But the more devotees “Islam” _i.e._, “submission” (to the will of God) acquired, the more eagerly did its enemies seek to stifle the work in the blood of its author. New persecutions increased the number of the emigrants; only Mohammed and his most faithful worshippers were protected by Abu Talib from the rage of the sons of Shams and Naufal. He hid them in a strong castle without the city, in the depths of an impassable ravine, and when their powerful enemies laid a ban on all the followers of the prophet and the whole race of Hashim and solemnly declared in a roll which was hung up in the interior of the Kaaba that until he was given up they would treat his protectors as enemies, the faithful uncle betook himself to the rocky fortress with many of his kinsmen. For three years they lived in the barren desert, cut off from all communication with the city, whither they could venture only in the sacred months, and often they were in want of the most necessary means of existence. Finally the ban, which had excited the greatest discontent in Mecca, and of which even the sons of Shams were beginning to grow weary, was removed. The parchment roll disappeared from the Kaaba, according to the legend, by a miracle. Mohammed now returned to Mecca (_circa_ 620); but soon the death of his paternal friend and protector, Abu Talib, who was followed to the grave a few days later by his faithful wife Khadija, exposed him to fresh dangers. Abu Talib died in the religion of his fathers; he had always honoured his nephew as an upright and god-fearing man, but he had never believed in his prophetic mission. Mohammed sincerely mourned them both. [Sidenote: [620-622 A.D.]] “Never was there a better wife than Khadija,” he said once to the youthful and beautiful Aisha; “she believed in me when men despised me; she relieved my wants when I was poor and despised by the world.” Nevertheless he soon consoled himself for her loss by his marriage to Sauda and his betrothal to Aisha, the seven-year old daughter of Abu Bekr. While the prophet was leading a melancholy existence under scorn and ignominy, sometimes in Mecca, sometimes in the society of a few friends in Taif, a place lying in a fruitful region on the borders of the hill country, hiding himself with difficulty from the snares and persecutions of his enemies, his soul felt itself comforted and exalted by new visions. He saw in the spirit how he was borne on a winged horse to the temple at Jerusalem and thence to the seventh heaven to the presence of God, where the patriarchs, the earlier prophets, and the hosts of angels yielded him precedence, and the Lord himself proclaimed him as the crown and aim of creation. He needed this self-confidence, this firm belief in his high message, to keep him from wavering and succumbing to the storms and dangers which gathered over his head.