Banu Nadir

Place in the story

AllytowardThe early Muslim community · 622 CE · 1 BH† – 625 CE · 4 AH†Historical

OpponenttowardThe early Muslim community · 625 CE · 4 AH† – 628 CE · 7 AH†Historical

Victim · 625 CE · 4 AH†Historical

Roles are dated and sourced; the museum describes the act and attributes the judgement.

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Banu al-Nadir — the farming Jews of Yathrib — were exiled in 625 CE after a plot accusation; many of them ended at Khaybar.

Banu al-Nadir — the farming Jews of Yathrib, the wealthiest of them in houses and property — were exiled in the chosen exile of 625 CE after an accusation of a killing plot, their lot ending at Khaybar and the settling that came after. In the years following Uhud Medina accused their chief Huyayy ibn Akhtab of arranging the Prophet ﷺ's assassination by inviting him to his assembly; the armies besieged them until they left with six hundred loads, whatever the camels bore — arms excepted. Many settled at Khaybar and Huyayy became the leader of the Jewish front against the state until he fell after its fall. Their land — the Fadak groves and the Nadir holdings — became in the tradition the Prophet's own booty, and from it his endowment.

Storytellers (10–12) read the Explorers text, then cross to the Scholars text.

Banu al-Nadir — the farming Jews of Yathrib, the wealthiest of them in houses and property — were exiled in the chosen exile of 625 CE after an accusation of a killing plot, their lot ending at Khaybar and the settling that came after. In the years following Uhud Medina accused their chief Huyayy ibn Akhtab of arranging the Prophet ﷺ's assassination by inviting him to his assembly; the armies besieged them until they left with six hundred loads, whatever the camels bore — arms excepted. Many settled at Khaybar and Huyayy became the leader of the Jewish front against the state until he was killed after its fall. Their land — the Fadak groves and the Nadir holdings — became in the tradition the Prophet's own booty, and from it his endowment.

Overview

Banu al-Nadir were Jews of Yathrib who farmed, the most prosperous of them in houses and wealth. They were expelled in 625 CE, with the choice of what their camels could carry, after being accused of a murder plot. Their story ran on to Khaybar, and then to the plot to win it back.

History

In the years after Uhud, the city accused their chief Huyayy ibn Akhtab of arranging the Prophet's assassination by inviting him to his gathering. The armies besieged them until they came out with six hundred loads and whatever the camels could carry, apart from weapons ¹. Many settled at Khaybar, and Huyayy became the leader of the Jewish front against the state there, until he was killed after it fell ².

Their land, the orchards of Fadak and the estates of al-Nadir, became in the tradition a fay' belonging to the Prophet in particular, and his endowment came from it ³.

Legacy

The Nadir story is a knot in Jewish–Islamic classification. In the Sira it is a just punishment for betrayal. In academic study it is an early example of "pre-emptive expulsions". In Jewish heritage it is a chapter of the peninsula's lost laments ².

In the introduction to al-Raheeq al-Makhtum

Al-Raheeq al-Makhtum counts this tribe among the well-known Jewish tribes when Islam came: Khaybar, al-Nadir, al-Mustaliq, Qurayza and Qaynuqa'. It reports from al-Samhudi that the number of Jewish tribes exceeded twenty. Their settlement in the Hijaz began with the migration of Jews to Yathrib, Khaybar and Tayma' after the Romans took Palestine in 70 CE ⁴ ⁵ ⁶. See Judaism in the Arabian Peninsula and the Jewish tribes of the Hijaz.

In Medina at the Hijra (al-Raheeq al-Makhtum, p. 180)

It was one of the three Jewish tribes of Yathrib. It stirred up wars between the Aws and the Khazraj through incitement, and its people lent money to the Arabs at interest (Medina's society at the time of the Hijra) ⁷.

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Sources

Ibn Ishaq / Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad (1955)

Watt, Muhammad at Medina (1956)

Ibn Sa'd, Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kabir (Bewley translation, Ta-Ha)

al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri , p.40

Qalb Jazirat al-Arab — Fuʾad Hamza , p.151

Wafa al-Wafa — al-Samhudi , p.116

al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri , p.180

Medina

City in the Hejaz to which the Prophet migrated in 622 CE; site of the Prophet's Mosque and the first Muslim community. The Prophet declared it a sanctuary as Abraham declared Mecca — its bounds 'between 'Ayr and Thawr' (or 'to Uhud' in the reading Abu 'Ubayd and al-Hazimi preferred) and 'between its two lava fields'; within them hunting and tree-cutting are forbidden and the bloodwit for unintended killing is heavier. Samhudi counts nearly ninety-five names for it, among them Tayba, Taba and Yathrib.

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