh, daughter-in-law’s of Abu Lahab. After the mission of the Prophet, he orders his sons to divorce them in order to hurt and show con­tempt for the Prophet. But Osman, who is a young, weal­thy, handsome man, marries Roqiyyeh and from the point of view of society, the act of Abu Lahab is answered. Roqiyyeh then immigrates to Ethiopia with Osman.

Umm Khulthum, whose life had fallen apart and who had given up her happiness because of her faith in her father, now found herself in the compound, preferring hunger and remaining with her generous and heroic father in the way of faith and freedom to living in comfort and ease with her malicious and conservative husband, Otaybeh. The days pass with difficulty in this compound. At night, the black tent of darkness falls upon the residents of this mountainous area separated from life.