ABSTRACT
In the late summer of 622 CE, a Jewish peasant from Yathrib, an oasis town some 200 miles north of Mecca, spotted two men heading towards the shade of palm trees. He recognized them: Muhammad and his staunch companion Abu Bakr (c. 573-634 CE), destined to become the fi rst of the four ‘rightly guided’ republican caliphs who succeeded the Prophet. He knew they had escaped Meccan persecution to seek asylum in Yathrib, a city later renamed as al-madı¯nat al-nabiyy (city of the messenger). He was not prescient enough to know that their arrival marked the beginning of a new era of universal history.
