Disputing the count of raids and sariyas

The scholars of the campaigns (maghazi) differed over the number of the expeditions the Prophet ﷺ led in person, and over the number of his detachments (saraya) and dispatches (ba'uth). ²

Ibn Hisham relates from Ziyad al-Bakka'i, from Ibn Ishaq, that the total of the expeditions the Prophet made in person was twenty-seven. He counts them from Waddan to Tabuk, and he fought in nine of them: Badr, Uhud, the Trench, Qurayza, al-Mustaliq, Khaybar, the Conquest, Hunayn, and al-Ta'if. See the list of expeditions. ³ His dispatches and detachments were thirty-eight, between dispatch and detachment. He begins them with the expedition of Ubayda ibn al-Harith (may God be pleased with him), and mentions that some people place the expedition of Hamza before it. See the list of detachments. ⁴

Al-Masudi mentions that the expeditions the Prophet made in person were twenty-six according to Ibn Ishaq, while others counted them as twenty-seven by separating the expedition of Wadi al-Qura from Khaybar. He says that he fought in nine by agreement of Ibn Ishaq and al-Waqidi, and that al-Waqidi added Wadi al-Qura and the day of al-Ghaba. He says the detachments are said to be thirty-five, or forty-eight, or sixty-six. ² A reader will note that the printed Ibn Hisham says twenty-seven, not twenty-six, although his list counts the Umra of al-Qada' as an expedition. ³

At the end of the list of detachments, Ibn Hisham notes that Ibn Ishaq mentioned the dispatch of Khalid ibn al-Walid (may God be pleased with him) to Yemen in his narrative but did not count it in the number of dispatches and detachments, so "the number in his words should be thirty-nine" instead of thirty-eight. See the expedition of Ali to Yemen. ⁵