The Battle of Mu'tah

Mu’tah was no battle of the kind the Muslims had fought before. At Badr, Uhud and Al-Khandaq, the community of Madinah had stood against the tribes of Arabia, men who spoke the same tongue, knew the same traditions and lived on the same peninsula. At Mu’tah, three thousand Muslims stood against the army of the Byzantine Empire and its Arab vassals, in a valley in the south of present-day Jordan, many days’ march from Madinah. It was the first confrontation between the Islamic state and a world power. What happened was no victory in the usual sense. But it was no defeat either. And the way in which the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions ﵃ dealt with it says more about the nature of this community than many a battle won.

The Cause

The immediate cause was the killing of an envoy. Al-Harith ibn Umayr al-Azdi ﵁ had been sent by the Prophet ﷺ with a letter to the ruler of Busra in Syria. On the way he was intercepted by Shurahbil ibn Amr al-Ghassani, the vassal king of the Ghassan under Byzantium, and killed. The killing of envoys was, in the Arab tradition, one of the gravest violations of the unwritten laws governing relations between peoples. The Prophet ﷺ could not leave it unanswered without putting at stake the standing and safety of every future envoy.

He assembled an army of three thousand men, the largest expedition that had so far set out from Madinah. He appointed three commanders in order of succession.

Zayd ibn Haritha ﵁ was the freed slave and adopted son of the Prophet ﷺ, a man whom he loved deeply. Ja’far ibn Abi Talib ﵁ was his cousin, the man who in Abyssinia had spoken before the Negus and had recited the verses of Surah Maryam. Abdullah ibn Rawaha ﵁ was the poet who had walked ahead of the Prophet ﷺ at the Umrat al-Qada. Three men dear to the Prophet ﷺ, in the front rank of an expedition into the heart of the Byzantine sphere of influence.

When the army left Madinah the Prophet ﷺ stood at the edge of the city to see them off. Abdullah ibn Rawaha ﵁, who knew what might lie before him, wept.

The Army Reaches Mu’tah

When the army reached the region of Ma’an in southern Syria, reports came in about the size of the enemy force. Heraclius had assembled a combined army of Byzantine troops and Arab vassals estimated at one hundred thousand men. Some accounts speak of two hundred thousand. Against three thousand Muslims.

The commanders held council.

The army marched on to Mu’tah.

The Battle

The two armies met on the plain of Mu’tah. Zayd ibn Haritha ﵁ took the banner and fought until he fell, pierced by spears. Ja’far ibn Abi Talib ﵁ seized the banner with his right hand. When his right hand was cut off he took it with his left. When his left hand was cut off he clutched the banner to his chest until he fell. He had at that moment ninety wounds upon his body, half of them in front.

Abdullah ibn Rawaha ﵁ took up the banner after Ja’far ﵁. He hesitated for a moment, something in him drew back. Later he related what had passed within him.

After the death of the three commanders, Thabit ibn Arqam ﵁ took up the banner for the moment and called on the Companions ﵃ to choose someone. They pointed to Khalid ibn al-Walid ﵁, who had only recently accepted Islam but whose military genius everyone knew.

Khalid ﵁ understood at once that a frontal assault on an army of that size meant the destruction of the Muslim force. He carried out a controlled withdrawal, repeatedly altering the formation to give the enemy the impression that reinforcements had arrived. The Byzantines, uncertain of what was happening, drew back. The Muslim army returned to Madinah.

The Reception in Madinah

The return was not triumphant. The three commanders were dead. The army had withdrawn without securing a decisive victory. The people of Madinah came out to meet those who had returned.

The Prophet ﷺ went to the house of Ja’far ibn Abi Talib ﵁ to console his wife Asma bint Umays ﵂. She was busy putting the house in order and baking bread, not knowing what had happened.

Of Ja’far ﵁ the Prophet ﷺ later said that Allah ﷻ had given him two wings with which he flew in Paradise, in place of his two severed hands. From that moment onwards he was called Ja’far al-Tayyar, Ja’far the Flying.

The Meaning of Mu’tah

Mu’tah is described in the sources neither as a victory nor as a defeat. The Islamic state had for the first time entered into a confrontation with the greatest military power of its day and had emerged from it intact. Three thousand men had stood firm against many times their number, three commanders had held the banner until they fell, and a fourth had saved the army with a withdrawal that, strategically, was the only sound decision.

Its significance was also symbolic. The Muslims had shown that they were not only equal to the tribes of Arabia, but were ready to push out to their frontiers, far from Madinah, against a world power. Khalid ibn al-Walid ﵁ would defeat that very Byzantine army years later, at the Battle of Yarmuk, decisively, opening Syria to Islam. The road to that victory began in the valley of Mu’tah, where three men whom the Prophet ﷺ loved held the banner until they could hold it no longer.