1 of 2 · 10th year of prophethood · c. 619 CE · The Ka'bah, Makkah
Al-Mut'im ibn 'Adi
Tearing the Pact
Al-Mut'im ibn 'Adi was a grandson of Nawfal, the brother of Hashim, so his clan and the Prophet's ﷺ were close cousins within Banu 'Abd Manaf. For about three years he watched Banu Hashim and Banu al-Muttalib starve in the valley of Abu Talib under the pact Quraysh had hung in the Ka'bah.
Ibn Ishaq reports that Hisham ibn 'Amr, a man troubled by the boycott, went to him and asked whether he was content to see two branches of Banu 'Abd Manaf perish while he went along with Quraysh. Al-Mut'im agreed to act. With Zuhayr ibn Abi Umayyah, Abu al-Bakhtari and Zam'ah ibn al-Aswad, they planned to break the pact together.
The next morning, Zuhayr called out at the Ka'bah that the pact must be torn up. Abu Jahl objected, and the others answered him one after another. Al-Mut'im went to take down the document and, the biographers report, found that insects had eaten it away except for the words "In Your name, O Allah". The boycott was over.
Al-Mut'im did not share the Prophet's ﷺ faith, but he would not stay silent while his kin were starved. A sense of justice can move people far outside our own circle.
Is there an injustice you have grown used to because everyone around you accepts it?
- Ibn Hisham, al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah (the ending of the boycott)Historical report
- Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabaqat al-KubraHistorical report
- Ibn Kathir, al-Bidayah wa'l-NihayahHistorical report
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