1. Do you not see what your Lord did with the Companions of the Elephant? This is a question which implies wonder. The Companions of the Elephant, Mahmud, and his owner, Abraha, the King of Yemen and his army. He built a temple in San‘a in order to divert people from making pilgrimage to Makka. A man of the tribe of Kinana went and defiled it and soiled the qibla of the temple with faeces to desecrate it. Abraha swore that he would destroy the Ka‘ba. He came to Makka with his army on the elephant of Yemen, with Mahmud in the vanguard. When they set out to destroy the Ka‘ba, Allah sent against them what is mentioned in the following verses.

2. Did He not bring all their schemes to nothing – Allah thwarted their plan to destroy the Ka‘ba,

3. …unleashing upon them flock after flock of birds; most commentators say that ababil has no singular, although some say that its plural is abul, ibal, or ibil;

4. …bombarding them with stones of hard-baked clay;

5. …then making them like stripped wheat-stalks eaten bare? Like leaves of crops eaten by animals, crushed and crumbled. Allah destroyed each of them with a stone on which was written the name of the person it hit. These stones were larger than lentils and smaller than chickpeas. They pierced the skulls of men and camels before reaching the ground. These events took place the year that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was born.