Did plague ever enter Madina? True prediction in Hadith:
On the authority of Anas b. Malik: The Prophet (ﷺ) said, “Dajjal will come to Madina and find the angels guarding it, and so the Dajjal will not come near it.” He added. “Nor will the plague (ta‘un), if Allah so willed (in sha’ Allah).”
(Bukhari:7134)
There is no historical account to confirm plague afflicting Madina till date. In fact a number of historians over the centuries had mentioned that Madina had never been afflicted by plague (ta‘un) till their day.
Among them were Ibn Qutaiba (d. 276/889),[1] Al-Tha‘alibi (d. 429/1038),[2] and al-Samhudi (d. 911/1506).[3]
In fact al-Kashmiri (d. 1934) who highlighted that wording of the hadith did not establish the promise also maintained that Madina had remained safe from plague till his time.[4]
Likewise, John L. Burckhardt (d. 1817) confirmed that a plague that hit Arabia in 1815 reached Makkah as well but, he wrote, “Medina remained free from the plague.”[5]
Richard Burton (d. 1890) writing in the middle of the nineteenth century also observed, “It is still the boast of El Medinah that the Ta‘un, or plague, has never passed her frontier.”[6]
References:
[1] Al-Dainawari, Ibn Qutaiba, al-Ma‘arif, (Cairo: General Egyptian Book Org., 1992) 602
[2] Al-Tha‘alibi, Abu al-Mansur, Thimar al-Qulub fi al-Mudaf wa al-Mansub, (Cairo: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1985) 547
[3] Al-Samhudi, Wafa’ al-Wafa’, Vol.1, 57-59
[4] Al-Kashmiri, Faid al-Bara ‘ala Sahih al-Bukhari, Vol.6, 57
[5] Burckhardt, John Lewis, Travels in Arabia, (London: Henry Colburn, 1829) Vol.2, 326-327
[6] Burton, Richard F., Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, (Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1874) Vol.1, 93
Source: https://icraa.org/hadith-and-protection-of-makkah-and-madina-from-plague/
