What is poison the prophet? Who is the person that gave poison to the prophet muhammad?
The Jews had still not given up their treachery despite the humane treatment they were receiving from the Muslims. They plotted, in secret, to murder the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace-. As vivid as the consequences of their recent crimes still were, they were now attempting to once again betray a Prophet who, instead of sending them to exile like he had done with some other Jewish tribes, had already forgiven them once before for attempting to execute a similar murder plan. Incredibly, they were breaching their pact yet again.
To execute this sinister plot, Zaynab, a daughter of a Jewish notable by the name of Harith, invited the Blessed Prophet, along with some of his Companions, to a feast of roasted lamb, which she thoroughly contaminated with poison from beforehand. Knowing the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace- was especially fond of the shoulder meat of the lamb, she even added extra poison there. But the instant the Prophet of Allah -upon him blessings and peace- took a morsel of the meat, he took it out, and warned his Companions, “The meat tells me it is poisoned…Do not eat from it!” Bishr ibn Bara -Allah be well-pleased with him- had however already taken a piece of the meat, immediately after seeing the Messenger of Allah -upon him blessings and peace- begin to eat and had swallowed the morsel by the time the Prophet -upon him blessings and peace- gave the warning. The others had still not touched the food.
Before too long, the malicious women was caught and brought to the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace-.
“Was it you that poisoned this lamb?” he asked her.
“How did you find out it had been poisoned?” she asked.
“The shoulder blades in front of me informed me”, answered the Noble Messenger -upon him blessings and peace-.
“Yes, it was me who poisoned the lamb”, she then said, admitting to her crime.
When asked by the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace- as to her motive for doing so, she explained, “You killed my father, my uncle and my husband. There is nothing left you have not done to my people. So I thought to myself, ‘If he is really a prophet, then my plot will be brought to his awareness by the Almighty and the poison will do him no harm; but if he is a liar and simply a ruler, he will die from this poison and we will be able to avenge those deaths and rid ourselves from him!’”
“Allah has not given you the power to do that”, stated the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace-.
While coming clean with her plot, deeply affected by what she had witnessed, the woman became a Muslim and voicing her remorse, asked to be forgiven. The Prophet -upon him blessings and peace-, sent as a mercy to the worlds, forgave her for her attempted assassination plot. But as Bishr ibn Bara -Allah be well-pleased with him- died a short while later from the poison, his relatives asked for qisas or retribution. Harith’s daughter was therefore made to consume the same poison.
In order to rid his body of the effects of the poison, the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace- had some blood extracted from between his shoulder blades. (Bukhari, Jizya, 7; Muslim, Salam, 45; Ibn Hisham, III, 390; Waqidi, II, 678-679; Haythami, VI, 153)
Three years later, before breathing his last, the Blessed Prophet -upon him blessings and peace- is reported to have diagnosed the effects of this poison as the cause of his passing away. (Hakim, III, 242/4966)
Source: Osman Nuri Topbaş, The Prophet Muhammed Mustafa the Elect II, Erkam Publications
