8th meeting

Our today's story - "The Bloody Battle Between Birds and Elephants" from "Illustrated Animal Stories from the Quran" by Dr. Abdur Rauf

Today we came together for a very special story - a story from the Holy Quran about the battle between birds and elephants. When Umm Uzair inquired, it turned out that nearly all of us had already heard this story before, but we didn't mind hearing it once again. Umm Uzair told us, how there is a whole Surah in the Quran dedicated to this great battle.

First, we looked at the Surat-ul-Feel (the Elephant). Umm Zainab was kind enough to recite for us this Surah in Arabic, after which Umm Uzair read to us the English translation of the Surah. Then, we were ready for the story.

The story was about an evil king Abrahah, who wanted to go and destroy Kabah, because he was so jealous of all the pilgrims going there and trade happening there. He wanted all these things for his own country. He collected a large army, which had even elephants in it and headed for Makkah to Kabah.

When Makkans saw the army approaching, they got very scared and run and hid in the mountains, being sure that Allah (swt) will protect His House from the army. And indeed it happened so. First, Abrahah's clever elephant refused to move towards Kabah. Then, Allah (swt) sent thousands and thousands of small birds, each carrying three pebbles, for hitting with these stones the attacking army. As the birds trew the stones, they turned into bullets and killed the entire army! This was how Allah (swt) saved His Kabah from the wrongdoers!

After reading, Umm Uzair showed us, how to make a simple illustration of the story - she was making her own picture and we, by looking at hers, tried to make our own. Look, how great our illustrations came out to be! Aren't all of us splendid illustrators? :)