Mishkat al-Masabih — Hadith #52230

On the authority of Abu Musa, he said: Abu Talib went out to the Levant, and the Prophet, may God bless him and grant him peace, went out with him, accompanied by sheikhs from Quraysh, and when they overlooked the monk, they descended. So they dismounted, and the monk came out to them. Before that, they were passing by him, but he did not come out to them. He said, “They are dismounted.” They set out on their journey, and the monk began to penetrate them until he came and took the hand of the Messenger of God, may God bless him and grant him peace. He said, “This is the Lord of the worlds. This is the Messenger of the Lord.” God will send him as a mercy to the worlds. Elders from Quraysh said to him, “What has taught you?” He said, “When you approached from Al-Aqaba, not a tree or a stone remained but it fell down in prostration, and they do not prostrate except to a prophet, and I recognize him by the seal of the Prophethood, below the cartilage of his shoulder. Like an apple. Then he came back and prepared food for them. When he brought it to them, and he was herding the camels, he said, “Send to him.” So he came, wearing a cloud to shade him. When he approached the people, he found that they had preceded him to the tree’s palm. When he sat, the tree leaned over him and said, “Look at the tree.” He leaned over the tree and said, “I adjure you by God, which of you is his guardian.” They said, “Abu Talib.” He continued to appeal to him until he rejected him. Abu Talib and Abu Bakr sent Bilal with him, and the monk provided him with cakes and oil. (The Sheikh commented that mentioning Bilal in the hadith was a mistake, as he had not yet been created.)