the afternoon, the sunset and the evening prayers.
Then he slept for a short while and mounted leaving for the Ka‘bah. He performed the Farewell
Circumambulation (Tawaf Al-Wada‘), after ordering his Companions to do the same thing.
Upon the accomplishment of his religious rituals he quickened his move to the purified Madinah. He  went there not to seek rest but to resume the strife and struggle in the way of Allâh.
THE LAST EXPEDITIONS:
The pride of the Byzantine State made it deny Muslims their right to live. The Byzantine arrogance  made them even kill those agents of theirs, who embraced Islam. Killing Farwah bin ‘Amr Al-Judhami,  who was their agent on Mu’an, was an evidence of their arrogance. Due to that arrogance and  presumptuousness of the Byzantines, the Messenger of Allâh (Peace be upon him) started to mobilize  a  great army in Safar in the eleventh year of Al-Hijra and made it under the command of Osamah bin
Zaid bin Haritha with orders to have the horses of Muslims tread on the lands bordering Al-Balqa’ and
Ad-Darum of Palestine. His aim was to terrorize Byzantines and to implant confidence into the hearts  of
Arabs who were settled at the borders of the Byzantines. His other purpose was to deliver a message  to  everybody there, so that no one may dare say that the Church brutality can’t go with impunity; and  that Islamization is not synonymous with fear and vulnerability.
The leadership of Osamah was subject to criticism. Because he was still too young, people tarried at  joining his expedition. The Messenger of Allâh (Peace be upon him) addressed people saying:
“No wonder now you contest his leadership, for you have already contested the ex-leadership  ofhis father. Yes, by Allâh, his father, who was one of the most beloved people to me, was quite  efficient for leadership; and this son of his is one of the most beloved individuals to me after his  father.”
So people started tending towards Osamah and joined his army. The number of volunteers in his army  was so enormous that they formed such a long queue that they had to descend the escarpment —  which was a parasang off Madinah. The anxiety-provoking news about the Messenger of Allâh’s  sickness, however, made the expedition tarry again in order to know what Allâh had willed as regards
His Messenger (Peace be upon him).
It was Allâh’s Will that Osamah’s expedition would be the first one dispatched during the caliphate of  the veracious Abu Bakr.