The Gharaniq Incident: The Day All of Mecca Bowed — the Reports and the Refutations
Tabari, Ibn Sa'd and al-Waqidi record that during Surah al-Najm the words "these are the exalted gharaniq, whose intercession is hoped for" were pronounced concerning al-Lat, al-Uzza and Manat — and all of Quraysh prostrated. Bukhari 4862 records the prostration without the words. Ibn Kathir, Qadi Iyad and al-Albani declared the story baseless. Both columns, exactly as they are.
By John Shaqi · July 21, 2026 · 15 min read
The Day All of Mecca Bowed
There is hardly a stranger scene in all of Sirah literature. Sahih al-Bukhari — the book Sunni Muslims regard as the most authentic after the Quran — records (Hadith 4862 and elsewhere) that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ recited Surah al-Najm and prostrated at its final verse, and with him prostrated the Muslims, the mushrikun (idolaters), the jinn and mankind.
Pause on that. The idolaters of Quraysh — the men who had persecuted the Muslims for years — fell into prostration, in that same gathering, at a surah revealed against their own idols? In the report from Ibn Mas'ud, only one old man did not bow.
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