أَلَمْ تَرَ كَيْفَ فَعَلَ رَبُّكَ بِأَصْحَابِ الْفِيلِ
Have you not seen how your Lord dealt with the companions of the Elephant?
Quran 105:1
10
The Arabs before the Message
العرب قبل المبعث
Jahiliyyah
Tabari is one of the great stores of pre-Islamic Arabia: the tribes, the hajj that Ibrahim left and that Quraysh altered, the Year of the Elephant, the digging of Zamzam by Abd al-Muttalib. Ibn Ishaq is his frequent door. Where Ibn Ishaq is supported by a sahih hadith, the ground is firm. Where he is alone, it is sirah — precious, not sahihayn.
Abrahah came against the House with the elephant. The birds came with stones of baked clay. The year became a date for Quraysh: the Year of the Elephant, the year the Prophet ﷺ was born.
The Tarikh, from Ibn Ishaq and others, under Surat al-Fil
The ayah is wahy. The narrative filling is sirah. They agree in the event.
How to weigh this
Jahiliyyah poetry and battle-days in Tabari are Arab memory. They explain the world the Quran addressed. They are not a sunnah.