What did the early Muslims in Makkah suffer before the Hijrah?

For roughly thirteen years the believers in Makkah faced ridicule, social boycott, beating and torture: Bilal ibn Rabah was pinned under a rock on burning sand, and Sumayyah bint Khayyat was killed, becoming the first martyr of this ummah. Khabbab ibn al-Aratt narrated that when they complained to the Prophet ﷺ while he sat in the shade of the Kaʿbah, he told them of those before them who were sawn in two and combed with iron combs down to the bone yet did not leave their religion, and promised that Allah would complete this affair until a rider could travel from Sanʿaʾ to Hadramawt fearing none but Allah. Allah also permitted the one physically coerced to utter words of kufr while his heart remained at rest with faith, a concession the mufassirūn connect with ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir. The lesson of that period is that the dīn advanced through ṣabr and uncompromising tawḥīd, not through concessions in creed.

Ask your own question → All questions