588 Mohammad's Journey to Syria. [No. 7. 



ed by Abu 1-Sa'adat Ibn al-Athyr. He says in his Jami'alogdl, II. 3 : 



^JIL Ij| oJilij Jj.j Jj a<xi.c ^1*1 &&*&)] j XjX\J\ +J&*.i tojxh UxjLj v^AA^\ 



**** &ij&* J l -*+^ £k v^l d^l ^y f^lJ <*&° ^1 2J*ij ^ia. 



" His uncle Abu. Talib was gone with him to Syria on commerce. 

 He was then thirteen years of age, the Rahib BaAyra saw him and 

 observed that'he was an orphan, and he recognized him by the signs 

 of prophecy, and by the description which he had of him, and he did 

 not cease to urge upon Abu 2alib until he (Abu Talib) caused him to 

 return and he remained at Makkah until he was twenty-five years 

 of age." 



These are all the original accounts which are available for me. Tabary 

 furnishes no additional information. This historian usually gives all 

 the conflicting traditions on a question, and then his own views there- 

 on. It is likely that he has done the same in this instance. He gives 

 the story in the version of Ibn IsAaq, but unfortunately just where it 

 ends, two pages are wanting in my MS. These two pages in all pro- 

 bability contained the other versions current in those days. 



All accounts agree that MoAammad instead of proceeding on his 

 journey precipitously returned to Makkah, some say from Balqa, others 

 from Kafr, and others say from Bostra, and it is this circumstance 

 which served as a peg on which to fasten the marvelous portion of the 

 story, BaAyrd's recognition of the prophet in the boy. It will pro- 

 bably never be possible to ascertain the real cause of this precipitous 

 return, but that Abu Talib took measures that his nephew should 

 return to Makkah sooner than it was originally intended, is certain, 

 unless the whole journey is a fiction.* In the first two traditions, it is 



* It is stated in the Icabah that there is a tradition extant, resting however 

 on weak authority that Mohammad met BaAyra again, when he went the second 

 time to Syria for Khadyjah. The Biographers of Mohammad state that he met 

 in his second journey to Syria, the monk Nestur and they repeat nearly the 

 same miracles and adventures, which they relate of his first journey. Maracci has 

 thereby been induced to identify Ba/zyra and Nestur, and to suppose that Nestur 

 means simply that Ba^yra was a Nestorian. Considering that the oldest and most 

 authentic tradition on this journey that of Tirmidzy, contains the greatest number of 

 marvels, it is not at all unlikely that the first journey to Syria is altogether apocry- 

 phical and that it has been invented with the view of covering the real facts regard- 



