Thousands had accompanied Muhammad to Mecca, and for the first day on the return trip, many or most of them were still there. Before the crowd broke up to go separate ways, Muhammad gave another short speech. They had stopped for the night around a very small oasis spring called Ghadir Khumm. This oasis had a pool, but its water was generally too salty to drink; its name meant “Deceiver Pond.” The place was significant because it was a visible intersection of three main roads leading to Egypt, Iraq, and back to Medina.
Muhammad had some men pile camel saddles up to form a platform, with palm branches reaching up to make a little shade on top. He sat on this dais. The Prophet’s short speech is not disputed in Islamic sources. He called Ali up to him, and he asked the crowd whether he (Muhammad) was not closer to the believers than they were themselves? This was a point made in the Quran, so they called back “Yes!” In that case, he said, “Anyone who has me as his mawla, has Ali as his mawla.”
What did “mawla” mean? There isn’t a straightforward answer. It was the word that referred to a client, like a newly converted person under the protection of a believer, or like tribes that paid deference or taxes to another tribe. But its root meaning also refers to closeness, and to having power over someone, so it can be used to mean the opposite: to be the guardian in a client relationship. It can also mean a helper. Sometimes a source quotes Muhammad using a related word, wali, which has a similar range: guardian, friend, helper.
Whether the Prophet meant chiefly “friend” or “boss,” in any case, he made the point that he and Ali were the same. If you listen to one, listen to the other. Why was he making this speech at this time? That’s where it gets contentious.
The Shi’a believe that it was part of Muhammad’s series of farewell speeches. He had told friends that Allah gave him a choice of long life or a sooner return to God, and he chose God. He made this pilgrimage so that he could leave clear instructions, and he made a plainly valedictory speech on the hilltop. Ali had joined the pilgrimage party after the main events were over, because he had been in Yemen. He took a party of several hundred men a few months earlier; they were to instruct the people in proper Muslim prayers and law, but if there were any tribes that needed to be conquered, they had weapons along too. So when the Prophet gave his hilltop speech, Ali was not with him yet.
In the Shi’ite narrative, this first stop at the tiny oasis was the last farewell to the crowd of believers and Muhammad wanted to make his successor clear. He stood on the dais and brought Ali up, and raising Ali’s arm, he said “If I am your master, then Ali is your master.” They all shouted “Yes!” in response.
But the Sunnis downplay the importance of the speech. As you’ll see in later parts of the story, the other Companions strenuously opposed Ali’s leadership. Even in their telling, Umar congratulated Ali on getting the nod of succession—-at this event. But later, Umar too opposed actually giving Ali any power. Perhaps in order to justify the way things worked out, they have a back story to explain Muhammad’s speech.
In the Sunni story, Ali came back from Yemen with 300 men who were wearing the same clothes they wore out from Medina. The clothes were dirty and sweaty. When they heard that Muhammad was in Mecca, they decided to ride back to join him, but as they grew closer to the city, they realized that everyone there would be very clean and in best clothes (or pilgrim garb?). Some of the booty/tribute they had in the camel train was a lot of freshly woven linen, which Ali intended to present to the Muslim treasury as a grand gift. But when Ali rode out faster to meet Muhammad first, the men left behind agreed to share out the clean linen for themselves. When Ali saw this, maybe the next day, he was angry and told them to take it off. They had to put on their sweaty clothes, and this made them angry. They grumbled at Ali for several days, and they complained to Muhammad.
In this narrative, Muhammad’s speech about Ali was a way of telling them to shut up. Would they complain if he told them to put on dirty clothes? No? Well then don’t complain if Ali says it. It’s the same message, but restricted to a situation right there at hand. If the context is about dirty laundry, there’s no reason to think it was a succession investiture.
Shi’ites celebrate the day when Ali was declared the successor as Eid al-Ghadir. It’s a very important feast, considered by some as the greatest feast of all. And yet the biography of Muhammad by Martin Lings, a Sunni scholar, detailed the dirty linen story while not even mentioning the way this speech might have been a succession ceremony. It shows outsiders how deep the divisions can run.
- Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources, by Martin Lings.