Scholars
the Hijra
In 622 the Prophet left Mecca for Yathrib — soon called Medina, the City — and the Hijra became a turning point, not a flight. The Ansar welcomed the emigrants, sharing homes and wealth, and the Muslims built their first self-governing community: a mosque that gathered them, a charter regulating the rights of Muslims, Jews and the remaining tribes, and markets run on new rules. From Medina went out Badr, Uhud and Khaybar; to it people flocked after the conquest of Mecca in 630. When the Prophet died, the Rightly Guided caliphs ruled there before the capital moved to Kufa, then Damascus. Today millions of Muslims visit his mosque in Medina, and the old name Yathrib still recalls how a new community can be born out of a migration. In this the Hijra stands as the ummah's first lesson: a faith needs a home, a home needs an order, and an order needs patience.