Hilf al-Fudul

Hilf al-Fudul (Arabic: حلف الفضول‎‎) was a 7th-century alliance created by various Meccans, including the Islamic prophet Muhammad, to establish fair commercial dealing. Because of Muhammad's role in its formation, the alliance plays a significant role in Islamic ethics. Because fudul commonly means "virtuous" the alliance is often translated as League of the Virtuous.

In the years preceding the pact, the Quraysh were involved in intermittent conflict. The war, as usual, was a result of an unsettled murder. The effect was growing discontent with the form of justice that required sacrilegious war. Many Quraysh leaders had travelled to Syria, where they found relative justice prevailed. Similar conditions also existed in Abyssinia. No such system, however, existed in Arabia.

Following the Fijar War, the Quraysh realized that the deterioration of their state and the loss of Mecca's prestige in Arabia were the result of their inability to solve disagreements, creating internal division.

It is believed to have been founded by Az-Zubayr ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib.

A Yemeni merchant from Zabid had sold some goods to a notable member of the clan of Sahm. Having taken possession of the goods, the man from Sahm refused to pay the agreed price. The wrong doer knew very well that the merchant had no confederate or kinsman in Mecca, whom he could count upon for help. But the merchant, instead of letting it pass, appealed to the Quraysh to see that justice was done.

In response a meeting was hosted at the house of Abdullah ibn Jada'an. At the meeting, various chiefs and members of tribes pledged to:

To make the pact imperative and sacred, the members went into the Ka'aba and poured water into the receptacle so it flowed on the black stone. Thereupon each man drank from it. Then they raised their right hands above their heads to show they would stand together in this endeavor. The pact was written and placed inside the Ka'aba, the place where the participants believed it would be under the protection of God.

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