The shaytan unmasked on the eve of the hijra

The seerah relates that when the Prophet resolved to emigrate to Medina, an old man of Banu Shayba appeared to him counselling him to remain in Mecca and warning him of his people Quraysh, saying 'you have brought sedition; stay among your people in ruin' ^{2 3}.

When the Prophet knew he was not human he pressed him to say 'I testify that there is no god but God and that Muhammad is His messenger'; the old man refused, turned and fled from him, and the Companions knew he was the shaytan sent to obstruct the hijra ^{1 2}.

This episode is among the seerah's clearest texts on Iblis's direct dealing with the people of prophethood; the seerah books gather it with the cave story and the Prophet's journey to Yathrib the long hijra hadith, and this browser reads it as a chapter in the struggle between the Prophet and the devil who swore to mislead His servants ^{2 3}.