Bahira the monk

Bahira was a Christian monk in Busra in the land of Syria; The Sealed Nectar calls him Jirjis. When the caravan of Abu Talib alighted there, he came out to them and honoured them. He recognised the boy Muhammad by his attributes, and advised his uncle to send him back to Mecca ^{1 2 3 4}.

There was a monk in Busra known as Bahira. When the caravan alighted, he came out to them and honoured them with hospitality; he had not used to come out to them before that ^{2 3}. He recognised the boy by his attributes, took him by the hand and said that he was the master of the worlds, whom God would send as a mercy to the worlds ^{2 3}.

Abu Talib asked him how he knew this. He replied that the stones and the trees fell prostrate when the caravan came up over the pass, that they prostrate only to a prophet, that he would recognise him by the seal of prophethood below his shoulder-blade, like an apple, and that they find him described in their books ^{2 3}. He asked Abu Talib to send him back and not take him on to Syria, out of fear for him from the Jews. His uncle sent him back to Mecca with some of his servants (the meeting with Bahira) ^{2 4}.

Al-Mas'udi counted him among those who called to God and warned their people about His signs in the interval between prophets, and he made him one of Abd al-Qays ⁵.

• The author notes in a footnote that the report in Tirmidhi and others, that Abu Talib sent Bilal with him, is a clear error: Bilal was perhaps not yet born at that time, and if he was, he was neither with his uncle nor with Abu Bakr. He refers to Zad al-Ma'ad ^{2 6 7}.
• The report belongs to the omens (irhasat) that biographers relate in the form of a narration.