Comillg Home^179The Prophet stayed in Mecca for two weeks, and the situation be~n to
settle down. He sent expeditions to make sure that his alliances with the
nearby tribes were solid and that those who had announced they accept-
ed Islam had given up all idol worship. Khalid ibn al-\"/alid had been
entrusted with such a mission among the Banu Jadhimah, who eventually
surrendered, but Khalid d ecided, against Abd ar-Rahman ibn Awf's
advice, to execute rhe prisoners toward whom he harbored particular re-
sentment. After ex ecuting some of them, he stopped at Abd ar-Rahman's
insistence, the latter having mad e it dear to him that his behavior was
motivated by other inten tions than faith in God and justice. T he P rop het
got very ang ry when he heard of Khalid's behavior; he decided to pay
blood money fo r all the dead, and he kept repeating aloud: "0 God, 1 am
innocent o f what Khalid ibn al-Walid has dond"Z5
The path to the education of hearts and conscicnces of the !vIedina
and Mecca Muslims was still long. De eply rooted habits and old feelings
continued to rise to the surface and manifest as behaviors contrary to
Islam's precepts. Moreover, the J\'Ieccans' mass entry into Islam required
additio nal efforts in religious education. T he Prophet asked Muadh ibn
Jabal to make this a priority: the new converts had to be educated and
taught the principles of their new religion. The unity in adversity that had
prevailed so far had paradoxically been easier to achieve than the u nity in
faith , love, and respect that must henceforth be established now that there
were no major enemies left in the region.
T he Prophet had come back to the place of origin of his mission. He
had experienced persecution, then exile, then war, and he was returning to
the source in peace, with the aura of victory. More than the physical path
of a life, this \vas the initiatOry journey of a heart and conscience going
through the stages of the great jihad that takes people from the natural
tension of passions to the peace of spiritual education. ric had come back
different in the intensity of his effons and patience, and yet similar to
himself in his faithfulness to the message. When he had left, he had
prayed to the One, confident that he could not bur come home one day
to p ray at the foot of the House of God. Thus, he had left Mecca as a
human being undertaking the journey of his life, intimately convinced
that so meday he would have to come back to the origin, the center, close
to his heart, and return to the source of Life, the pulse of the divine.