She thought too late at midnight, and finally decided how to take revenge from him (the Prophet (PBUH)! She could not sleep at all at night because she was too eager to take revenge for the idols she worshiped.
A Failed Plot
Even before the first ray of sunlight had entered her window, she was busy sweeping her house; she saved all the garbage in a basket, placed out of the roof of her house, and proudly looked at it for a while.
Then with an impatient look on her face, she looked at the street that she lived on and thought:
“No one has ever seen him angry. Everybody will praise me when they will see him shouting and getting mad! They will laugh at him and make fun of him.”
She looked at the basket again and grinned mischievously.
Meanwhile she heard footsteps announcing the approach of the end of her waiting.
“Finally my prey has arrived!” She thought.
As she saw a man just in clean white clothes coming her way, she picked up the basket in her hands and threw all the garbage on him when he passed by.
Much to the woman’s disappointment, he did not say anything and continued on his way calmly.
She did the same thing the following day thinking:
“Maybe this time I will be able to frustrate him.”
But he was too gentle to shout at a woman. She misinterpreted his attitude as fear; and decided to repeat the same mischief every day in order to keep him frightened so that he might stop preaching the oneness of God.
This gentleman, whom the woman hated so much, was Muhammad (peace be upon him) the last Prophet of Allah Almighty.
He did not want to disappoint the woman and so continued to walk down the street every day instead of picking an alternate route, and prayed for the woman to recognize the truth.
Kindness Always Wins
One day, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) did not find the woman to be on the roof of her house with the basket.
This worried him because he thought something must have happened to her for not being there.
So, he knocked at the door. “Who is it?” asked in a feeble voice.
“Muhammad ibn Abdullah”, he replied, “can I come in?”
The woman feared:
“I’m sick and too weak to fight or talk back, therefore Muhammad has come to take revenge for what I have been doing to him.”
But the permission to enter her house was in such a gentle voice that she allowed him in.
Muhammad (peace be upon him) entered the house and told the woman that not finding her on the roof had worried him and he wanted to inquire about her health.
On finding out how ill she was, he gently asked if she needed any help. Hypnotized and beautified by the affectionate tone in the Holy Prophet’s blessed voice, she forgot all fear and asked for some water.
He kindly gave her some in a utensil and prayed for her health.
While she quenched her thirst, this made her feel very guilty for being so cruel to him in the past, and she apologized for her mean behavior.
He forgave her with his mercy, and came to her house every day to clean it, to feed her, and to pray for her until she was on her feet again.
This kind of attitude of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him) inspired her into the recognition of the truth. And his prayers were answered in the form of yet another addition into the growing number of Muslims.