On the way back, the Prophet(sa) again informed his Companions of his approaching death. He said, "O men I am but one like you. I may receive the Call any day and I may have to go. My Kind and Vigilant Master has informed me that a Prophet lives up to half the years of the Prophet before him.1 I think I shall soon receive the Call and I shall depart. O my Companions, I shall have to answer God, and you will have to answer also. What will you then say?"
Upon this the Companions said, "We will say that you delivered well the Message of Islam and devoted all your life to the service of the Faith. You had the most perfect passion for the good of man: We will say: Allah, give him the best of rewards."
Then the Prophet(sa) asked, "Do you bear witness that God is One, that Muhammad(sa) is His Servant and Prophet, that Heaven and Hell are true, that death is certain, that there is life after death, that the Judgement Day must come, and that all the dead will one day be raised from their graves, restored to life and assembled?"
"Yes," said the Companions. "We bear witness to all these truths."
Turning to God, the Prophet(sa) said, "Be Thou also a witness to this—that I have explained Islam to them."
After this Pilgrimage, the Prophet(sa) was very busy teaching and training his followers, trying to raise their moral standard and to reform and refine their conduct. His own death became his frequent theme and he prepared the Muslims for it.
One day, rising for an address to the Faithful, he said, "Today I have had the revelation:
When the help of Allah comes, and victory, and thou seest men entering into the religion of Allah in troops, extol thou the glory of thy Lord, with His praise, and seek forgiveness of Him. Verily He is Oft-Returning with compassion " (110:2-4).
That is to say, the time was coming when, with the help of God, multitudes were to join the Faith of Islam. It was then to be the duty of the Prophet(sa)—and of his followers—to praise God and pray to Him to remove all obstacles in the way of the establishment of the Faith.
The Prophet(sa) made use of a parable on this occasion: God said to a man, 'If it please you, you may return to Me, or you may work a little longer at reforming the world.' The man said that he preferred to return to his Lord.
Abu Bakr(ra) was among the audience. He had been listening to this last address of the Prophet(sa), with fervour and anxiety the fervour of a great believer and the anxiety of a friend and follower who could see in this address the portents of the Prophet's(sa) death. On hearing the parable Abu Bakr(ra) could contain himself no longer. He broke down. The other Companions, who had taken a surface view of what they had been listening to, were amazed when Abu Bakr(ra) burst into tears. What could be the matter with Abu Bakr(ra)? they asked. The Prophet(sa) was relating the coming victories of Islam, yet he was weeping. Umar(ra), particularly, felt annoyed at Abu Bakr(ra). The Prophet(sa) was giving glad news, yet this old man was crying. But only the Prophet(sa) understood what was happening. Only Abu Bakr(ra), he thought had understood him. Only he had perceived that the verses which promised victories also portended the Prophet's(sa) approaching death.
The Prophet(sa) went on to say, "Abu Bakr(ra) is very dear to me. If it were permissible to love anyone more than others, I would so have loved Abu Bakr(ra). But that degree of love is only for God. O my people, all the doors which open to the mosque should be closed from today except the door of Abu Bakr(ra)."
There was no doubt that this last instruction implied a prophecy that after the Prophet(sa) Abu Bakr(ra) would be the First Khalifa. To lead the Faithful in prayers he would have to come to the mosque five times a day and, for this, he would have to keep open the door of his house into the mosque. Years afterwards, when Umar(ra) was Khalifa, he asked some of those present the meaning of the verse, "When the help of God and victory come." Evidently he remembered the circumstances in which the Prophet(sa) taught Muslims this and the verses which follow. He must have remembered also that then only Abu Bakr(ra) understood the meaning of these verses. Umar(ra) was trying to test Muslims for their knowledge of these verses. They had failed to understand them at the time of their revelation: did they know the meaning now? Ibni Abbas(ra), who must have been ten or eleven years of age at the time of their revelation and who was now seventeen or eighteen, volunteered to answer. He said, "Leader of the Faithful, these verses contained a prophecy about the death of the Holy Prophet(sa). When a Prophet's(sa) work is done, he wishes no longer to live in the world. The verses spoke of the imminent victory of Islam. This victory had a sad side and that was the impending departure of the Prophet(sa) from this world." Umar(ra) complimented Ibn Abbas(ra) and said that when the verses were revealed only Abu Bakr(ra) understood their meaning.
1 This was not meant as a general law. It referred only to the Holy Prophet(sa). A tradition puts down the age of Jesus(as) at one hundred and twenty or so. As he had already attained to sixty-two or sixty-three, he thought his death must be near.—Ed.