Signs & Miracles · Signs Seen in Public

The palm trunk that wept

Handle with care. Do not use this as a standalone proof to a sceptic. Use it after the checkable material, as a picture of the man rather than a knock-down argument.

In short

• 1.He preached leaning on the stump of a date palm in the mosque at Madinah.
• 2.A pulpit was made; the first time he used it, the trunk made a sound the congregation described as the crying of a child.
• 3.He came down, put his arms round it, and it settled.
• 4.Jabir says: if he had not embraced it, it would have kept crying until the Day of Judgement.

The claim being examined

The Prophet used to lean on a palm trunk while preaching. When a pulpit was built and he stepped away from it, the trunk is reported to have cried out until he comforted it.

The Islamic position

The mosque congregation heard it. It is narrated in Bukhari from several companions, graded sahih.

Analysis

The hadith of al-jidh' (the palm trunk) is recorded by al-Bukhari from Jabir ibn Abdullah, Ibn Umar and Anas, and by other collectors, and is treated by hadith scholars as approaching mass transmission because of the number of independent companion narrations. The witnesses are the entire congregation of the Prophet's mosque, which is why classical writers on the signs of prophethood placed it among the strongest.

From the Sunnah

Sources

Al-Bayhaqi, Dala'il al-Nubuwwah · Al-Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa · Sahih al-Bukhari 3583; Sahih al-Bukhari 3584

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