Khalifa Abu Bakr - The Treaty of Hudaibiya

After some further negotiations a pact was executed between the Quraish and the Muslims. According to the treaty of Hudaibiya, truce was declared between the Quraish and the Muslims for a period of ten years. It was stipulated that if any tribe wished to enter into treaty with the Muslims it could do so, and whoever wished to enter into a covenant with the Quraish was likewise free to do so. It was provided that if any one from the Quraish came to the Muslims without the permission of his guardian he was to be returned to the Quraish. On the other hand if a Muslim sought refuge with the Quraish, he was not to be delivered to the Muslims. It was further agreed that the Muslims would withdraw that year without performing the pilgrimage, and that they would be free to perform the Haj the following year when they could stay in Makkah for three days.

Abu Bakr on the treaty of Hudaibiya. Prima facie the Hudaibiya pact favored the Quraish, and some of the Muslims were critical of the terms of the treaty. Umar regarded the treaty as humiliating to the Muslims He saw Abu Bakr, and wanted him to persuade the Holy Prophet to withdraw from the pact. Abu Bakr said: "The Holy Prophet knows things more than we do. What the Holy Prophet has done is in the interest of the Muslims. Do not b critical, but hold fast to the stirrup of the Holy Prophet."

Umar waited on the Holy Prophet, and gave expression to his discontentment with the terms of the treaty. The Holy Prophet assured him that whatever he had done was under the command of God, and the terms which appeared to be against the interests of the Muslims would turn out to their advantage.

Abu Bakr expressed his views about the treaty of Hudaibiya in the following words: "No victory of Islam has more importance than the treaty of Hudaibiya. Men are always for hurrying things on, but God lets them ripen. Previously there had subsisted a wall of partition between the Muslims and the rest of men; they never spoke to each other, and wherever they met they began to fight. Subsequently hostility died down and security and mutual confidence took its place. Every man of even moderate intelligence who heard of I lam joined us and in the twenty-two months in which the truce subsisted the number of conversions was greater than throughout the whole of the previous period, and the faith of Islam diffused itself in all directions among the people."