The city that welcomed a stranger

There are many ways to lose your home. Fire can take it. War can destroy it. Poverty can force you to leave. But there is another way, perhaps harder to understand. You can find yourself unwelcome in the very place where you were born, surrounded by people whose names you have known all your life.

The streets haven't changed. The mountains are where they have always been, the markets still open, and the familiar rhythms of daily life continue around you. It is your place in that world that has changed.

In seventh-century Makkah, belonging was about considerably more than having somewhere to live. Family and tribe were central to a person's identity, livelihood and security. In a society without modern institutions of law enforcement, they were also among the most important sources of protection. To lose that protection was no small thing.

For some of the earliest Muslims, following their faith meant confronting precisely that possibility.

When belief came at a price

The early Muslim community included merchants and labourers, people of influence and people with very little. Some belonged to powerful families. Others were enslaved or lacked the protection of influential relatives. Their experiences of persecution were consequently very different.

Bilal ibn Rabah (رضي الله عنه), an enslaved man who embraced Islam, became one of the best-known examples of the cruelty directed towards those who had little power to defend themselves. Accounts of his persecution describe the physical suffering inflicted upon him because of his faith. Others faced pressure from their families, hostility from their communities and restrictions on their freedom to practise their religion.

Even Abu Bakr (رضي الله عنه), a respected member of Makkah's society, experienced the limits of personal standing. An account preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari describes how he set out towards Abyssinia after facing hostility in Makkah. Along the way, he encountered Ibn al-Daghinnah, a tribal chief who offered him protection and persuaded him to return.

That protection came with conditions. Abu Bakr's public recitation of the Qur'an attracted attention, and the leaders of Quraysh objected. Eventually, he relinquished the protection he had been offered.

The account reveals something important about the society. Even a respected man could find that his freedom to practise his faith openly depended upon the protection and approval of others. For those without influential connections, the consequences could be considerably worse.

History often reduces persecution to a single word. Yet behind it were individual lives, each shaped by different pressures, vulnerabilities and difficult choices. For many of the Muslims in Makkah, those choices would eventually lead to a decision that changed their lives. They would leave.

The price of leaving

Human beings are rather attached to the places they call home. We establish businesses, raise children and develop an extraordinary affection for familiar streets. We learn which neighbours can be relied upon, which merchants offer a fair price and which relatives are best visited in small doses.

Over time, these things become the fabric of ordinary life. Leaving them behind is rarely as simple as changing an address.

For the early Muslims, migration could mean separation from family, the loss of possessions and livelihoods, and the uncertainty of beginning again among people they did not yet know. Some were able to leave with their families. Others faced obstacles, opposition or separation.

Looking backwards, it is easy to treat the Hijrah as inevitable. We know that Madinah would become the home of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. We know that a new Muslim community would take shape there and that the events which followed would profoundly influence history.

The people preparing to leave Makkah had no such hindsight. They knew what they had already endured and what they might have to sacrifice. Beyond that lay a future whose details were unknown to them.

Their destination was Yathrib, an oasis settlement distinguished by its date palms, agricultural land and communities established long before the arrival of the emigrants. Its inhabitants included the Arab tribes of Aws and Khazraj, alongside Jewish communities with their own histories, livelihoods and alliances.

This was not an empty refuge waiting to receive newcomers. It was an established society, with its own relationships, resources and tensions.

Through the pledges at Aqabah, groups from Yathrib had already made commitments to the Prophet ﷺ. These helped make the city a place where the Muslims of Makkah could seek refuge. But welcoming people driven from their homes involves more than goodwill. They need shelter, food, livelihoods and security. And those who receive them may face risks of their own.

The people of Yathrib were making a commitment that could change the future of their city.

The distance between two cities

Today, travelling between Makkah and Madinah is a relatively comfortable affair. Pilgrims board coaches, climb into cars or settle into the air-conditioned carriages of the Haramain high-speed railway. There are comfortable seats, drinking water, luggage compartments and the reassuring certainty of a destination displayed on a screen.

Outside, the landscape stretches towards the horizon. Rocky mountains rise above exposed ground, while broad expanses of desert seem to continue without interruption. Even from a moving train, the scale of the landscape can be striking.

It is one thing to observe this country through a window. It is quite another to cross it without the roads, railways and infrastructure we now take for granted.

Fourteen centuries ago, journeys depended upon animals, reliable guides, knowledge of the terrain and access to water. The climate and geography imposed demands that modern travellers can easily overlook. Distance was measured not simply in miles, but in the time, provisions and effort required to cross it.

For those leaving Makkah under threat, the difficulties were not limited to the landscape. There was also the danger posed by people determined to prevent their departure.

The migration of the Prophet ﷺ and Abu Bakr (رضي الله عنه) offers a revealing example. The account narrated by Aisha (رضي الله عنها) and preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari describes careful preparations for the journey. Abu Bakr had readied two riding animals, arrangements were made with a trusted guide, and members of his household played important roles in supporting their departure.

The Prophet ﷺ and Abu Bakr took refuge in the cave of Thawr for three nights while the search for them continued. Abdullah ibn Abi Bakr (رضي الله عنه) brought information about developments in Makkah. Amir ibn Fuhayrah (رضي الله عنه), who tended Abu Bakr's sheep, also assisted them.

These details matter because they reveal the practical realities behind an event we often describe in purely spiritual terms. The journey required planning, discretion, trusted companions and an understanding of the dangers involved.

Even the guide entrusted with leading them was not, at that time, a Muslim. His knowledge and reliability were what made him suitable for the task.

There is something worth noticing here. The Hijrah is rightly remembered as an extraordinary act of faith, but the historical accounts also reveal the preparation and human effort that accompanied that faith. Trust in Allah did not mean neglecting the realities of the journey.

After the danger, the concealment and the passage through difficult country, there was a destination. Yathrib, the city that would become known to the world as Madinah.

The people who made room

Hospitality is one of those virtues almost every society admires. It becomes rather more demanding when the guest needs somewhere to live, a means of earning a living and help rebuilding an entire life.

The people of Madinah who supported the Prophet ﷺ and welcomed the emigrants became known as the Ansar: the Helpers. Those who migrated from Makkah became known as the Muhajirun: the Emigrants.

Under the guidance of the Prophet ﷺ, bonds of brotherhood were established between members of the two groups. One account, preserved in Sahih al-Bukhari, offers a particularly revealing glimpse of what this meant in practice.

When Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf (رضي الله عنه) arrived in Madinah, the Prophet ﷺ established a bond of brotherhood between him and Sa'd ibn al-Rabi (رضي الله عنه), one of the Ansar. Sa'd offered to share his wealth, an extraordinary gesture in a society where possessions represented security, livelihood and the means to provide for a family.

Abd al-Rahman thanked him, prayed for blessings upon his family and possessions, and asked to be shown the market. He wanted to establish himself through trade.

It is a small exchange in the vast sweep of history, but it tells us a great deal. One man was prepared to give generously. The other was determined to support himself. Generosity met dignity, hospitality met enterprise, and a newcomer began finding his place in an unfamiliar city.

The Ansar did not possess unlimited resources, nor were they without responsibilities of their own. Their generosity mattered precisely because sharing involved giving something up.

The Qur'an praises those who had made Madinah their home and embraced faith, describing their love for the emigrants and their willingness to give preference to others, even when they themselves were in need (Surah Al-Hashr, 59:9).

Something remarkable was taking shape. Belonging was no longer determined solely by ancestry, tribe or the circumstances of one's birth. Faith and shared responsibility were creating bonds of another kind.

More than a refuge

Welcoming the emigrants was only the beginning. A community still had to be built, and Madinah was home to people with different backgrounds, histories and loyalties. The arrival of the Prophet ﷺ and the Muhajirun did not erase those differences overnight.

The Prophet's Mosque became central to the emerging Muslim society, serving not only as a place of worship but also as a gathering place and centre of communal life. The bonds between the Muhajirun and Ansar helped address the needs of those who had migrated, while the developing relationships and agreements among Madinah's communities reflected the challenges of establishing a functioning society.

Nor did hardship disappear when the travellers reached safety. There would be disagreements, economic pressures, external threats and, in the years ahead, armed conflict. The community would be tested repeatedly.

But something fundamental had changed. In Makkah, the early Muslims had faced persecution and struggled to practise their faith in safety. In Madinah, they could begin establishing a community organised around that faith.

The Hijrah was therefore more than a change of location. It marked a turning point in Islamic history.

The people who made that possible came from different places and brought different experiences, resources and skills. Some had been born in Makkah; others had spent their lives in Yathrib. What united them was not that they had always belonged to the same community, but that they were now committed to building one together.

What they built together

Fourteen centuries later, the journey between Makkah and Madinah is measured in hours rather than days. The roads are busy, the trains are fast, and the city that once welcomed a community of emigrants now receives visitors from across the world.

Many come to pray in the Prophet's Mosque. Others visit places associated with the city's early history. They arrive with passports, hotel reservations and return tickets, carrying little of the uncertainty faced by those who made the journey in the seventh century.

But the most remarkable legacy of Madinah is not the number of people who visit it. It is what happened when people from different backgrounds, tribes and circumstances began building a life together.

The Muhajirun had left much behind. The Ansar had much to share. Neither group came with identical experiences, resources or expectations. Yet under the guidance of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, they helped establish a community whose bonds reached beyond ancestry and whose responsibilities extended beyond family.

It was not a community without hardship, disagreement or difficult choices. The years that followed would test it repeatedly, but something extraordinary had taken root.

From this city emerged a generation that Muslims would come to regard as an example of faith, character and service. Their accounts would be preserved, their decisions studied and their generosity remembered. The lessons of their lives would travel further than any of them could have imagined.

And their names would be spoken with an affection that has endured for more than fourteen centuries.

Even today, when Muslims mention Abu Bakr, Bilal, the Muhajirun or the Ansar, they follow their names with a prayer: Radiyallahu anhum. May Allah be pleased with them.

It is a remarkable thing. The people who opened their homes, shared their wealth and helped build a community in seventh-century Arabia are still remembered in the prayers of people who never met them.

Indeed, the Qur'an itself teaches those who come after the early believers to pray for those who preceded them in faith, asking Allah for their forgiveness and for hearts free from resentment (Surah Al-Hashr, 59:10).

Their example continues to shape how we understand brotherhood, our obligations towards those in need, and the belief that faith should be reflected not merely in what we say, but in how we treat one another.

Perhaps that is what makes Madinah's story so enduring. People who had been forced to leave one community helped build another, alongside those who had chosen to welcome them.

What began as a place of refuge became a place from which the world would learn.