His appearance was
striking. He was slim and tall. His face
was bright and he had a sparse beard. It
was pleasing to look at him and
refreshing to meet him. He was extremely
courteous and humble and quite shy. Yet
in a tough situation he would become
strikingly serious and alert, resembling
the flashing blade of a sword in his
severity and sharpness.
He was described as
the Amin or Custodian of Muhammad's
community. His full name was Aamir ibn
Abdullah ibn al-Jarrah. He was known as
Abu Ubaydah. Of him Abdullah ibn Umar,
one of the companions of the Prophet,
said:
"Three persons in
the tribe of Quraysh were most
prominent, had the best character and
were the most modest. If they spoke to
you, they would not deceive you and if
you spoke to them, they would not accuse
you of Lying: Abu Bakr as-Siddiq, Uthman
ibn Affan and Abu Ubaydah ibn al-Jarrah."
Abu Ubaydah was one of
the first persons to accept Islam. He
became a Muslim one day after Abu Bakr.
In fact, it was through Abu Bakr that he
became a Muslim. Abu Bakr took him,
Abdur Rahman ibn Aut, Uthman ibn Mazun
and al-Arqam ibn Abu al Arqam to the
Prophet, upon whom be peace, and
together they declared their acceptance
of the Truth. They were thus the first
pillars on which the great edifice of
Islam was built.
Abu Ubaydah lived
through the harsh experience, which the
Muslims went through in Makkah, from
beginning to end. With the early
Muslims, he endured the insults and the
violence, the pain and the sorrow of
that experience. In every trial and test
he remained firm and constant in his
belief in God and His prophet. One of
the most harrowing experiences he had to
go through however, was at the battle of
Badr.
Abu Ubaydah was in the
vanguard of the Muslim forces, fighting
with might and main and as someone who
was not at all afraid of death. The
Quraysh cavalry were extremely wary of
him and avoided coming face to face with
him. One man in particular, however,
kept on pursuing Abu Ubaydah wherever he
turned and Abu Ubaydah tried his best to
keep out of his way and avoid an
encounter with him.
The man plunged into
the attack. Abu Ubaydah tried
desperately to avoid him. Eventually the
man succeeded in blocking Abu Ubaydah's
path and stood as a barrier between him
and the Quraysh. I hey were now face to
face with each other. Abu Ubaydah could
not contain himself any longer. He
struck one blow to the man's head. The
man fell to the ground and died
instantly.
Do not try to guess
who this man was It was, as stated
earlier, one of the most harrowing
experiences that Abu Ubaydah had to go
through, how harrowing, it is almost
impossible to imagine. The man in Fact
was Abdullah ibn al-Jarrah, the father
of Abu Ubaydah!
Abu Ubaydah obviously
did not want to kill his father but in
the actual battle between faith in God
and polytheism, the choice open to him
was profoundly disturbing but clear. In
a way it could be said that he did not
kill his father--he only killed the
polytheism in the person of his father.
It is concerning this
event that God revealed the following
verses of the Quran:
"You will not
find a people believing in God and the
Last Day making friends with those who
oppose God and His messenger even if
these were their fathers, their sons,
their brothers or their clan. God has
placed faith in their hearts and
strengthened them with a spirit from
Him. He will cause them to enter gardens
beneath which streams flow that they may
dwell therein. God is well pleased with
them and they well pleased with Him.
They are the party of God. Is not the
party of God the successful ones?"
(Surah al-Mujactilah 58:22)
The response of Abu
Ubaydah at Badr when confronted by his
father was not unexpected. He had
attained a strength of faith in God,
devotion to His religion and a level of
concern for the ummah of Muhammad to
which many aspired.
It is related by
Muhammad ibn Jafar, a Companion of the
Prophet, that a Christian delegation
came to the Prophet and said, 'O Abu-l
Qasim, send one of your companions with
us, one in whom you are well pleased, to
judge between us on some questions of
property about which we disagree among
ourselves. We have a high regard for you
Muslim people."
"Come back to me
this evening," replied the Prophet,
"and I will send with you one who
is strong and trustworthy."
Umar ibn al-Khattab
heard the Prophet saying this and later
said: "I went to the Zuhr (midday)
Prayer early hoping to be the one who
would fit the description of the
Prophet. When the Prophet had finished
the Prayer, he began looking to his
right and his left and I raised myself
so that he could see me. But he
continued looking among us until he
spotted Abu Ubaydah ibn al-Jarrah. He
called him and said, 'Go with them and
judge among them with truth about that
which they are in disagreement."
And so Abu Ubaydah got the
appointment."
Abu Ubaydah was not
only trustworthy. He displayed a great
deal of strength in the discharge of his
trust. This strength was shown on
several occasions.
One day the Prophet
dispatched a group of his Sahabah to
meet a Quraysh caravan. He appointed Abu
Ubaydah as amir (leader) of the group
and gave them a bag of dates and nothing
else as provisions. Abu Ubaydah gave to
each man under his command only one date
every day. He would suck this date just
as a child would suck at the breast of
its mother. He would then drink some
water and this would suffice him for the
whole day.
On the day of Uhud
when the Muslims were being routed, one
of the mushrikeen started to shout,
"Show me Muhammad, show me
Muhammad." Abu Ubaydah was one of a
group of ten Muslims who had encircled
the Prophet to protect him against the
spears of the Mushrikeen.
When the battle was
over, it was found that one of the
Prophet's molar teeth was broken, his
forehead was bashed in and two discs
from his shield had penetrated into his
cheeks. Abu Bakr went forward with the
intention of extracting these discs but
Abu Ubaydah said, "Please leave
that to me."
Abu Ubaydah was afraid
that he would cause the Prophet pain if
he took out the discs with his hand. He
bit hard into one of the discs. It was
extracted but one of his incisor teeth
fell to the ground in the process. With
his other incisor, he extracted the
other disc but lost that tooth also. Abu
Bakr remarked, "Abu Ubaydah is the
best of men at breaking incisor
teeth!"
Abu Ubaydah continued
to be fully involved in all the
momentous events during the Prophet's
lifetime. After the beloved Prophet had
passed away, the companions gathered to
choose a successor at the Saqifah or
meeting place of Banu Saaadah. The day
is known in history as the Day of
Saqifah. On this day, Umar ibn al-Khattab
said to Abu Ubaydah, "Stretch forth
your hand and I will swear allegiance to
you for I heard the Prophet, peace be
upon him say, 'Every ummah has an amin
(custodian) and you are the amin of this
ummah.' "
"I would
not," declared Abu Ubaydah,
"put myself forward in the presence
of a man whom the Prophet, upon whom be
peace, commanded to lead us in Prayer
and who led us right until the Prophet's
death." He then gave bayah (the
oath of allegiance) to Abu Bakr as-Siddiq.
He continued to be a close adviser to
Abu Bakr and his strong supporter in the
cause of truth and goodness. Then came
the caliphate of Umar and Abu Ubaydah
also gave him his support and obedience.
He did not disobey him in any matter,
except one.
The incident happened
when Abu Ubaydah was in Syria leading
the Muslim forces from one victory to
another until the whole of Syria was
under Muslim control. The River
Euphrates lay to his right and Asia
Minor to his left.
It was then that a
plague hit the land of Syria, the like
of which people had never experienced
before. It devastated the population.
Umar dispatched a messenger to Abu
Ubaydah with a letter saying:
"I am in urgent
need of you. If my letter reaches you at
night I strongly urge you to leave
before dawn. If this letter reaches you
during the day, I strongly urge you to
leave before evening and hasten to me.
When Abu Ubaydah
received Umar's letter, he said, "I
know why the Amir al-Mumineen needs me.
He wants to secure the survival of
someone who, however, is not
eternal." So he wrote to Umar:
"I know that you
need me. But I am in an army of Muslims
and I have no desire to save myself from
what is afflicting them. I do not want
to separate from them until God wills.
So, when this letter reaches you,
release me from your command and permit
me to stay on.''
When Umar read this
letter tears filled his eyes and those
who were with him asked, "Has Abu
Ubaydah died, O Amir al-Mumineen?"
"No," said
he, "But death is near to
him."
Umar's intuition was
not wrong. Before long, Abu Ubaydah
became afflicted with the plague. As
death hung over him, he spoke to his
army:
"Let me give you
some advice which will cause you to be
on the path of goodness always.
"Establish Prayer. Fast the month
of Ramadan. Give Sadaqah. Perform the
Hajj and Umrah. Remain united and
support one another. Be sincere to your
commanders and do not conceal anything
from them. Don't let the world destroy
you for even if man were to live a
thousand years he would still end up
with this state that you see me in.
Peace be upon you and
the mercy of God."
Abu Ubaydah then
turned to Muadh ibn Jabal and said,
"O Muadh, perform the prayer with
the people (be their leader)." At
this, his pure soul departed. Muadh got
up and said:
"O people, you
are stricken by the death of a man. By
God, I don't know whether I have seen a
man who had a more righteous heart, who
was further from all evil and who was
more sincere to people than he. Ask God
to shower His mercy on him and God will
be merciful to you. "
Sheikh Abdulfattah Abu-Abdullah Adelabu (Ph. D. Damas),
a West African Islamic Academic founded AWQAF Africa, of
which he's the first al Amir (i.e. President).
Sheikh Dr. Adelabu was studying Postgraduate Degrees in
Damascus early 1990's during when Syria reviewed its
national security after an �Oslo Accord'...
Syria like many other countries around the world
witnessed, during this period, the flood of refugees
from war troubled nations like Somalia, arrival of
people from Algeria during the brutal struggling between
the Mujahidun and the government, resettlement of the
Palestinians fleeing from sophisticated guns of the
Israelis as well as adventure of African migrants for
reasons uncountable�
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