separate from each other until they come to me by the
pool of Paradise.”
Sunni scholars dispute this. These words were added
later, they say, and besides, they do not indicate that
Muhammad knew he was soon to die. Like anyone of
sixty-three, when the human body makes its age known
in ways a younger person never imagines, he certainly
knew he would not live forever, but that did not mean he
expected to die in the near future. He was merely
preparing the assembled Muslims for the inevitable,
whenever it would come.
The time and place of Muhammad’s declaration are
not in dispute. It was on March 10 in the year 632, three
months before his ɹnal illness. The caravan of returning
pilgrims had stopped for the night at the spring-fed
water hole known as Ghadir Khumm, the Pool of
Khumm. It was not the picturesque Hollywood image of
an oasis, but oasis it was: a shallow pool with just
enough moisture in the sand around it to nurture the
undemanding roots of a few scraggly palm trees. In the
barren mountains of western Arabia, even the smallest
spring was a treasured landmark, and this one more
than most since it was where several caravan routes
intersected. Here the thousands of returning pilgrims
would break up into smaller parties, some going on to
Medina and other points north, others to the east. This
was the last night they would all be together, and their
numbers were swelled by the arrival of Ali at the head of