Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) gave Qatada b. al-Nu‘man a staff, saying: ‘This staff will light up ten yards all around you. You will see a dark shadow when you arrive at your house; it is Satan. Throw him out of the house and drive him away!’ Qatada took the staff and set off. It cast a light like Moses’ shining hand. He came to his house, where he saw the shadowy figure, and he drove it away.”1
The Second: While fighting the idolators during the great Battle of Badr, itself a source of wonders, ‘Ukkasha b. Muhassin al-Asadi had his sword broken. God’s Noble Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace) gave him a stout staff in place of it, saying: “Fight with this!” Suddenly, with God’s leave, the staff became a long white sword, and he fought with it. He carried the sword on his person for the rest of his life until he fell as a martyr during the Battle of al-Yamama.2 This incident is certain, because throughout his life he carried the sword with pride and it became famous with the name of Succour. Thus, two proofs of this incident are ‘Ukkasha’s pride, and the sword’s name, Succour and its widespread fame.
The Third: It is narrated by authorities on Hadith like Ibn ‘Abd al-Barr,3 a celebrated scholar known as the Scholar of the Age, that at the Battle of Uhud the sword of ‘Abdullah b. Jahsh, a cousin of the God’s Messenger (Upon whom be blessings and peace), was broken. The Messenger (UWBP) gave him a staff and it turned into a sword in his hand. He fought with it, and after the battle that product of a miracle remained a sword.4
In his Siyar, the well-known Ibn Sayyid al-Nas reports that some time later ‘Abdullah sold the sword to a man called Bugha’ al-Turki for two hundred liras.5 Thus these two swords were each miracles like the Staff of Moses. But while no aspect of miraculousness remained in his staff after Moses’ death, these swords remained unchanged.
Musnad, iii, 65; al-Sa’ati, al-Fath al-Rabbani, xxii, 66-7; al-Haythami, Majma’ al-Zawa’id, ii, 166-7; al-Hindi, Kanz al-‘Ummal, xii, 376; Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa’, i, 3323; ‘Ali al-Qari, Sharh al-Shifa’, i, 671; al-‘Asqalani, al-Isaba, no: 7076.
Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa’, i, 333; ‘Ali al-Qari, Sharh al-Shifa’, i, 671; al-Khafaji, Sharh al-Shifa’, iii, 156; Ibn Hisham, Sirat al-Nabi, i, 637; Ibn al-Qayyim, Zad al-Ma’ad (Tahqiq: Arnavudi), iii, 186.
Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa’, i, 333; al-Khafaji, Sharh al-Shifa’, iii, 157; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, ‘Uyun al-Athar, ii, 20; al-‘Asqalani, al-Isaba, no: 4583.
‘Abd al-Barr, al-Istibab, ii, 274 (gloss on al-Isaba); Ibn Hajar, al-Isaba, ii, 287; Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, ‘Uyun al-Athar, ii, 32; ‘Abd al-Razzaq, al-Musannaf, xi, 279.
Ibn Sayyid al-Nas, ‘Uyun al-Athar, ii, 32; ‘Abd al-Razzaq, al-Musannaf, xi, 279.