The Prophet of Mercy Website

  Ishmael (Peace be upon him) administered authority over Makkah as well as custodianship of the
Holy Sanctuary throughout his lifetime. Upon his death, at the age of 137, two of his sons, Nabet
and Qidar, succeeded him. Later on, their maternal grandfather, Mudad bin ‘Amr Al-Jurhumi took
over, thus transferring rulership over Makkah to the tribe of Jurhum, preserving a venerable
position, though very little authority for Ishmael’s sons due to their father’s exploits in building the
Holy Sanctuary, a position they held until the decline of the tribe of Jurhum shortly before the rise of
Bukhtanassar.

The political role of the ‘Adnanides had begun to gain firmer grounds in Makkah, which could be
clearly attested by the fact that upon Bukhtanassar’s first invasion of the Arabs in ‘Dhati ‘Irq’, the
leader of the Arabs was not from Jurhum.
Upon Bukhtanassar’s second invasion in 587 B.C., however, the ‘Adnanides were frightened out to
Yemen, while Burmia An-Nabi fled to Syria with Ma‘ad, but when Bukhtanassar’s pressure lessened,
Ma‘ad returned to Makkah to find none of the tribe of Jurhum except Jursham bin Jalhamah, whose
daughter, Mu‘ana, was given to Ma‘ad as wife who, later, had a son by him named Nizar.

On account of difficult living conditions and destitution prevalent in Makkah, the tribe of Jurhum
began to ill-treat visitors of the Holy Sanctuary and extort its funds, which aroused resentment and
hatred of the ‘Adnanides (sons of Bakr bin ‘Abd Munaf bin Kinana) who, with the help of the tribe of
Khuza‘a that had come to settle in a neighbouring area called Marr Az-Zahran, invaded Jurhum and
frightened them out of Makkah leaving rulership to Quda‘a in the middle of the second century A.D.
Upon leaving Makkah, Jurhum filled up the well of Zamzam, levelled its place and buried a great
many things in it.

The Sealed Nectar

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