13. The Battle of the Trench

13. The Battle of the Trench

The Battle of the Trench also has the name of Ghazwatul Ahzāb. Ahzāb are the confederates or the      parties or the clans; it is translated differently but these are the two names of the battle; Al-Khandaq and Al-Ahzāb.

13.1 Jews Gather a Formidable Force

What was the reason? Ibn Is’hāq says, “What happened at Al-Khandaq was that a group of Jews brought together a coalition of clans against the Messenger of Allāh.” So this was a coalition that was pulled together by the Jews; they went to Makkah, they went to the tribes of Ghatafān, and they brought together quite a formidable army; 10,000 strong – [the] largest army ever assembled against Rasūlullāhﷺ up to that point. The agreement was that Ghatafān would supply 6,000 men in exchange of the Jews paying them the entire date harvest of Khaibar for one year. So with Ghatafān, they were in it for money; mercenaries. The ones who had an intention of fighting against Muhammadﷺ were the people of Quraish and the Yahūd, but Ghatafān were from far away and they just came in because the Jews promised them money. And the Jews would go to Makkah and the people of Makkah would ask them – because they were the learned men; you see, the Arabs used to consider that the Jews were the wise learned men because they, the Arabs, were illiterate – so Abū Sufyān and the leaders of Quraish asked, “Well you are the learned men, you are the People of the Book, so tell us, who is right, us or Muhammad? Who is on the right path?” The Jews would tell them, “You are.” Allāh revealed: Have you not seen those who were given a portion of the Scripture, who believe in superstition and false objects of worship and say about the Disbelievers, “These are better guided than the Believers as to the way”? Those are the ones whom Allāh has cursed; and he whom Allāh curses – never will you find for him a helper. An-Nisā’: 51-52

Now,one would wonder, what in the world would make the Jews claim that the Pagan Idol-Worshippers were more guided than the Muslims? The Jews have much more in common with the Muslims than they have with the Pagan Idol-Worshippers; there is nothing in common with the People of the Book and the Pagan Idol-Worshippers, but there is a lot in common between them and the Muslims, so what would make them take such a position? That would go back to the reasons that we talked about earlier, the stand that the Jews took from very early on against Rasūlullāhﷺ for the various reasons of jealousy and hatred, [etc.].

13.1.1 News Reaches Rasūlullāhﷺ

Rasūlullāhﷺ was following the news, and again, we said that he had his men spread out all over, gathering intelligence for him. So the news reached Rasūlullāhﷺ prior to them advancing towards Madīnah that a huge army is coming your way. Rasūlullāhﷺ holds a Shūrā session, and Salmān Al-Fārsī has a suggestion, he said, “O Messenger of Allāh, in our land in Persia, if we feared the cavalry, we would dig a trench or a moat. O Messenger of Allāh, why do we not dig a moat or trench?” Rasūlullāhﷺ and the Muslims liked the idea, and the project started. Now, it would have been impossible for them to dig this moat all around Madīnah because they just did not have the manpower for that, so they had to choose the locations which were vulnerable; that location was north of Madīnah, which sounds strange because Makkah is to the south, but the thing is that Madīnah had a natural protection from the east and west, and that was what is called Al-Harrah – these are tracks of volcanic rocks; very sharp, very edgy – and boulders all over, so it is difficult for an army to march through. And then from the south you have the dwellings and the farmland which also makes it difficult to penetrate, so the danger is from the north, and that is where they dug the trench.

13.1.2 Muslims Dig the Trench

Every 10 men were given 40 feet of land to dig, and they split into groups and they started the work. It was very difficult; the Muslims were hungry, they were poor, there was lack of food, and there was lack of numbers too to dig this trench. Anas Ibn Mālik said, “The Messenger of Allāh went out to the trench and found that the Muhājirūn and the Ansār were busy digging. It was a very cold morning and they had no slaves to do that work for them. When he saw what they were suffering from, the hard labour and their hunger, he said, ‘O Allāh, their life is indeed that of the Afterlife. Forgive the Ansār and the Muhājirūn.” They are having difficulty in Dunyā but their life does not belong to this world, it belongs to the Afterlife.

Rasūlullāhﷺ himself participated in the digging. Al-Barā’ narrates in Al-Bukhārī, “On the Day of Ahzāb when Rasūlullāhﷺ was digging the trench, I saw him carrying dirt until there was so much dirt on his stomach I could not see his skin anymore.” Rasūlullāhﷺ was right there with his followers in the field, working with them. This is the leadership example that Rasūlullāhﷺ is giving us; he was not aloof from the people, he would not treat himself specially, he was trying to be one of them when Rasūlullāh was the best of humanity,ﷺ.

Rasūlullāhﷺ would get so hungry [that] he would have to tie a stone to his stomach to suppress the hunger; to elevate the pain he would tie this rock to his stomach – that was how difficult it was on him and how hungry he was. But his spirit was high, and he would elevate the spirits of the Sahābah and he would chant with them, so they would recite these lines of poetry, and Rasūlullāhﷺ would go along with them and recite these words, they would say, “O Allāh! Without You we would not have been well-guided, nor would we have been charitable, nor would we have prayed, so do send tranquillity upon us and make us stand firm when we meet the foe. They have wronged us, if they want trouble, we will meet them.” And Rasūlullāhﷺ would stretch the final words.

13.1.3 Rasūlullāhﷺ Receives News of Banū Qurayzah’s Potential Betrayal

There were guards around the clock, guarding the trench and guarding Madīnah, and the Sahābah would take turns in guarding. The difficulties were increasing rather than decreasing; you have this army coming forward made up of Quraish and Ghatafān, and then there was a very serious problem, and this could not have come at a worse time; the dwellings of Banū Qurayzah, the last Jewish tribe remaining in Madīnah, were part of the protection, were part of the plan of protection that Rasūlullāhﷺ had for Madīnah, so their fortresses were used as a protection from the army advancing from that area. Rasūlullāhﷺ was receiving news that Banū Qurayzah themselves were betraying their agreement with Rasūlullāhﷺ and were going to join with the Confederates. This would have been a disaster because they were supposed to be part of the protection, so if that gate is opened, then the Muslims are going to be in serious trouble. So Rasūlullāhﷺ sends Az-Zubair Bin Al-‘Awwām to investigate the matter. Az-Zubair Ibn Al-‘Awwām brings back information that they are bringing in their livestock and they are paving their roads, which is an indication for preparation for war. Rasūlullāhﷺ wanted to investigate the matter further so he sends Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, Sa’d Ibn ‘Ubādah, ‘Abdullāh Bin Rawāhah and Khawwāj Bin Jubair. He told them, “Go and investigate the matter and bring me news of whether Qurayzah have betrayed or broken their agreement with me. If that is the case, do not weaken the people; come and deliver the news to me secretly. If you find that they are still up to their word and agreement and they are keeping the agreement, then make the news public.” And we learn a lesson here from Rasūlullāhﷺ that sometimes you want to keep away some news from the people. If it is detrimental news, if it is a news that would demoralise them, if it would weaken them, it might be Maslahah to keep it away from the army; Rasūlullāhﷺ wanted to keep it secret if that was the case, but if it is good news that they are still keeping the agreement then [to] make it public.

13.1.4 Banū Qurayzah’s Betrayal Confirmed by Sahābah

Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, Sa’d Ibn ‘Ubādah, ‘Abdullāh Bin Rawāhah and Khawwāj go there [and] they came back and they tell Rasūlullāhﷺ two words, “‘Azl Wal Qārrah.” ‘Azl Wal Qārrah, if you remember, are the two tribes that betrayed the men whom were sent by Rasūlullāhﷺ, the ones who betrayed the men and killed them. So this was an indication from these men that Qurayzah have broken the agreement, and Rasūlullāhﷺ got the point and made preparations for that. Rasūlullāhﷺ sends out two groups; one [with] 200 men, the other one [with] 300 men, as guards, and they would go around the area of Banū Qurayzah to show them that we are still here and we are still strong and we are willing to fight, so it was a show of strength. And the Muslims were able to intercept 20 camel loads of dates, figs and barley that were going towards the army of Ahzāb, and their point of origin was Banū Qurayzah. So this makes it clear that Banū Qurayzah have betrayed Rasūlullāhﷺ, they have committed treason; they are now supplying the army of the enemy.

13.1.5 The Extreme Difficulty on the Muslims

So it was very difficult on the Muslims, extremely difficult, probably the most difficult situation they have been through. Allāh describes it to us, Allāh says: [Remember] when they came at you from above you and from below you, and when eyes shifted [in fear], and hearts reached the throats and you assumed about Allāh [various] assumptions. Al-Ahzāb: 10

Sohere the eyes were shifting in fear; you know, there was this disorientation going on. And Allāh says that the hearts reached the throats, which means that the hearts were pounding so fast it was as if you can feel it in your throat; that was how difficult the situation was. And you assumed about Allāh various assumptions. So some people were making assumptions about Allāh, like Allāh has promised us in vain, and that Allāh  will not give us victory, and that this religion is not true and we made a mistake; so all of these doubts were coming into the hearts, and obviously the ones who were having these dangerous doubts in the Religion were Al-Munāfiqūn.

Allāh also says, and these Āyāt are from Sūrah Al-Ahzāb: And when the Believers saw the companies, they said, “This is what Allāh and His Messenger had promised us, and Allāh and His Messenger spoke the truth.” And it increased them only in faith and acceptance. Al-Ahzāb: 22

This was the response of the Believers. When the Believers saw all of these dangers being thrown at them, that increased their Īmān rather than decreased it, because they knew that Allāh will test them, so they saw this as part of the test, therefore it only confirms what we already knew would happen, but with the Munāfiqīn, it made them doubt even more in the authenticity of Islām. So you can see how one event brought forth different reactions from the two camps, the Believers and the Non-Believers. You see, when it comes to fear, the fear was across the board; the Believers were afraid and the Munāfiqīn were afraid, but what is different is the reaction to that fear. You see, fear is a natural human instinct, it is natural for a human being to feel fear, Mūsā  himself felt fear, Allāh  said: Fa’awjasa Fī Nafsihī Khīfatam Mūsā – And he sensed within himself apprehension, didMoses. Tā-Hā: 67

Allāh said that he felt fear in his heart, but the thing is, with Mūsā the fear was restricted to the heart, it did not show up in his actions; his actions were full of Īmān. So that is the difference between Al-Mu’minūn and Al-Munāfiqūn; the Munāfiqūn acted negatively upon their fear while the Believers acted positively, they said this is what Allāh has promised us! We expected this would happen.

Ibn Is’hāq said, “Thereupon, the anxiety and fear increased. Their enemy came at them from above and below, so the Muslims were very confused. Dissension arose to the point where Mu‘attib Bin Qushail commented, ‘Muhammad used to promise us that we would eat the treasures of Qisrah and Caesar, and now we do not even feel safe going to the toilet.’” So this is an example of the response of a Munāfiq, he said what is Muhammad talking about? Rasūlullāhﷺ – and we will talk about this – when they were digging the trench, he gave glad-tidings that this Ummah would open the Persian Empire and the Roman Empire. He [Mu‘attib] said, ‘What is Muhammad talking about? We cannot even feel safe going to the toilet and he is promising us that we will conquer lands thousands of kilometres away from us?!’

13.1.6 Allāh Reveals Āyāt Describing Characteristics of Al-Munāfiqūn

And the Āyāt of Qur’ān described Al-Munāfiqūn, and I will go through these Āyāt because these are the characteristics of Al-Munāfiqūn yesterday and today, they do not change. Allāh says:

And when a faction of them said, “O people of Yathrib, there is no stability for you [here], so return [home].” And a party of them asked permission of the Prophet, saying, “Indeed, our houses are unprotected,” while they were not exposed. They did not intend except to flee. Al-Ahzāb: 13

 Sothe Munāfiqūn here do not want to stay next to the trench, they do not want to stay in the camp, they want to go back home and the excuse is, ‘We need to go and defend our homes.’ So they were pretending that they were going to go and fight, but Allāh said: They did not intend except to flee. That was their intention, to run away.

And if they had been entered upon from all its [surrounding] regions and Fitnah had been demanded of them, they would have done it and not hesitated over it except briefly. Al-Ahzāb: 14

This Āyah means that if the Munāfiqūn are pressured a bit, they are going to give up Islām. If the enemy ask them to become Non-Muslim, they are going to do that.

And they had already promised Allāh before not to turn their backs and flee. And ever is the promise to Allāh [that about which one will be] questioned. Say, [O Muhammad], “Never will fleeing benefit you if you should flee from death or killing; and then [if you did], you would not be given enjoyment [of life] except for a little.” Al-Ahzāb: 15-16

In this Āyah, Allāh is saying [that] death is destined upon you, so running away from it would not change it a bit. Now, let us assume that it is even going to change it, how long are you going to live? Your life as a human being is very short, so what are you running away from? And then Allāh says:

“Who is it that can protect you from Allāh if He intends for you an ill or intends for you a mercy?” And they will not find for themselves besides Allāh any protector or any helper. Al-Ahzāb: 17

The Munāfiqūn are looking for help in the wrong place, they are looking for help from the Yahūd, they are looking for help from the Kuffār; Allāh is saying only Allāh is An- Nāfi’ and Ad-Dār, only Allāh can benefit you and only Allāh can harm you. And then Allāh says:

Already Allāh knows the hinderers among you and those [Hypocrites] who say to their brothers, “Come to us,” and do not go to battle, except for a few, indisposed toward you. And when fear comes… Yousee, this is the reaction when in times of difficulty; what do they do? …you see them looking at you, their eyes revolving like one being overcome by death. But when fear departs, they lash you with sharp tongues, indisposed toward [any] good. This is a quality of Nifāq; in times of fear, their eyes are rotating, they are going around in circles because of fear, they are confused, they are afraid, but when fear goes away they are very loud, they talk a lot. And then Allāh says: Those have not believed, so Allāh has rendered their deeds worthless, and ever is that, for Allāh, easy. Al-Ahzāb: 18-19

Therefore, do not go by what people say in times of peace. You see, in times of peace, anybody and everybody can talk, but what happens in times of difficulty, in times of Fitnah? The Munāfiqūn stay quiet, they are afraid, they are terrified, but when fear goes away, they lash out at everyone, they start criticising so and so, talking against so and so. So their bravado only comes out in the wrong time.

They think the companies have not [yet] withdrawn. And if the companies should come [again], they would wish they were in the desert among the Bedouins, inquiring [from afar] about your news. These Munāfiqūn, if the armies would attack Madīnah once again, they would wish that they were not in Madīnah and they were with the Bedouins watching the news on their TV sets, listening to it on their radio sets. They would wish they could hold the remote control in their hands and flip through the channels and listen to the news or watch the news about the Muslims, but they do not want to be there. And then Allāh says: And if they should be among you, they would not fight except for a little. Al-Ahzāb: 20

These are signs of Nifāq.

13.1.7 Muslims Suffer from Extreme Hunger

The Muslims were suffering hunger. In Al -Bukhārī, Anas Ibn Mālik said, “They would bring a handful of barley and some ill-smelling fat as a meal for them. Hungry as they were, it stuck in their throats and smelled bad.” So what was the food? Some barley, and then they had animal fat which was very old, long expired, smelled bad, it was rotten. And they would swallow it and it would stick to their throat. You know how animal fat sticks to the throat if you eat fat? Especially if it is cold, it sticks to your mouth and your teeth and your throat and all. And because it smelled bad they could still smell it, but they were so hungry that they were eating this horrible food.

Al-Wāqidī describes this situation that was going on and he talks about the fear that everyone was feeling, the hunger that everyone was feeling, the low spirits, especially because of what the Munāfiqūn were doing; bombarding the Muslims with only bad news, and then you have this disaster coming from the quarters of Banū Qurayzah, the news that they have broken their agreement with Rasūlullāhﷺ, so it was very difficult. And the Muslims had to work day and night, Muhammad Ibn Maslamah said, “Kāna Laylunā Bil Khandaqi Nahārā –Our night during the Khandaq was daytime.” Meaning we had to work around the clock; night was no different than day. So it was very stressful, and you know how when people are lacking, how they lose concentration and they fail to think straight. So Allāh was testing them, Allāh was testing them to the limit.

13.1.8 Skirmishes in the Battle of Al-Khandaq

Fighting did occur; you had duels, you had enemy trying to break through the trench from time to time. One incident that happened, a challenge to single combat, was ‘Amr Bin ‘Abd Al-Wud, and ‘Amr Bin ‘Abd Al-Wud was one of the heroes of Quraish, a strong powerful man. So he challenges the Muslims, “Send me forth one of your men.” The one who went forth was ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib. ‘Amr asked him, “Who are you?” He said, “I am ‘Alï.” He asked, “Ali the son of ‘Abd Al -Manāf?” He said, “No, I am ‘Alï the son of Abū Tālib.” He said, “Nephew, there are among your uncles men who are more mature than you, I feel sorry spilling your blood.” ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib said, “But I do not feel sorry spilling your blood.” ‘Amr Bin ‘Abd Al -Wud wanted someone more senior to come and meet him, stronger, with more experience, and he said, ‘I would not want to spill your blood my young nephew.’ ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib said, ‘I would be very happy to spill yours.” So ‘Amr was very upset and Ibn Is’hāq said he drew out his sword as if it was a brand of fire, and they exchange blows, and ‘Amr strikes the shield of ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib, and the blow was so hard that the shield ended up hitting the head of ‘Alï; that was how powerful it was, but on the other hand, because it was such a powerful blow, the sword got stuck in the shield and ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib struck ‘Amr in the neck, and he fell down dead, and the Sahābah made Takbīr, and that is when Rasūlullāhﷺ knew that ‘Alï Ibn Abī Tālib won.

Sa’d Ibn Abī Waqqās was a good marksman, so he had in his sights this enemy soldier who was holding two shields and was sort of teasing the Muslims; he would move down the shield a bit so that the upper part of his head would show and then he would cover it again and then pull it down and up and down. So Sa’d aims at the man and fires his shot while the shield was down, and it hits the man right in his forehead. So the man falls down and his legs go up, and Rasūlullāhﷺ saw that and laughed! The way the man fell down was funny, so Rasūlullāhﷺ laughed.

Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh , ‘Ā’ishah said he was a tall and large man, and he was wearing armour but his arms were not covered, so ‘Ā’ishah said, “When I saw him, I was really worried about his arms.” And Subhān’Allāh, he was shot by an arrow in his arm and it cut the main vein or artery in his arm, and he was seriously injured.

So these were some of the skirmishes that happened during the Battle of Al-Khandaq.

13.1.9 Rasūlullāhﷺ Tries to Break the Coalition

Rasūlullāhﷺ tried to break the coalition; that was part of his strategy. So what he did [was that] he tried to negotiate a deal with Ghatafān. Ghatafān are these tribe from An-Najd who came and participated in the coalition with a force of 6000. Now, the entire coalition was 10,000, so they are more than half of the entire coalition. So Rasūlullāhﷺ was trying to work a deal with them. Rasūlullāhﷺ met with their two leaders and he proposed to them that they withdraw from the coalition, in exchange, Rasūlullāhﷺ is going to pay them one third of the harvest of Madīnah. They agreed and they wrote up a document, but they did not finalise it by bringing the witnesses. Rasūlullāhﷺ calls Sa’d Bin Mu‘ādh and Sa’d Bin ‘Ubādah who are the heads of Al-Ansār, and he makes Shūrā with them, and notice here that Rasūlullāhﷺ only made Shūrā with them, and this shows you that Shūrā is not done with everyone; Shūrā is done with the pertaining people to every situation. Now, since Rasūlullāhﷺ is here offering one third of the harvest of Madīnah which belongs to Al- Aws Wal-Khazraj, he needs to seek their counsel, so he told them what he proposed to Ghatafān. They responded by saying, “Messenger of Allāh, is this something that you wish to do, something Allāh has ordered you to do and which we must put into effect, or is it something you are doing for our sake?” If it is something from Allāh, we will accept it, but if it is your opinion and you are doing it for our sake, let us know. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Yes, I am doing it for your sake.” Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh said, “Messenger of Allāh, we used to be Disbelievers in Allāh and worshipped idols along with those people, not worshipping nor knowing Allāh. At the time, they would never have dreamed of eating a single date of ours except as our guest or after purchase. Should we give them our property now after Allāh has honoured us with Islām, led us to Him, and given us esteem through you and through Him? We will have none of this! By Allāh, all we will give them is the sword until Allāh decides between us and them.” Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh and Sa’d Ibn ‘Ubādah are saying [that] these people would not have dreamed of getting one date off us except if they would pay the price for it or if we gave it to them as our guests, and now we are just going to give it to them for free so that they leave? We do not want to have anything to do with this. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “As you wish.” So Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh took the document from Rasūlullāhﷺ and he erased the writing from it saying, “Now let them fight us.” Now let them fight us. So brothers and sisters, again, you can see the Ansār and how they would approach matters. Rasūlullāhﷺ was willing to negotiate this matter but the Ansār said no, we are going to fight, let us just fight. May Allāh have His mercy on them. So this is the issue with Ghatafān. Obviously, the whole thing did not go through.

13.1.10 Allāh’s Help Arrives through Nu‘aim Bin Mas‘ūd

Now, because the Muslims, through their Īmān, qualified in the Eyes of Allāh for victory, Allāh was going to help them. You know, you could be at a disadvantage compared to your enemy, and from every angle you look at it, there is no way you are going to win, but because you deserve to win, since you have fulfilled the requirements of winning in the Eyes of Allāh , Allāh  is going to find a way out for you. Wamay Yattaqillāha Yaj‘allahū Makhrajā. Wa Yarzuqhu Min Haythu Lā Yahtasib –And whoever fears Allāh – He will make for him a way out. And will provide for him from where he does not expect. At-Talāq: 2-3

If you have Taqwā in Allāh,Allāh will find a way out for you, and will provide you from avenues you never expected. So underline here the words you never expected; it is going to come from a place, a quarter, that you did not expect. You looked at all of the variables, you assessed the situation, there is no way you can make it, but Allāh knows what you do not know.

A man came to Rasūlullāhﷺ, his name was Nu‘aim Bin Mas‘ūd, this man was from Ghatafān. He comes to Rasūlullāhﷺ and says, “Messenger of Allāh, I have accepted Islām but my people do not know of this. Give me whatever orders you wish.” Here, this man comes out of nowhere and says I am a Muslim, and Subhān’Allāh! This appears to be the wrong time to become a Muslim; the Muslims are under siege, it appears that they are losing, and you want to become Muslim? Well that is because he was a soldier of Allāh; Allāh was bringing this man forward because he was one of soldiers of Allāh. Wamā Ya’lamu Junūda Rabbika Illā Hū – And none knows the soldiers of your Lord except Him. Al-Muddaththir: 31

Only Allāh knows His soldiers, we do not know them. So he comes to Rasūlullāhﷺ and says, “Order me. Give me your orders.” The Messenger of Allāh said, “You are only one man; use trickery to relieve us of them if you can. War is deception.” Rasūlullāhﷺ is telling Nu‘aim that if you join us, we are going to be 3001, it does not really make a difference, you are just one man, but since they do not know that you have become Muslim, go back; go back and try to weaken them because war is deception. In other words, Rasūlullāh is saying that you can use deception if that will support the cause of relieving us of them.

Nu‘aim left and he went to the Jews of Banū Qurayzah. Now, the thing here with Nu‘aim [is that] he had good relations with the Jews, good relations with Quraish, and since he was from Ghatafān he had good relations with his people. Nu‘aim Bin Mas‘ūd was a well -known man, a trusted man, so he went to Banū Qurayzah and he told them, “You know me and I know you, and you know our friendship and you know that I would only give you a sincere advice. What you have done is wrong. You have decided to fight against Muhammadﷺ but you are living in Madīnah, your women and children and property are here, while Quraish and Ghatafān are coming over to fight but their women, children and property are somewhere else. Now, Quraish and Ghatafān are going to try and seize the opportunity to defeat Muhammadﷺ, but if that opportunity does not arise, they are going to pack up and leave, and you know what will happen if they leave; Muhammadﷺ will attack you first since you are right there with him in Madīnah, and you know that you cannot face off alone against Muhammadﷺ.” They said, “Well, what you are saying is true, what shall we do?” He said, “You want to make sure that Quraish and Ghatafān are willing to fight until the end, until you achieve the objective, not just try to win [and] if it does not work out then they leave; no, you want to make sure that they will stay behind and fight with you and not betray you and leave.” They said, “Alright, well tell us how we can guarantee that.” He said, “Ask them to leave some of their men with you as assurance,” meaning you take some of their men as hostages. And this was a practice that existed in those days; you could borrow money and then you could leave your child as a security, so it was not something that strange, it did exist in those days. So Nu‘aim here is saying, “Ask them to hand over some of their men, both from Quraish and from Ghatafān, and hold them with you as an assurance, as a guarantee, that they are going to fight until the end.” They said, “That is a good idea. We agree, we will do that.”

Now Nu‘aim leaves the Jews and he goes to Quraish and he tells them, “You know how close our friendship is and you understand that I would be sincere in my advice to you and I would only tell you the truth. I have come here because I have something to disclose to you, and I want you to keep this information classified.” They said, “Yes Nu‘aim, we trust you and we know that, go ahead.” He said, “The Jews have regretted the fact that they have abrogated their agreement with Muhammadﷺ, and now they are involved in negotiations with him to bring back the agreement. And they have offered Muhammad to hand over some of your men to him to be executed as a sign of their sincerity and repentance of their deed.” So Nu‘aim is here telling Quraish that the Jews are sorry that they have broken their agreement with Rasūlullāhﷺ and they are willing to make that up by handing over some of your men to him, so if the Jews come to you asking for hostages, do not give them any. And then he went to Ghatafān and tells them the exact same thing.

Now, the siege was taking a long time and Quraish were getting fed up. Now remember, Quraish did not come to Madīnah to lay siege to it, they came in to fight, and they were surprised to find this moat in front of them, the trench. So they did not come in with supplies to last for a siege, they came in for a fast battle, get it over with and leave, so they were not prepared to wait for a long time. So ‘Ikrimah Bin Abī Jahl was sent to head a delegation to go and meet with the Jews of Banū Qurayzah. He went to them and said, “We are getting tired of this long siege, our camels and horses are dying and we want to wage an all-out war on Muhammad, so get yourselves ready and we shall attack today.” The Jews said, “No, you know that we do not fight in the Sabbath, and some of our people who did fight in the Sabbath, this and this happened to them.” They went on talking about the history of staying away from fighting on the Sabbath, and then they said, “And we are worried that you might not stay the course, and to ensure that you are willing to fight until the end, we want you to hand over some of your men as a guarantee.” ‘Ikrimah goes back and conveys this information to Abū Sufyān. Abū Sufyān said, “This is it! This is what Nu‘aim told us, that the Jews have betrayed us and they want to hand over our men to Muhammadﷺ.” So Abū Sufyān answers back and said, “We are not going to hand over even one man, not one single person.” The Jews said, “This is exactly what Nu‘aim told us, these men are not serious and they are going to leave us alone to suffer the attacks of Muhammadﷺ.” And the same thing happened with Ghatafān, and therefore one man, one single man, was successful in breaking up this coalition. The coalition that was brought together by the Yahūd, headed by Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab, was now broken through one of many soldiers of Allāh. And as I said, this help appears as if it came out of nowhere, but it was part of the Qadr of Allāh because the Muslims have passed the test. The Muslims have passed the test of Īmān, of perseverance, of endurance, patience, trust in Allāh. Since they had passed all of these requirements, now Allāh is going to find a way out for them. Just like when Mūsā and Banū Isrāīl were faced with the sea in front of them and Fir‘aun from behind them, it was a test for them to see if they believe in the promise of Allāh  that He will save them and protect them or not; many of them failed, some of them did pass, and after the test was over that is when Allāh  told Mūsā  all you have to do is strike the sea with your stick and it will split, so the whole thing was a test. Nu‘aim Ibn Mas‘ūd, single-handedly, brought an end to this coalition.

13.2 Lessons from Incidences of Ghatafān and Nu‘aim Bin Mas‘ūd

13.2.1 Study and Know the Enemy and their Objectives

Rasūlullāhﷺ negotiated with Ghatafān because they were there only for financial gain, but the Jews and Quraish were fighting a war of ‘Aqīdah, their objective was to bring down Islām from its foundations, and therefore he did not even attempt to negotiate with them. So you need to know the objectives of your enemy; is the enemy fighting because of ‘Aqīdah or is the enemy fighting for another reason, or is it a combination of both? You see, with Ghatafān, they were drawn into this because they are going to make money, and if they can make money off Muhammadﷺ then [so] be it, we will leave, and they agreed, but Rasūlullāhﷺ never attempted to do that with the Jews or with Quraish because they were fighting from the standpoint of ‘Aqīdah. Quraish were fighting to defend their religion and to take revenge of those men from Quraish who became Muslim, and the Jews were also fighting from an ‘Aqīdah point of view. So it is important to know and to try to study the enemy.

13.2.2 Do Not Make Enemies – Neutralise them

The Second Lesson: Rasūlullāhﷺ told Sa’d Bin ‘Ubādah and Sa’d Bin Mu‘ādh that the reason why he was making this offer was because he saw that the Arabs are ‘as if they are shooting you from one single bow.’ Meaning that they have unified against you and I want to break up that coalition. Innī Ra’aytul ‘Araba Ramatkum An Qawsin Wāhidah. So the lesson here is that the Muslim leader needs to have Hikmah, and if it is possible to neutralise a particular party and some of the enemies of Islām rather than have them all face at once, that can be part of the strategy. And the Muslims should not try to make enemies, but they should try to neutralise the enemy as long as this is done without giving up some of our principles. Why fight everybody at once? That was where Rasūlullāhﷺ was coming from, he was trying to break up this coalition; Ghatafān, we can deal with them later, let us deal with the priority now which is Quraish and Al-Yahūd. Now, one can argue that this was before the ruling of Allāh: Wa Qātilul Mushrikīna Kāffah – And fight against the Disbelieverscollectively, At-Tawbah: 36

but even then, if the Muslims do not have the capability of doing that, they can strategise and rank them according to how dangerous they are as enemies of Allāh.

13.2.3 The Leader Should Put the Right Person in the Right Place to do the Right Thing

Next Lesson: The leader should have the capability of taking advantage of the abilities of his soldiers. So Rasūlullāhﷺ here did not invite Nu‘aim to come over and just give him a sword and give him a spear and tell him, ‘Well, go and fight.’ No, Rasūlullāhﷺ knew where to use Nu‘aim Bin Mas‘ūd. So the leader needs to know the qualities of his followers and put each person in the right place; put the right person in the right place to do the right thing.

13.2.4 Du‘ā’ – A Powerful Weapon

Rasūlullāhﷺ was using a powerful weapon against the enemies of Allāh, and that is Du‘ā’. Rasūlullāhﷺ was saying, “O Allāh! Revealer of the Book, quick to take account, defeat the clans. O Allāh! Defeat them and shake them!” And Allāh accepted the Du‘ā’ of Rasūlullāhﷺ and He assisted the Muslims with soldiers they did not see. Allāh says: O you who have believed, remember the favour of Allāh upon you when armies came to [attack] you and We sent upon them a wind and armies [of angels] you did not see… Allāh sent armies that they did not see; the Malāikah [and] wind were all armies sent by Allāh, and we will talk about wind later on in the story of Hudhaifah. …And ever is Allāh, of what you do, Seeing. Al-Ahzāb: 9

SoAllāh is now sending soldiers from His armies to defend the Muslims. The Muslims, by the way, also had a battle-cry in Khandaq, and that was, “Hāmīm Lā Yunsarūn! – They will not be victorious! They will not be victorious!”

13.2.5 Hudhaifah Bin Al-Yamān

The story of Hudhaifah, and I will read to you two narrations, one is narration of Ahmad and the other one is narration of Muslim. In the narration of Ahmad, which is a bit more detailed, [it says that] a man from Kūfah asked Hudhaifah Bin Al-Yamān, “Have you actually seen the Messenger of Allāh, and were you really a Companion of his?” So this happened in the time of At- Tābi‘īn. Hudhaifah said, “Oh yes nephew.” The Tābi‘ī asked, “And how did you get by?” How did you treat him? How did you deal with him? Hudhaifah said, “It was difficult for us, I swear by Allāh, but we tried our best.” This Tābi‘ī said, “I swear, if we had lived at his time, we would never have let his foot so much as touch the ground, we would have carried him on our shoulders.” This Tābi‘ī heard stories about how the Sahābah were with Rasūlullāhﷺ and he felt that if Rasūlullāhﷺ came in their time they would have treated him much better than the Sahābah, he said we would have carried him on our shoulders, we would not even let his feet touch the ground. Now, Hudhaifah wants to teach this man a lesson and make him understand that it is easier said than done. You know, yes, now because we brought Islām to you – it was the Sahābah who brought it to At-Tābi‘īn – now because Islām was brought to you and you understand how great Rasūlullāhﷺ is and you see the fruits of his mission and you see the Khilāfah that he established, now you say, ‘Well, if we were living then we would have done so and so,’ but this Tābi‘ī does not understand that these were men who were living with Rasūlullāhﷺ and they had to fight their fathers, they had to fight their brothers, they had to fight their clans, they had to give up their wealth, they had to sacrifice their lives, so it was not easy. Yes, it is easy now to say that we would have carried Rasūlullāhﷺ on our shoulders, but if you were there you would have maybe acted differently.

So Hudhaifah wants to give him an example of how the situation was, and how difficult it was, he is telling him about the reality, he said, “Nephew, I swear I see us now with the Messenger of Allāh at Al -Khandaq, and after he had prayed for a part of the night, he turned to us and asked, ‘Who will volunteer to go and see what the enemy is doing and then come back?’ The Messenger of Allāh stipulated that if the volunteer would come back, he would ask Allāh that the man be his Companion in Paradise, but so severe was the fear, cold and hunger, that not one person volunteered.” Rasūlullāh is asking for a volunteer, and this volunteer will be with him in Jannah, all what you have to do is go and visit the camp of the enemy and come back. Hudhaifah said none of us stood up, none of us volunteered; why? Because we were so terrified, it was cold, we were so hungry, and when you are in a situation like that you cannot think straight, so none of us stood up. He then said, “Since no one had risen, he called upon me, and once he had done so I had no alternative but to do so.” So now Rasūlullāhﷺ is not asking for a volunteer, he said, ‘Hudhaifah, you go.’ “He then told me, ‘Hudhaifah, go and infiltrate the enemy, go and see what they are doing, but do not cause any trouble, then return to us.’” Hudhaifah said, “So I did. The gale and Allāh’s soldiers were greatly damaging them, leaving them no fire nor pots nor tents upright.” The wind was so strong it was blowing everything. “Abū Sufyān arose and said, ‘Quraish, every man check out the person sitting next to him.’” Abū Sufyān was worried that in such a condition where the wind is blowing so fiercely, the enemy could possibly try to infiltrate us, so Abū Sufyān said, “Let everyone check the person next to him.” Hudaifah said, “At this, I took the hand of the man next to me and asked him his name.”

So Hudhaifah acted very quickly; rather than have somebody ask him, he asked the man next to him – a very smart move, it saved him his life. “He told me who he was. Abū Sufyān then said, ‘We are not in a permanent camp, our horses and camels are dying, and Banū Qurayzah are at odds with us, and we have heard things about them that we do not like. You can see what we have lost due to the gale, how our cooking pots will not stand upright, and we cannot keep fires burning and our tents standing; you should leave as I am about to do.” That was it, they were giving up. “He then went to his camel which was hobbled, mounted it, struck it so that it arose on three legs since he only un-hobbled it when it was standing. If it had not been for the promise that the Messenger of Allāh made me make not to cause trouble, I could have shot him with an arrow.” Because remember Rasūlullāhﷺ told him, ‘Do not cause any trouble; just go, gather information and come back.’ Hudhaifah went on, “So I returned to the Messenger of Allāh and found him standing in Prayer shrouded in a wrap belonging to one of his wives. When he saw me, he asked me to come in to sit at his feet and threw an end of the wrap over me. He then bowed and prostrated while I was under it. When he was finished, I related the news to him. When Ghatafān heard what Quraish had done, they hurried off home.” So now everyone left. This is the narration of Ahmad.

In the narration of Muslim, it is narrated by Yazīd At-Taymī from his father who said, “We were with Hudhaifah when a man told him, ‘If I had been alive with the Messenger of Allāh, I would have fought alongside him heroically. So Hudhaifah said, ‘Would you indeed? Is that the case, now claiming that you would have fought fiercely with Rasūlullāhﷺ?’ And then Hudhaifah told him, ‘Once we were there at the Battle of Al-Ahzāb with Rasūlullāhﷺ. It was night time and there was a fierce cold gale blowing. He asked us, ‘Is there no man who will bring me the news of the enemy and be with me at Judgement Day?’ When none of us responded, he asked the same question a second and a third time. Then he said, ‘Hudhaifah, you go and bring us news of the enemy.’ Since he had called upon me by name, I had no alternative but to get up. He then said, ‘Bring me news of them without giving them any cause for alarm about me.’ So I left and made my way to them, feeling as if I was walking through a public bath (meaning he was feeling hot). I found Abū Sufyān there warming his back to the fire. I placed an arrow in the centre of my bow and was about to release it when I remembered how Rasūlullāhﷺ had told me not to give them any alarm about it. If I had shot it, I would have hit him. I then left to return to Rasūlullāhﷺ, and again, the feeling of walking in a bath overcame me. When I arrived back, I felt very cold and chilled once again. I told this to him and he put over me part of the cloak he was wearing as he prayed. He slept right on through till morning, when he spoke to me saying, ‘Up you get sleepy head.’’”

So Hudhaifah here is telling this man that this was our situation, so you need to ask yourself whether you would have fought alongside Rasūlullāhﷺ heroically. Now you are saying that, years later; only Allāh  would know what would happen if you were there at that difficult moment, whether you would have been with the Munāfiqīn or with the Mu’minīn. So we should try to avoid making all these big claims of what we can do and how we are going to give victory to Islām – just do it, do not talk about, do it. That is our problem today; everyone is proposing a solution, everyone is saying that I am going to do this and do that for the Religion, and nothing gets done.

Now Ghatafān and Quraish just left; that was it. Rasūlullāhﷺ wakes up next day in the morning and takes a look at the empty campground; no one is left. Quraish and Ghatafān have left as if there was no Ahzāb, so Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Lā Ilāha Illallāh, Wahdah, Sadaqa Wa’dah, Wa Nasara ‘Abdah, Wa Hazamal Ahzāba Wahdah –There is no one worthy of worship except Allāh, His promise came true, and He gave victory to His servant, and He defeated the coalition alone.” It was Allāh who defeated the coalition, and He did it alone.

13.2.6 Miracles in Ghazwat Al-Khandaq

We have been talking about miracles in the Ghazawāt, what are the miracles that happened in Ghazwat Al-Khandaq?

13.2.7 Increasing of Food

When the Muslims were digging the trench, Jābir Ibn ‘Abdillāh saw the condition of Rasūlullāhﷺ; people were tying one stone to their stomachs and he had two stones tied to his stomach, so he goes back to his wife and he tells her, “I have seen Rasūlullāh in an intolerable condition. Do you have any food for him?” She said, “All what I have is some barley and a small goat.” Jābir goes and slaughters the goat and he tells his wife to prepare some dough for baking bread, and while the meat was cooking and she was baking the bread, he goes to Rasūlullāhﷺ and tells him, “I have some food for you, so you can come along with one or two of your Companions.” Rasūlullāhﷺ asked him, “How much food do you have?” He told him [how much he had]. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Oh, that is plenty. Tell your wife not to move the soup (the meat was cooked with soup) from its place until I come.” And then Rasūlullāhﷺ stands up, and to the amazement of Jābir, Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “O Muhājirūn! O Ansār! Jābir has prepared some food for you.” Jābir has told Rasūlullāhﷺ to come along with one or two [people], and Rasūlullāhﷺ has invited the entire camp! All of you are invited to Jābir’s house. So Jābir runs back home very embarrassed; what in the world are we going to do? And you know when you invite people and there is not enough food, that is very embarrassing. So he goes to his wife and tells her, “You know what, Rasūlullāh is coming along with all of Ahlul Khandaq; everyone is coming!” He was worried. So she said. “Did he ask you how much food we have?” He said, “Yes.” “And you had told him?” He said, “Yes.” She said, “Allāh and His Messenger know best.” Jābir said, “Those words comforted me.” He knows best; you already told him how much food you have.

Rasūlullāhﷺ comes in, and he would pour the soup and the meat, and then he would crush bread over it, so he was doing the dishing. And he told the Sahābah to come in and not crowd each other, to come in in groups because they were very hungry and you could have a stampede, [so] Rasūlullāhﷺ told them to slow down and to come in in groups. They would come in in groups of 10; Rasūlullāhﷺ would prepare the food for them and bring it to them, they would eat and then they would leave. Another 10 would come in; Rasūlullāhﷺ would prepare the meal for them and so on and so forth. In one narration it says that 800 people ate from that meal, and when they were done, Rasūlullāhﷺ went back and the pot was full as it was and the bread was still baking in the oven, so Rasūlullāh told the wife of Jābir to feed her neighbours. This was a miracle of Rasūlullāhﷺ – increasing the food, Takthīrut Ta‘ām.

13.2.8 Rasūlullāhﷺ Receives Glad-tidings

Another miracle: when they were digging the trench, a boulder stood in their way and they could not move it or break it, in fact it was breaking their axes, so they came to Rasūlullāhﷺ and told him about it. Rasūlullāhﷺ went there, grabbed an axe and said “Bismillāh” and struck it. A lightning came out and Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Allāhu Akbar!” He then struck it again; light came out and he said, “Allāhu Akbar!” He struck it a third time and then it disintegrated into dust and Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Allāhu Akbar!” So Salmān asked him, “O Messenger of Allāh, why were you saying Allāhu Akbar and what was that light coming out like lightning from this boulder?” Rasūlullāh said, “The first time I struck it, I was given the glad-tidings of conquering the Roman Empire, and I could see the red palaces of Syria from right here. The second time I said Allāhu Akbar, I was given the glad-tidings of conquering the Persian Empire, and I was able to see its white palace from right here. And the third time I said Allāhu Akbar, I was given the glad-tidings of conquering Yemen, and I was able to see the gates of San‘ā’ from right here.” Now, notice here that Rasūlullāhﷺ is giving them these glad-tidings in the worst of times, when the morale was low, when you look around you and all what you see is defeat, when you are besieged; but that is the whole point of giving a glad-tiding, that is when glad-tidings should be given, it is when you are weak, when you are almost going to give up. So now if the Ummah is weak, divided, defeated, we should give the glad-tidings that Rasūlullāhﷺ has given us. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Sayablughu Hādhad Din Mā Balaghal Laylu Wan Nahār –This Religion will reach as far as night and day can reach. Allāh has shown me the entire earth and He told me that the kingdom of my nation will reach all of it.” So victory belongs to this Ummah, and it is coming.

13.2.9 Rasūlullāhﷺ Predicts ‘Ammār’s Death.

Rasūlullāhﷺ saw ‘Ammār Bin Yāsir working hard and he told him, “Yā ‘Ammār, Taqtulukal Fi’atul Bāghiyah –Yā ‘Ammār, you will be killed by the aggressing party.” That is all; you will be killed by the aggressing party. ‘Ammār lives through the time of Rasūlullāhﷺ, lives through the era of Abū Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthmān, and then in the time of ‘Alï he joins in the army of ‘Alï and was killed by the army of Mu‘āwiyah. So this Hadīth tells us that the party of ‘Alï was right while the party of Mu‘āwiyah was wrong, and this was news of Al-Ghaib that Rasūlullāhﷺ was given by Allāh, and he was told that ‘Ammār will be killed by the aggressing party. Now, both of them are Muslim parties, but one of them was right and one of them was wrong.

13.3 Lessons from Story of Hudhaifah

Let us talk briefly about lessons from the story of Hudhaifah which we just mentioned.

Discipline: First of all: The discipline. It is very important for the Muslim who is working in a Jamā‘ah to have discipline. Rasūlullāhﷺ told him, “Do not cause any trouble.” So even though Hudhaifah had Abū Sufyān in his sights and he could have shot him and killed him, he stopped because of the order of Rasūlullāhﷺ – that is discipline.

Karāmah of Not Feeling the Cold: Number Two: He did not feel cold throughout this journey, and that is a Karāmah.

Fast Response: Number Three: His fast response. As soon as Abū Sufyān said that everyone should check out the man next to him, Hudhaifah was the one who took the initiative and did that.

Difference between Theory and Reality: Finally, [the difference] between theory and reality. You know, that Tābi‘ī was talking about theory while Hudhaifah was talking about reality, and there is a difference between the two. So do not assume things until they happen, and do not have too much confidence in yourself and in your Īmān until you are tested, because one cannot know the results until after the exam is given.

13.4 Lessons from Ghazwat Al-Khandaq

Lesson One: Allying of Jews with Al-Mushrikīn against Muslims is Contradictory but Expected: Lesson One: For the Jews to ally themselves with the Mushrikīn against the Muslims is contradictory. Why would they ally themselves with Al-Mushrikīn when they are closer in terms of similarity of religion to the Muslims? But even though it is contradicting, we should not be surprised, and that is still repeating until this day. Contradicting theories or political views will come together to fight the Religion of Truth. Can you not see today that the West, the democratic West, the West of the human rights, the West that claims to be fighting for the sake of spreading democracy, is allying itself with the most autocratic and oppressive regimes on the face of the earth?! For the sake of what? For the sake of fighting Islām. So one should not be surprised.

Lesson Two: Make Use of the Available Technology: Lesson Two: A Muslim should make use of available technology. Rasūlullāhﷺ approved the idea of Salmān Al-Fārsī bringing in a foreign idea, an idea that belonged to Kuffār – it belonged to the Persians – but since it is not in an issue of religion and it is a matter of strategy, Rasūlullāhﷺ adopted that idea which was novel to Arab warfare.

Lesson Three: Example of Leadership Given by Rasūlullāhﷺ: Lesson Three: The example of leadership given by Rasūlullāhﷺ. He was digging the trench with them; not for the sake of bringing the TV cameras to show the leader as part of the people and make a big political propaganda out of it; no, Rasūlullāhﷺ was doing it sincerely and to give us the example of how a leader should act. He goes hungry like they did, and when he finds food, he shares it with them; he did not just invite the one and two that Jābir said, but he invited the whole camp to go and eat with him.

Lesson Four: Rasūlullāhﷺ Raising Morale through Nashīd: Lesson Four: He was raising the morale through Nashīd, they were chanting those words of poetry to raise up the spirit. So the leader should have the highest spirit among the group because he is the person whom the followers take refuge in when things get tough, so if they find that the leader is weak and the leader has already given up, they will do the same.

Lesson Five: Rasūlullāhﷺ was Optimistic Even after News of Qurayzah’s Treachery: Lesson Five: The reaction of Rasūlullāhﷺ to the news of Qurayzah’s treachery. We talked about when he sent out Sa’d Bin Mu‘ādh, Sa’d Bin ‘Ubādah and ‘Abdullāh Bin Rawāhah to go and check out if Qurayzah have broken their agreement with Rasūlullāhﷺ, and he told him, “If you find that to be the case, then hint it to me without letting the people know; do not weaken their morale.” Now, when the news was delivered to Rasūlullāhﷺ, he said, “Abshirū – Receive the glad-tidings.” So Rasūlullāhﷺ was optimistic even at that moment, and this would give confidence to the Sahābah.

Lesson Six: Difficult Times Show what is in the Hearts of Men: Lesson Six: Difficult times show what is in the hearts of men. Talking about Al -Khandaq, Ibn Is’hāq said, “When conditions worsened, so did the attitude of many people and they began saying ugly things.” So the attitude changed under the stress and they started saying ugly things, in terms of ugly things in ‘Aqīdah, ugly things about Islām, ugly things that showed weakness in the personality, weakness in the trust in Allāh. So one needs to prepare themselves for difficult situations; do not go by your conduct in times of ease, but you need to prepare yourselves for times of difficulty, because that is when the truth comes out.

Āyāt Regarding Al-Mu’minīn: We talked about the Munāfiqīn and we recited the Āyāt relating to the Munāfiqīn; what about the Mu’minīn? What about the Believers? What did Allāh say about them in the context of Al-Ahzāb? Allāh says, and these Āyāt are in Sūrah Al-Ahzāb which is the Sūrah named after The Coalition – Al-Ahzāb, Allāh said:

There has certainly been for you in the Messenger of Allāh an excellent pattern for anyone whose hope is in Allāh and the Last Day and [who] remembers Allāh often. And when the Believers saw the companies, they said, “This is what Allāh and His Messenger had promised us, and Allāh and His Messenger spoke the truth.” And it increased them only in Faith and acceptance. Among the Believers are men true to what they promised Allāh. Among them is he who has fulfilled his vow [to the death], and among them is he who awaits [his chance]. And they did not alter [the terms of their commitment] by any alteration – That Allāh may reward the truthful for their truth and punish the Hypocrites if He wills or accept their repentance. Indeed, Allāh is ever Forgiving and Merciful. Al-Ahzāb: 21-24

There has certainly been for you in the Messenger of Allāh an excellent pattern for anyone whose hope is in Allāh and the Last Day and [who] remembers Allāh often.

What was the context of this Āyah? You see, this Āyah is saying: Laqad Kāna Lakum Fī Rasūlillahi Uswatun Hasanah – Youhave a good pattern of conduct in Rasūlullāhﷺ for you to emulate, for you to imitate in your lives. So this Āyah is asking us to follow the Sunnah, this is the Āyah in Qur’ān that tells us to follow the Sunnah; we have an example in Rasūlullāh – follow it. Now, was this Āyah revealed because one of the Muslims did not use the Miswāk? Was this Āyah revealed because one of the Muslims did not have their thobe above the ankle? Was this Āyah revealed because one of the Muslims did not grow a beard? All of this is part of Sunnah, but was this the reason why the Āyah was revealed? The reason why the Āyah was revealed according to Ibn Jarīr At-Tabarī is [because] Allāh was reprimanding the Believers who stayed behind and did not go and join the camp that was right next to the trench, so Allāh was telling them, ‘You should follow the Sunnah of Rasūlullāhﷺ and go and be with him.’ And Ibn Abī Hātim narrates that As-Suddī said – Suddī [being] one of the Mufassirīn – he said that it means here Muwāsāf Al-Qitāl – you should be standing next to him in fighting, in Qitāl. This was the context in which the Āyah was revealed. So nowadays it is unfortunate to hear people talk about Sunnah but they completely neglect the issue of Jihād Fee Sabeelillāh as being part of the Sunnah of Rasūlullāhﷺ. We should not over-emphasise some parts of Sunnah and neglect others; Sunnah should be taken as a whole package. And then we prioritise among the Sunnah; so we say all is important, but some are more important than others, and since the Āyah was revealed in this context, definitely this will be the most important Sunnah of all. The next Āyah:

And when the Believers saw the companies, they said, “This is what Allāh and His Messenger had promised us, and Allāh and His Messenger spoke the truth.”

You see, when the Munāfiqīn saw the coalition, they said, ‘Allāh has lied to us, Rasūlullāhﷺ has lied to us, he is telling us that we are going to conquer the Persian Empire and the Roman Empire and we cannot even feel safe going to the toilet.’ So they were having doubts in the promise of Allāh. What was the reaction of the Believers? They said, ‘This is exactly what Allāh and His Messenger promised us.’ What does this mean? Allāh says in Sūrah Al-Baqarah: Or do you think that you will enter Paradise while such [trial] has not yet come to you as came to those who passed on before you? They were touched by poverty and hardship and were shaken until [even their] Messenger and those who believed with him said, “When is the help of Allāh?” Unquestionably, the help of Allāh is near. Al-Baqarah: 214

Soit tests them to the limit until they start asking, ‘OAllāh, when are you going to give us victory?’ So the Sahābah said, ‘This is what Allāh promised us; Allāh spoke about this in Sūrah Al-Baqarah and here it is happening, it is happening just as we were promised.’ So it only added to their Īmān, because they saw the promise of Allāh being fulfilled in front of their eyes. So you can see how the same event brought forth a different reaction from the Believers and a different reaction from the Munāfiqūn, and it increased them only in Faith and acceptance.

So this was the reaction of Al-Mu’minūn. Inshā’Allāhu Ta‘ālā we will now talk about Ghazwat Banū Qurayzah, and that should be our final talk in this series of lectures on the Seerah of Rasūlullāhﷺ.

13.5 Ghazwat Banū Qurayzah

13.5.1 Banū Qurayzah Break their Agreement

We mentioned that Banū Qurayzah, the last Jewish tribe remaining in Madīnah, did participate in the Battle of Trench alongside Quraish and Ghatafān. Now, let us go back to a conversation that occurred between Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab and Ka’b Ibn Asad who was the head of Banū Qurayzah. Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab belongs to Banū Nadīr and we talked about their fate, that they were besieged and then they left, they went to Ash-Shām and some of them went and settled in Khaibar. Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab was one of those who stayed in Khaibar and he was carrying on his fight against Rasūlullāhﷺ, and remember that Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab was the one who was discussing with his brother Abū Yāsir the day Rasūlullāhﷺ had arrived in Madīnah, and Abū Yāsir was asking him, “Is this him?” Meaning is this the Prophet that we have the description of in our books? Huyaÿ said, “Yes, it is him.” Abū Yāsir asked, “Are you sure it is him?” He said, “Yes, I am sure it is him.” So Abū Yāsir asked, “So what are you going to do?” He said,

“I am going to be his enemy until the end of my life.” He knows that he is the Prophet of Allāh and he still insists that he will be his enemy until the end of his life, and Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab was true to his promise.

So Huyaÿ goes to Ka’b Ibn Asad, the head of Banū Qurayzah. When Ka’b Ibn Asad sees him approaching, he locks his gates – remember, these Jews used to live in fortresses – so he locks the gates of his fortress. Huyaÿ knocks on the door and says, “Open for me, damn you!” Ka’b said, “Damn you Huyaÿ! You are an evil man and you bring misfortune. I have made a pact with Muhammad and I am not going to break my agreement with him. I have never found him to be anything but trustworthy and truthful.” Ka’b is telling Huyaÿ, ‘Just leave. We have a pact with Muhammadﷺ and are going to stick to it.’ Huyaÿ said, “Damn you, open so I that could talk to you.” Ka’b said, “I will not.” Then Huyaÿ insulted Ka’b and said, “I swear, the reason why you are locking me out is that you are scared that I would share your dinner with you.” So this embarrassed Ka’b and he opened the door. Huyaÿ came in and he said, “I bring you glory of all time and a sea of goodness.” Ka’b said, “What are you talking about?” He said, “I bring you Quraish with their chieftains and their nobles whom I have left encamped at the confluence of the streams at Rūmah, along with Ghatafān with their chiefs and nobles whom I have positioned at Damb Natmah near Uhud, they have made a treaty that they will not leave until we completely destroy Muhammad and those with him.” Ka’b responded back, he said, “What you bring me, I swear by Allāh, is shame forever, and a cloud that has lost its rain so it is thundering and lightning and there is nothing in it. Damn you Huyaÿ! Leave me to maintain my pact with him, I have never found Muhammad to be anything but trustworthy and honest.” So Ka’b was responding to what Huyaÿ said – I bring you glory of all time and a sea of goodness – he said [that] you bring me nothing but dishonour, you bring me nothing but shame forever, and this sea of goodness that you are talking about is nothing but a cloud that has lost its rain, so it is making noise, thunders, and there is lightning coming out of it, but there is no rain in it, so it is just show. Huyaÿ would not take no for an answer, he kept on badgering Ka’b until he was able to convince him to break his agreement with Muhammadﷺ, and that shows you the insistence of this Imām of Evil, Huyaÿ Ibn Akhtab.

13.5.2 Jibrīl Tells Rasūlullāhﷺ to Pick Up Arms and Head to Banū Qurayzah

Now, the Battle of the Trench was over. Rasūlullāhﷺ heads back home and he takes off his armour and he takes a bath. ‘Ā’ishah  said in Al-Bukhārī, “When the Prophetﷺ returned from the Trench and he had put down his arms and taken a bath, Jibrīl came to him and said, ‘So you have put down your arms? We have not done so I swear by Allāh, go forth to them.’ Rasūlullāhﷺ asked, ‘Where to?’ Jibrīl said, ‘Over there,’ and he gestured towards Banū Qurayzah.” Rasūlullāhﷺ and the Muslims suffered a lot during the siege of the Trench; they were exhausted, cold, hungry, and finally now they can take some rest, and Jibrīl comes to Muhammadﷺ and says, ‘Put you armour back on, pick up your weapons, and go and fight.’ So no rest.

Rasūlullāhﷺ felt that the matter was so urgent [that] he told the Sahābah, “Lā Yusalliyanna Ahadakumul ‘Asr Illā Fī Banū Qurayzah – Do not pray ‘Asr except at Banū Qurayzah.” The matter is urgent, you have to leave now. So the Sahābah left, but sunset was approaching and they had not reached yet to Banū Qurayzah, so they discussed the order of Rasūlullāhﷺ [that] you should not pray ‘Asr except at Banū Qurayzah. Some of them said that we have to pray ‘Asr now because it is already sunset, and what Rasūlullāh meant by that statement is that we should rush and hurry up. The others said no, we are going to pray over there just as Rasūlullāhﷺ said. So both of them wanted to follow what they understood to be the meaning of the Hadīth of Rasūlullāhﷺ. When they returned and they brought the matter up to Rasūlullāhﷺ, he did not reprimand any one of them, he did not disapprove anyone, and this shows you that disagreements in issues of Sharī‘ah do occur, they occurred in the time of the Sahābah, and you do not have to have one party necessarily wrong; you see, Rasūlullāhﷺ approved both of them because they did their best in understanding what Rasūlullāhﷺ wanted, and they did it with the best of intentions.

Rasūlullāhﷺ laid siege to Banū Qurayzah. Allāh says: And He brought down those who supported them among the People of the Scripture from their fortresses and cast terror into their hearts [so that] a party you killed, and you took captive a party. And He caused you to inherit their land and their homes and their properties and a land which you have not trodden. And ever is Allāh, over all things, competent. Al-Ahzāb: 26-27

Allāh says in these Āyāt that He has brought down the People of the Book from their fortresses and He cast fear in their hearts.

So Jibrīl  was telling Muhammadﷺ to go to Banū Qurayzah which Rasūlullāhﷺ did, and we talked about how the Sahābah had on argument on; whether they should pray before sunset or whether they should pray at Banū Qurayzah, and they split; some of them prayed while some of them waited until they got there and then they prayed, and when they told Rasūlullāhﷺ about it, he did not berate any of the two opinions, which is very important because it shows you that in issues of Fiqh for example, there is room for different interpretations because we would have different understanding of the text, but the point here is that one should follow the opinion because they believe it to be the truth, not because it is the more convenient, not because it is the easiest, not because it is the easy way out; no, you do it because this is what you really believe that Allāh  wants from you to do; that is an important principle. If one has a floss in this regard and they choose the opinion based on what they believe is the best, Allāh will reward them.

13.5.3 Muslims Lay Siege on Banū Qurayzah

So they laid siege to Banū Qurayzah and it lasted about 25 days – in one narration it is 25 and in another it is 27 – and as we mentioned, Allāh said: Wa Qadhafa Fī Qulūbihumur Ru’b – [He] cast terror into their hearts,and this is a soldier of Allāh that we see which comes up again and again; it happened with Banū Nadīr, it happened with Banū Qurayzah, so Allāh will cast fear in the hearts of the enemies of Allāh.

Ka’b Ibn Asad gathers his people and he says that he will give them three options. He said, “You are aware of the difficult position in which we find ourselves, I am giving you three possibilities to choose from. The first one is to believe in this man Muhammad, and to follow him. By Allāh, we are now certain that he is a Prophet and a Messenger sent by Allāh, he is indeed the one described in our own book. If you do so, you spare your own lives and protect your children and families.” They objected to this and they said, “We will never abandon the Old Testament and substitute anything else for it.” So Ka’b said, “Since you refuse me this possibility, I suggest to you that we kill our women and children and go out to fight Muhammadﷺ and his followers. If we do so, we can fight much harder since we have no responsibility behind us, we can fight him until Allāh rules between us. If we are exterminated, then we will face death without any worry about our offspring, if on the other hand we achieve victory, we will soon find new women and have new children.” They said, “What would be the purpose of our lives if we kill these poor women and children?” What would we live for then? He said, “If you refuse this also, the only thing I can suggest to you is that since tonight is the Sabbath night, it may well be that Muhammad and his followers may relax their watch thinking that we would not do anything serious on the Sabbath night, let us then take him by surprise and fight them to the bitter end.” They said, “Do you want to spoil our Sabbath and violate it in a way that has never been done before except by those whom you know and who received the punishment you know?” Then one of them, whose name is Nabbāsh Bin Qais, said, “How do you expect us to take them by surprise when you can see that they are getting stronger every day? In the early days of the siege, they were in their positions during the day and retreating at night, now we see them maintaining the siege day and night. The surprise element is not in our hands.” Ka’b Ibn Asad looked at them and said, “None of you has ever made a firm decision since he was born.”

13.5.4 Abū Lubābah Repents

So Banū Qurayzah were thinking about surrendering. They send [someone] to Abū Lubābah, one of the Sahābah and one of their allies in the time of Jāhiliyyah, and they seek his counsel; what do you think, should we surrender or not? They meet Abū Lubābah [and] they came out with their women and children and they were sobbing. Imagine Abū Lababah coming in with all of these women crying and their children are crying, so it was an emotional scene. So when they asked Abū Lubābah, “What do you think Muhammad will do if we surrender?” He pointed to his throat and made a gesture that means he will slaughter you. As soon as he did that, he realised that he has betrayed Allāh and His Messenger; he should not have said that, he should not have disclosed any information that he had. So he rushed back and tied himself to a pillar in the Masjid An-Nabawī and said, “I am not going to untie myself until Allāh accepts my repentance.” Abū Lubābah remains tied up for six days in the Masjid. His wife would come up to him for every Salāh and untie him, and then after Salāh was over she would tie him again. And this continued until one night Rasūlullāhﷺ was at the house of Umm Salamah, his wife, in the room of Umm Salamah, and he smiled. So she asked him, “O Rasūlullāh, what is it?” He said, “Allāh has accepted the repentance of Abū Lubābah.” So Umm Salamah said, “Should I not go and deliver the good news to him?” Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Yes, if you want to.” So she opens the door of her room which was right across from the Masjid, and she delivers the news to Abū Lubābah. And the Sahābah rush towards Abū Lubābah to untie him, but he said, “Do not do so until Rasūlullāhﷺ comes and does that himself.”

So Abū Lubābah was affected by the emotional scene that he saw in front of his eyes – the sobbing of the women and children in front of his eyes – so when he was asked, “What do you think our fate will be?” His response was gesturing with his finger at his neck, which means that he will slaughter you. [So] he goes back to the Masjid An-Nabawī, he was terrified, he said, “I have betrayed Allāh and His Messenger.” He realised that after he acted; it was sort of a spontaneous move and he only realised his mistake after it occurred, but he was fast to repent and he was so serious about what he had done he rushed back to the Masjid An-Nabawī, tied himself to one of the pillars, and said, “I am not going to untie myself until Allāh accepts my repentance,” which Allāh  did after six days and Rasūlullāhﷺ received news of that, so Rasūlullāhﷺ smiled and he told Umm Salamah about it so Umm Salamah was the one who conveyed the news to Abū Lubābah. The Sahābah rushed to untie him [but] Abū Lubābah said, “No! Until Rasūlullāh comes and unties me himself.” So when Rasūlullāhﷺ went to pray Salātul Fajr, Rasūlullāhﷺ untied Abū Lubābah. And by the way, there is a pillar in Al-Masjid An-Nabawī right now that is named the Pillar of Tawbah, this was the pillar to which Abū Lubābah tied himself to, he stayed there for six days. He would not be untied except by his wife who would untie him before Salāh, he would pray, and then she would tie him to it again.

13.5.5 Banū Qurayzah Surrender and Agree for Sa’d Ibn Mu’ad to Be their Judge

Even though Banū Qurayzah got a hint that this would be their fate, they still agreed to surrender, but they agreed to surrender when they knew that Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh would be the one who would rule in their case, he would be the judge, and Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was their ally in the time of Jāhiliyyah, so they said, “Fine, well that is good. If it is going to be Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh and Rasūlullāhﷺ is going to give [him] complete authority to rule among us, then we will surrender.” So they surrender and they were tied up, and Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was given full authority to rule in their case. Now, Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, if you remember, was injured, he was injured during the siege at the Battle of the Trench, he was shot by an arrow in his arm. And Sa’d made a Du‘ā’ then, his Du‘ā’ was, “My Lord, if we are to fight Quraish again, spare me now for that fight. There are no people I like to fight for Your cause more than those who have opposed Your Messenger, rejected him, and forced him out of his hometown. If You have willed that this encounter between us and them would be the last, I pray to You my Lord to make this wound of mine my way to martyrdom, but do not let me die until I see our affair with the Qurayzah have a happy ending for Islām.” So Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was bitter at what Banū Qurayzah did when they betrayed Rasūlullāhﷺ in the bleakest of moments.

Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Bring him,” [meaning Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh.] Rasūlullāh had prepared for him a tent in Al-Masjid An-Nabawī and he was placed in that tent so that he could be cared for, and Rasūlullāhﷺ would come and visit him because he was injured and he was lying down. Now his injury was getting better but he still had to be carried, so they were carrying him to bring him to the gathering place where Rasūlullāhﷺ was and the Muslims and the Jews. While Sa’d  was carried by his people, the Aws were telling him, “Be kind towards Qurayzah,” and they were giving him advice, because in one narration the Aws came to Rasūlullāhﷺ and said, “Hand over Banū Qurayzah to us as you have handed over Banū Qaynuqā’ to our brothers Al-Khazraj.” If you remember when we talked about Banū Qaynuqā’, their affair was handed over to ‘Abdullāh Ibn Ubaÿ, the head of Nifāq; he was the head of Al-Khazraj, so he was the one to whom the Banū Qaynuqā’ were handed over to, and we know what happened; he set them free. Now, you see, Al-Aws and Al-Khazraj would compete in everything; now since Al-Khazraj324 had authority to rule over their allies in Jāhiliyyah, Banū Qaynuqā’, now Al-Aws want to have that same authority, so Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Then I will leave the matter to Sa’d Bin Mu‘ādh,” and Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was the head of Al-Aws, so they agreed. Now Al-Aws were coming to Sa’d advising him to be kind towards Banū Quarayzah. Sa’d did not respond, he was silent. They were talking to him, talking, talking, talking all throughout. In the end, Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh said, “Laqad Āna Li-Sa’din Allā Ta’khudhahū Fillāhi Lawma Talā’im –It is time for Sa’d to disregard any possible criticism in serving Allāh.” As soon as he said this, some of the men of Al-Aws went back delivering their condolences, they said, “He is going to kill them.” If these were his words, that means they will be dead.

Laqad Āna Li-Sa’din Allā Ta’khudhahū Fillāhi Lawma Talā’im – It is time for Sa’d to disregard all criticism in serving Allāh. Meaning, I am going to do what will please Allāh; I am not going to look into the politics of it, I am not going to look into what the media is going to say about it, I am not going to look at what my family will say about it, what my friends will say about it, I will do what is most pleasing to Allāh. Now, even though he did not spell it out, but pretty much they understood that it means death, and this shows you that the understanding of the Sahābah was that these people have committed a crime sufficient enough to be punished by death.

13.5.6 The Judgement of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh

Sa’d was brought in, and Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Qūmū Li-Sayyidikum – Stand up for your master.” Now, we know that Rasūlullāhﷺ has discouraged the Ummah to stand up for its leaders, however this is an exception; here, Rasūlullāhﷺ told them to stand up for Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, and by the way, we are going to talk in the end about the virtues of Sa’d; Sa’d was a special Sahābï. So they stand up in two lines to greet him while he is coming in, and then they told Sa’d to give his ruling. Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh looked toward the Jews and said, “Do you accept my ruling?” They said, “Yes, we do.” Then he points towards the direction of the Muslims and he said, “Do you accept my ruling?” Without staring at them, because he does not want to look at Rasūlullāhﷺ, he was so shy and embarrassed to ask Rasūlullāhﷺ, ‘Do you accept my ruling?’ He was thinking who am I to rule in the presence of Rasūlullāhﷺ, but since it was Rasūlullāhﷺ who told him to do so, he agreed, otherwise he would not have done so. So out of respect for Rasūlullāhﷺ, he does not look towards him, and he said, “And do you accept my ruling?” Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Yes, we do.” And now Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh will deliver his ruling on the entire tribe of Banū Qurayzah. This is a very important moment, a very important ruling, because it affects the fate of an entire tribe who has lived in Madīnah for hundreds of years. Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh said, “I hereby rule that all the men of the Qurayzah are to be killed, their properties to be divided, and their women and children be enslaved.” Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Laqad Hakamta Bihukmillāhi Min Fawqi Sab‘i Samāwāt – Youhave ruled the same ruling of Allāh from on top of the seven heavens.” This ruling of yours is the ruling of Allāh. This is the ruling that would please Allāh; all of the men be executed, the property divided, and the women and children enslaved, and this is the strictest ruling acceptable in Islām, to sort of say this is the maximum sentence.

13.5.7 Differentiation between Men and Boys

How would they separate between the men and the children? Well, they did not have any birth certificates in those days to tell how old a person was, the way they would do it was by seeing if a person has grown hair; facial hair or the hair that comes along with pubert. In fact in Abū Dāwūd, ‘Atiÿ Al-Qurdī said, “They uncovered my pubic area, and since I did not grow any pubic hair, they set me free.” They spared his life but he was enslaved. So this is how they separated between the young and the old.

13.5.8 Death Toll of Banū Qurayzah

How many of them were killed? There is a variation in numbers; it is between 400 and 900. Some narrations say 400, some say 700, some say 800, some say 900. These were the men of fighting age who were executed.

13.5.9 Other Events Surrounding the Execution of Banū Qurayzah

Only one woman was executed and that is because she killed one of the Sahābah by throwing a stone on top of him. This woman was sitting with ‘Ā’ishah and ‘Ā’ishah has no idea about what this woman has done, and this woman was laughing and joking, then ‘Ā’ishah said, “And then suddenly we heard her name announced, so I asked her, ‘Why is your name being called?’ She said, ‘They want to kill me.’ I asked, ‘Why would they kill you?’ She said, ‘Because of a crime that I have committed.’” ‘Ā’ishah said, “I will never forget how high-spirited she was even though she knew that she was facing death.” She was joking and laughing about it. Probably it was just the hysteria that comes in the last moments, maybe she thought that there was nothing she could do about it.

All of them were killed except for some who became Muslim, their lives were spared. A few men here and there, not many, but some of them did become Muslim, and they were treated as part of the Ummah. You see, there is no racism in Islām, no anti-Semitism; you repent from your sins you become one of the Ummah – that is it, we completely forget about your past.

One of their women called Rayhānah was taken by Rasūlullāhﷺ, she was a slave. Rasūlullāhﷺ invited her to Islām; in the beginning she refused but eventually it says that she did become Muslim, and Rasūlullāhﷺ gave her the option, he said, “Do you want to remain as a slave or do you want to be freed and I will marry you?” She preferred remaining in the state of slavery, so she was a slave-girl that was owned by Rasūlullāhﷺ until he died.

One of the Sahābah appealed for one of the Jewish men because this man had done him a favour in the time of Jāhiliyyah, so he wanted to pay him back for that, and this Sahābï was Thābit Bin Qais, he went to Rasūlullāh to appeal for Az-Zubair Bin Bāta’. Now, Az-Zubair Bin Bāta’ was an old man who had become blind, Thābit went to Rasūlullāhﷺ and asked Rasūlullāhﷺ to spare the life of Az-Zubair, and Rasūlullāhﷺ agreed, but then Az-Zubair told Thābit, “What would an old man who would have no son and no family do with his life?” So Thābit went to Rasūlullāhﷺ and asked Rasūlullāhﷺ to free his wife and his children which Rasūlullāh did, but then Az-Zubair said, “What is to become of a household in Hijāz that has no property, how could they survive?” We are in the desert, how will I live without my property? So Thābit goes to Rasūlullāhﷺ and asks for the property of this man to be released which Rasūlullāhﷺ did. So now Zubair is free, his wife is free, his children are free, and his property is back, but then Az-Zubair asked Thabit, “What became of Ka’b Ibn Asad whose face was like a mirror that reflects the faces of the tribe’s virgins?” Thābit said, “He has been killed.” Az-Zubair said, “And what of our vanguard in the attack and our protector in flight, Az-Zāl Bin Shamaw’al?” Thābit said, “He has been killed. “So what became of the two counsels?” He said, “They have been dispersed and been killed.” Then Az-Zubair said, “I ask you then Thābit, by your obligation to me, to let me join my own people. There is no good in life for me now that they have gone and I cannot stand postponing joining my loved ones for so long as it would take to fill an empty bucket being borne along by a camel.” Zubair said what is the purpose of living if my whole tribe has been exterminated? So this man was so attached to his people [that] he did not want to live without them, and he was asking Thābit to pay back his favour to him by making him join his loved ones. So when Az- Zubair said that that was his wish, Thābit Bin Qais went over to him and cut off his head. When the news of this reached to Abū Bakr, when he heard this statement of Az-Zubair where he said I want to join my loved ones, Abū Bakr As-Siddīq said, “He will meet them by Allāh in the fire of Hell, where he will dwell forever.” You want to join your people the Yahūd who died on Kufr? Fine, you will join them, but you will join them in Hellfire.

13.5.10 Rayhānah Chooses Slavery Over Freedom

Again, the men were killed and the property was divided. Ibn Is’hāq narrates how the one fifth was disposed of, because this was a war, so four fifth of the Ghanīmah was divided amongst the fighters and the remaining one fifth was given to Rasūlullāhﷺ, and this is how he used it, Ibn Is’hāq said, “The Messenger of Allāh dispatched Sa‘eed Bin Zayd with the captives taken from Banū Qurayzah to Najd, where he sold them in exchange for horses and weapons. The Messenger of Allāh had chosen for himself one of their women, Rayhānah. He stayed intimate with her until he died, she still being at that time in his household. The Messenger of Allāh had suggested that she accept Islām, but she had refused. Eventually she did accept Islām and this brought great pleasure to him. He suggested releasing and marrying her, but she chose to continue in slavery considering that easier for her. She remained with him until the Messenger of Allāh died.” So [with regards to the] institution of slavery, Islām has changed many of the rules regarding this institution to the extent that here you have a person who chooses to remain as a slave rather than be freed.

13.6 Lessons from Ghazwat Banū Qurayzah

13.6.1 Why Punishment was So Severe

Why was the punishment so severe? Why were 400 to 900 men slaughtered and the entire remaining population of women and children enslaved and the whole wealth taken as booty? Why? Why such a severe punishment? We can answer in one word, and that is treason. Banū Qurayzah were citizens of the Islāmic State and they committed treason. And it is an accepted rule that the punishment should be befitting of the crime, the punishment should be proportionate to the crime, and [the punishment is so severe] since this crime is so great; they have committed treason against the Muslims, they have committed treason against the Messenger of Allāh. Here we are dealing with the Messenger of Allāh, we are dealing with Muhammadﷺ; you lie to Muhammad, you betray Muhammadﷺ. We are not dealing with a particular head of state or a king, we are dealing with Muhammadﷺ; he was the Head of State, the Messenger, the Seal of Prophets, the most beloved of the creation of Allāh to Allāh, and they betray him? They lie to him? They conspire against him? So the punishment can be no less than what Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh chose, and that is why Rasūlullāhﷺ was happy with it and he said that this was the ruling of Allāh from above seven heavens.

Ibn Kathīr said, “All that was due to their Disbelief, their breaking of pacts between themselves and the Messenger of Allāh, and their allying themselves with the clans against him. None of that did them any good and brought the wrath of Allāh and His Messenger down upon them; a bad bargain for them in this world and the next.” So they received the punishment that they deserved.

13.6.2 A Time for Leniency and a Time for Harshness

Next Lesson: Sa’d refused to be lenient in his ruling because he knew that leniency in such matters is weakness – it is not a sign of mercy or compassion, it is a sign of weakness – and in such situations the only medicine is to be firm. So the perception that some Muslims have that Muslims should be lenient with their enemies so that we do not give Islām a bad image, we want people to say that we are tolerant and peaceful, we do not want them to say that Muslims are terrorists, this is a sign of weakness and failure. We can see today some of the Muslim leaders speaking soft words, but that only adds to the aggressiveness and the arrogance of the enemy. So sometimes the sword needs to be used, and sometimes the word of wisdom needs to be used, so one needs to use the right instrument at the right time; sometimes it is the pen, sometimes it is the sword, sometimes it is a Maw‘idah of Qur’ān, and sometimes it is the Sultān, theauthority of the Islāmic Khalīfah. ‘Uthmān Ibn ‘Affān says, “Inallāha Yaz‘a’ Bis Sultān Mal Yaz‘a’ Bil Qur’ān –Sometimes Allāh can fulfil some of the objectives of the Religion through the Sultān (through the Muslim authority) that cannot be fulfilled through the Qur’ān.”

13.6.3 Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh Wanted to Live Only for Jihād Fee Sabeelillāh

There are some lessons in this statement of Sa’d, in the statement that we read where he said, “My Lord, if we are to fight Quraish again, spare me now for that fight. There are no people I like to fight for Your cause more than those who have opposed Your Messenger, rejected him, and forced him out of his hometown.” Sa’d, being the head of one of the tribes of Al-Ansār, wanted to carry on fighting Quraish if there was any fighting left; we have given Rasūlullāhﷺ a pledge that we will defend him, and since it was the people of Quraish who have driven him out of his home and brought him to Madīnah, we are going to fight for the Messenger of Allāh until Allāh defeats Quraish. So he said [that] if there is any fighting left, I want to live and be there, but then he said, “If You have willed that this encounter between us would be the last, I pray to You my Lord to make this wound of mine my way to martyrdom.” So here he is asking Allāh to make him die if there is no fighting left with Quraish. This shows us that Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh has no objective in living except to fight the people of Quraish, to fight Jihād Fee Sabeelillāh. He does not want to live to cultivate his land, he does not want to live to marry some beautiful women, he does not want to live just because of the sake of loving life – like is the case with most of mankind, their only attachment to Dunyā is their attachment to life, they might have a miserable life but they still want to live it – Sa’d wants to live for a noble purpose; to fight Quraish. If there is no fighting left then O Allāh make me die as a Shahīd. And then he said, “And do not let me die until I see our affair with Qurayzah have a happy ending for Islām.” These were his allies, but now because his alliance is to Rasūlullāhﷺ, he was asking Allāh to not make him die until he sees a happy ending to the affair of Muslims and Banū Qurayzah, and Subhān’Allāh, Allāh made him be the person to rule among Banū Qurayzah; if you want to see a happy ending, then you be the one to choose it.

13.6.4 The Battle of Qurayzah is a Special Ghazwah

The Battle of Qurayzah is a special Ghazwah for the following reasons:

Commanded by Jibrīl: Number One: It was commanded by Jibrīl. Jibrīl came to Muhammadﷺ and said, “Go and fight Banū Qurayzah.”

Jibrīl Accompanied Muslims: Number Two: Jibrīl accompanied the Muslims. Anas Ibn Mālik says in Bukhārī, “It was as though I could see the dust rising in the street of Banū Ghanam due to the marching of Jibrīl’s troops when Rasūlullāhﷺ set out against Banū Qurayzah.” So Jibrīl went to fight against these Yahūd.

Execution of Banū Qurayzah a Command from Allāh Delivered on Tongue of Sa’d: Number Three: The execution of Banū Qurayzah was a command from Allāh delivered on the tongue of Sa’d. This was what Allāh wanted, this was the ruling that pleased Allāh. Even though it was a very strict [command], it was harsh, but this was what Allāh wanted. This shows you that this Ghazwah was a special Ghazwah, and this Ghazwah was the Ghazwah that drove out the last tribe of Yahūd in Madīnah.

13.6.5 Virtues of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh

[Following are] some virtues of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, this special man, this Sahābï:

Fulfillment of his Du‘ā’: Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was the head of Al-Aws. After the ruling was delivered on the Yahūd of Banū Qurayzah, the injury of Sa’d which was almost entirely healed, Subhān’Allāh, it again opened and it caused the death of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh. So the Du‘ā’ of Sa’d was fulfilled. Number one, there was no more fighting with Quraish, number two, he died as a Shahīd because of his wound, number three, he saw a happy ending to the affair of Banū Qurayzah.

Only Man for whom Rasūlullāhﷺ Told Sahābah to Stand Up: Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Qūmū Ilā Sayyidikum – Stand up for your master.” So Rasūlullāhﷺ called him master, and he is the only man whom we know that Rasūlullāhﷺ told the Sahābah to stand up for; that is one of his virtues.

Angels Rushing Towards Sa’d: When Rasūlullāhﷺ heard the news of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh dying, he rushed towards him with the Sahābah and he told them to come along with him and he was walking so fast [that] the shoes of the Sahābah were tearing and their garments were falling down, so they complained to Rasūlullāhﷺ about it [and] Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Innī Akhāfu An Tasbīqanal Malā’ikah Fatughassilu Kamā Ghasalat Hanzalah – Iam afraid that the angels willreach there before us.” So the angels were rushing to go towards Sa’d; that is another of his virtues.

‘Every Mourner is Exaggerating Except for the Mother of Sa’d’: When he died, the mother of Sa’d was weeping, she was mourning on her son. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Every mourner is exaggerating except for the mother of Sa’d.” You have a reason to cry, you have a reason to mourn the death of Sa’d, because he was such a Muslim – Kullunā Yaha Takdhib Illā Ummu Sa’d.

Angels whose First Visit to Dunyā was to Participate in the Funeral of Sa’d: When they carried the Janāzah of Sa’d, it was so light, so they went to Rasūlullāhﷺ and they said that it was so light, it was as if it was empty [and] his body was not there. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “And why should it not be light when angels that never came down to Dunyā came down to participate in carrying the Janāzah of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh?” Angels who never came down to Dunyā, came down specially to participate in the funeral of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, and they were carrying his body alongside the Sahābah. This is such a great Sahābï.

Throne of Allāh Shook because of the Death of Sa’d: And the greatest – the greatest – virtue of all, a virtue that we did not hear attributed to any Sahābï other than him, was the virtue that was mentioned by Rasūlullāhﷺ in Sahīh Muslim, Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Ihtazza ‘Arshur Rahmāni Limawti Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh –The Throne of Allāh shook because of the death of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh.” The Throne of Allāh, the Creator of the universe, moved, it was shaking! Why? Because of the death of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh. This is how great Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh was. And some of the scholars say that the reason why the Throne of Allāh shook was because of the commotion that was caused among the angels who are carrying the Throne of Allāh; when they knew that Sa’d died, commotion sort of occurred and that caused the Throne of Allāh to shake. That was Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh.

The Handkerchiefs of Sa’d in Jannah: Rasūlullāhﷺ never forgot about Sa’d; even after he died he would still remember him. One day Rasūlullāhﷺ received gifts, he received some pieces of cloths that the Sahābah never ever saw the likes of those pieces of cloths, probably they were garments of silver. So the Sahābah were holding this cloth, every one of them wanted to touch it, they wanted to touch this beautiful fabric, they were so impressed with it. Rasūlullāhﷺ saw this crowd taking a look at this piece of cloth so he said, “Ata’jabūna Min Līni Hādhih? –Are you amazed at how soft this cloth is?” They said, “Yes.” Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Lamānādīlu Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādhin Fil Jannah Khairum Minhā Wa Alyan –The handkerchiefs of Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh in Jannah are softer and better than this cloth.” The handkerchiefs – not the garment – the tissues, the handkerchiefs of Sa’d in Jannah are better than this.

Earth Squeezed Even the Body of Sa’d: Now, with all of these virtues of Sa’d, with the special status of Sa’d, when they were burying Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh, when they lowered his body into the grave, and when they were covering his body, Rasūlullāhﷺ was standing right on top of the grave, and suddenly his face changed, and then he said Subhān’Allāh three times, “Subhān’Allāh. Subhān’Allāh. Subhān’Allāh.” The Sahābah repeated the Subhān’Allāh after him, it says that you could hear the voices in Al-Baqī’, in the cemetery, they were saying Subhān’Allāh. And then the face of Rasūlullāhﷺ returned to usual and he said, “Allāhu Akbar! Allāhu Akbar! Allāhu Akbar!” They asked Rasūlullāhﷺ, “Why did you say that, why did you make Tasbīh and then you made Takbīr?” Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “The earth squeezed the body of Sa’d, and if there was going to be anyone who would be spared of that suffering of the squeezing of the grave, it would have been Sa’d. And then the earth released itself.” So the earth would squeeze in the body of a person when he is buried, and Rasūlullāhﷺ was worried when he saw that and he said Subhān’Allāh and his face changed, he was feeling sorry for Sa’d, but then when the earth released the body of Sa’d, Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Allāhu Akbar.” So dear brothers and sisters, we ask Allāh to spare us from the punishment of the grave. We ask Allāh to make our time in the graves times of blessing, of Ni’mah,because the righteous servant of Allāh will see his place in Jannah, we ask Allāh to make us of those. We ask Allāh to spare us from the Fitan; you have Sakarātul Mawt and you have the Fitnah of Al-Qabr, we ask Allāh to save us from all of those.

A Young Man who Gives Up Prime of his Life to the Service of Islām: This was the great Sahābï, Sa’d Ibn Mu‘ādh. He was the head of Al-Aws. How old was he when he died? 37 years old, meaning that when Rasūlullāh made Hijrah, he was 30 years old, and he became Muslim before that. So here you have a young man giving his prime life to the service of Rasūlullāhﷺ until he died for the sake of Islām. This is the meaning of Nusrah,giving Nusrah to the Religion, giving support to the Religion. It is not that you stay home laid back, attend the Islāmic conferences in the five-star hotels, go to your mosque comfortable, driving in an air-conditioned car in summer and using the heater when it is winter, and then you think that you have done the best that you could do for the Religion of Allāh, without suffering a bit, without spending a dime, without shedding a drop of blood. That was not how the Ansār did it, that was not their understanding of Religion; they spared nothing for the sake of serving Allāh and His Messenger Muhammadﷺ, and that was why they deserved to be called Al-Ansār.

13.6.6 Conclusion of First Stage of Madīnah

Dear brothers and sisters, after the Battle of the Trench, Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Al’āna Naghzūhum Walā Yaghzūnā – From now on we will attack them and they will not attack us.” So the Battle of the Trench was the turning point in the life of Rasūlullāhﷺ, it represented the move from the stage of defensive Jihād to the stage of offensive Jihād. Rasūlullāhﷺ said [that] from now on they will not attack us, we will be the ones to attack them. So we are done with the first stage of Madīnah, and that is the stage of Jihādud Daf’ –The Defensive Fighting Fee Sabeelillāh, and the following stage is the stage of offensive Jihād Fee Sabeelillāh.

We ask Allāh to accept from us our deeds, we ask Allāh to make us of those who understand the Sunnah of Rasūlullāhﷺ and follow it, we ask Allāh to make us of those who will give support – Nusrah, to His Religion.

This is our last session in the first part of Madīnah. Our Lord, give us in this world that which is good, and in the Hereafter that which is good, and protect us from the punishment of the Fire. Al-Baqarah: 201 We ask Allāh to reward us with Jannah and to save us from Hellfire.

MADĪNAN PERIOD STAGE TWO

13.7 Events between the Battle of the Trench and Al-Hudaybiyyah

13.7.1 A Turning Point in Islāmic History for the Islāmic State

When the armies disbanded after the Battle of the Trench, the Messenger of Allāhﷺ said, “Now we will attack them, they will not attack us – Al’āna Naghzūhum Walā Yaghzūnā.” This marked a turning point in the Islāmic history of the new founded State. For the past five years the Muslims were engaged in a defensive battle with Quraish, a defensive battle for survival; now the tables are turned, it is Quraish that will be struggling to survive, it will be Quraish who will now be on the defensive. Quraish are the ones who attacked the Muslims in Badr, it was Quraish who attacked in Uhud, it was Quraish who attacked in Al-Khandaq, and that was their last attempt. That was not because they were having a change of heart, or because they were now somehow becoming more sympathetic of the Muslims, it was simply because they were exhausted, they could not carry on this fight any further; the Muslims have outdone them in patience and perseverance and they could not keep up with them. So Rasūlullāhﷺ would say, “A year from now,” as we will see when we talk about Al-Hudaybiyyah, “Yā Wayha Quraishin

Qad Anhakathukum Harb –Woe to Quraish, war has exhausted them.”

Allāh says in Sūrah Āl ‘Imrān in the last Āyah: Yā Ayyuhalladhīna Āmanusbirū Wa Sābirū Wa Rābitū Wattaqullāha La‘allakum Tuflihūn – O you who have believed, persevere and endure and remain stationed and fear Allāh that you may be successful. Āl ‘Imrān: 200

Isbirū means be patient. Sābirū in Arabic, in the science of what is called Sarf which looks at the make-up of the word, you see, it says Isbirū wa Sābirū. Isbirū Wa Sābirū both come from the same root word which is Sabr, but Isbirū is a command to be patient, so what is Sābirū? Sābirū is in what they call the Wazn of Mufā‘alah,it is patience between two parties. Soin Arabic for example you have Musāra‘ah, Mudārabah, Muqātalah; here the Fi’l – the verb, is not done by the individual but it is between two parties. So it is as if Allāh is telling us that even though you might be patient, but what if your enemy is more patient than you? You have to outdo them in patience. So you have in the Āyah two commands from Allāh; one of them is to be patient and the other one is to outdo your enemy in patience – Isbirū Wa Sābirū. And that is what the Muslims did and it paid off now; after Badr and Uhud and Khandaq, now it is Quraish who will be on the defensive becaue the Muslims wore them out, the Muslims tired them, and now Rasūlullāhﷺ is saying, “ Al’āna Naghzūhum Walā Yaghzūnā – Now we will conquer them, they will not conquer us.” We will attack them, they will not attack us.

Abū Sufyān was never again able to bring together an army to invade Madīnah; that was it, he had done his best to the extent that he was able, same with his people, his followers in Quraish; that was the best they could pull off, the 10,000 strong army in Khandaq. It was a failure in the end because of the supernatural events that occurred, the wind and the soldiers of Allāh, Wamā Ya’lamu Junūda Rabbika Illā Hū – And none knows the soldiers of your Lord except Him. Al-Muddaththir: 31

Only Allāh knows His soldiers, we do not know the soldiers of Allāh, anything can be a soldier of Allāh. Sometimes things that are blessings, things that are reasons for life, could be a soldier of Allāh, like water for example was a soldier of Allāh, it killed Fir‘aun, a mosquito killed Nimrūd, the earth swallowed up Qārūn, wind is a soldier of Allāh , it destroyed nations, thunderbolts. So anything in this universe can be a soldier of Allāh, we do not know soldiers of Allāh that are around us.

13.7.2 Muslims End Difficult Period of Defending their Existence and their Base

With this, the Muslims ended a very difficult period of defending their mere existence and holding on to their base. Even though we say that the establishment of the Islāmic State was with the Hijrah of Rasūlullāhﷺ, but those were very very difficult days. The initial years in Madīnah were years of fear, were years of hiding, were years of insecurity. We should not think that this was a flourishing strong Islāmic State, it was in a very difficult predicament; Quraish from one side, the Yahūd from the other, the Bedouins from a third – very difficult time on the Muslims. The Sahābah used to say, “We would sleep with our arms next to us.” We would not feel security. So these first five years were very difficult, but the Muslims held on strong, they had Sabr in Allāh. But now, the Muslims will move on to occupy new positions, the next five years are going to be years of expansion, the move from the defensive Jihād to the offensive one has taken place. In these next five years, dear brothers and sisters, we will see an exponential growth of Islām and some important events occurring. The key events which we will talk about Inshā’Allāhu Ta‘ālā – we ask Allāh to give us the ability to go through the remainder of the five years of Seerah and to make this beneficial, we ask Allāh  to give us beneficial knowledge, Allāhumma Innā Nas’aluka ‘Ilman Nāfi‘an Wa Na‘ūdhubika Min ‘Ilman Lā Yanfa’, OAllāh, we ask You for knowledge that is of benefit and we seek refuge in You from knowledge which does not benefit – these key events are going to be the Truce of Al-Hudaybiyyah in the sixth year of Hijrah, the Battle of Khaibar in the seventh year of Hijrah, the Battle of Mu’tah, the Opening of Makkah, the Battle of Hunain and At-Tā’if in the eighth year, and then the Battle of Tabūk and the Farewell Hajj in the ninth year, and finally, the greatest event of all, the greatest calamity that has ever befallen the Muslim Ummah, and that is the death of Rasūlullāhﷺ. Then we will cover various other smaller events in between.

13.7.3 Competition between Al-Aws and Al-Khazraj

Al-Aws Assassinate Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf: We will start with some events that happened between Al-Khandaq and Al-Hudaybiyyah within the fifth year of Hijrah. We talked in the previous set of lectures about the assassination of Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf, and we said that Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf was a Jewish leader, a very rich man, he held an important position among the people in Hijāz, and he was a very eloquent poet, and he used to use this poetry – and we talked about the importance of poetry in the days of Jāhiliyyah, it was the media of the day – and Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf would use this poetry of his to defame the Muslims and talk against Rasūlullāhﷺ. If one would read in the history of Jāhiliyyah in Arabia, one would see that a particular line of history would bring a ruin to a tribe, it would ruin their reputation, just like a documentary or a particular article in a big newspaper would do today, in fact, probably the effect of poetry was even greater. So one of the things Ka’b Ibn Al -Ashraf was doing was that he was even talking about the Muslim women, and Muslims then – and this should be the case with Muslims all the time – would stand up for the rights of Al-Muslimāt and defend Al-Muslimāt, and we know of many stories in our history of that occurring, for example, the battle against the Jewish tribe of Banū Qaynuqā’ in Madīnah was because of their attack on a Muslim woman when they uncovered her, and we know what happened with Al-Mu’tasim, the Muslim Khalīfah in Ad-Dawlah Al-‘Abbāsiyyah; when the woman called to him ‘Wā Mu’tasimā!’ when the Romans attacked, he mobilised an entire army to go and defend her. So Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf was speaking against Muslim women, and it is said that he spoke about Umm Al-Fadl, the wife of Al-‘Abbās Bin ‘Abdul Muttalib, the uncle of Rasūlullāhﷺ. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Man Lī Bi Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf Fa Innahū Qad Ādhallāha Wa Rasūluh? –Who will get rid of Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf because he has harmed Allāh and His Messenger?” Muhammad Ibn Maslamah volunteered for this special operation along with some other members of his tribe. What tribe was this? This tribe was Al- Aws. So it was Al-Aws who killed Ka’b Ibn Al-Ashraf. Now, as one of the descendants of Al-Ansār said in a narration mentioned by Ibn Kathīr, Al-Aws Wal-Khazraj were like two stallions competing in front of Rasūlullāhﷺ; whenever one clan would do something in service of Rasūlullāhﷺ, the other clan would not want them to take that advantage alone and would try to do something similar. Subhān’Allāh, we see that they had the spirit of competition, but it was not in Dunyā, it was not in who would be more successful in Dunyā, who would make more money, who would hold a higher position, as we see competition now in the material world, in the materialistic capitalistic world and way of life that the West is promoting. You know, the success philosophy in the West today, and the competition for success that the West is presenting to the world today, is a materialistic one, and it holds no value in the Islāmic view of things, because success in the W est is defined in purely materialistic terms, but the success in Islām is how close to Allāh you are. So a person could be totally unknown in Dunyā, he could be very poor, nevertheless he is very successful because he is close to Allāh , and a classical example that one could give of that is Uwais Al-Qarnī.

Uwais Al-Qarnī: Uwais Al -Qarnī was a person who was ambiguous; people did not know him, and when ‘Umar Ibn Al-Khattāb asked the delegation that came from the tribe of Uwais Al-Qarnī – the name of his tribe is Murād, it is a tribe in Yemen – when ‘Umar Ibn Al-Khattāb asked about him, the way they talked about him it was as if they were surprised [as to] why the Amīrul Mu’minīn, why the Khalīfah would ask about such a simple person [thinking] who is he? Who is Uwais Al-Qarnī? No one knew him except his relatives and the people who lived with him. And they saw him as a simple normal human being; he was not a leader of a Muslim army, he was not an Amīr of a Jamā‘ah, he was not a famous scholar or Imām, he was just a simple human being, but there was something in his heart that made him special, in fact he was so special that Rasūlullāhﷺ told the Sahābah, “When a delegation comes from Yemen from the tribe of Murād, there will be a man with them whose name is Uwais Al-Qarnī. If you see him, then ask him to ask Allāh to forgive you.” This man is so special that you should ask him for Du‘ā’; he was one of As-Sālihīn, one of the Awliyā’ of Allāh. And who was Rasūlullāhﷺ telling this to? He was telling it to the Sahābah, the greatest generation that ever lived. And Uwais Al-Qarnī is not a Sahābï, he is a Tābi‘ī, because he never saw Rasūlullāhﷺ. He wanted to make Hijrah to Rasūlullāhﷺ, but because his mother was alone and ill, he stayed behind with her, and Rasūlullāhﷺ passed away so he never had a chance to meet him, but Rasūlullāhﷺ knew him and talked about him. When ‘Umar Ibn Al-Khattāb met with Uwais Al-Qarnī, he told him, “Ask Allāh to forgive me.”

13.7.4 Al-Khazraj Assassinate Abū Rāfi’

Back to this competition; Al-Aws Wal-Khazraj would compete with each other. What was their competition about? It was about Ākhirah, [about] who would serve Rasūlullāhﷺ better, and in this case, it was because Al-Aws had the honour of assassinating Ka’b Ibn Al- Ashraf who would defame Rasūlullāhﷺ, and Khazraj did not want to be left out on this, they wanted to do something similar. So they had a meeting and they discussed the issue amongst themselves, and they came up with the name of Abū Rāfi’ as a good candidate for performing such an operation against, and they presented the idea to Rasūlullāhﷺ and Rasūlullāhﷺ approved it. ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq was the man appointed to lead this special operations group, one of Al-Khazraj, and they set out to infiltrate deep into the land of Khaibar. This was before the Battle of Khaibar, and Khaibar was the stronghold of the Jews, nevertheless, the courage of the Sahābah was to lead them deep into the land of Khaibar, and Abū Rāfi’ lived in a fortress of his, he was not living in a normal house, he was living in a palace and it was a fortress. So they marched out and they arrived at the gates of the fortress of Abū Rāfi’. Now, how would they get in? ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq played a trick against the Yahūd. In one narration – and there are two narrations of this in Bukhārī – it says that these Yahūd lost a donkey, so they opened the gates and some men came out to fetch out this donkey. ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq stood next to the wall, and then he sat down and covered himself as if he was responding to the call of nature, he was pretending in front of Al- Yahūd. So what they thought was that he came out of the fortress, because in those days they did not have their restrooms inside their dwellings, they would go outside, and they would go far away from their houses to respond to the call of nature. So they thought that he came out of the fortress to respond to the call of nature, so when they went in they said, “Yā ‘Abdallāh – O servant of Allāh, if you want to come in, then now is the time.” So he walked in normally; the trick that he played on them worked. So now he was inside the fortress while all of his companions were outside; he told them to wait outside for him. So now he was in. He hid in a donkey stall and he was observing the gatekeeper and was able to see where he would hide the keys. In one narration it says [that] they were hung on a wooden peg and in another narration it says that they were in an itch in the wall. ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq then said that the men went on to have dinner with Abū Rāfi’, so he remained in hiding until all of these men left and the lights were turned off. It was a very dark night, ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq went and fetched out the keys, and Subhān’Allāh all of the keys for the fortress were together, keys for the gates of the fortress and they keys for the palace of Abū Rāfi’ were all there. Now he had the keys with him, so he would open the doors and then he would lock them from inside, therefore if anyone came in to help Abū Rāfi’, he would find that the gates are closed and the keys are not there, so he would open every door and lock it. Now, this was a double-edged sword; yes it would prevent people from coming in to help him, but it would also hinder the escape of ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq, but this is what he did until he made it into the inner chambers of Abū Rāfi’. Now he is with Abū Rāfi’ in the same room and Abū Rāfi’ is asleep and the lights are turned off. Tayyib. How is he going to find out his location? He can see nothing. What did ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq do? He just called out, he said, “Abū Rāfi’.” Now, it takes a lot of courage to do such a thing! It is a terrifying thing to call out for someone in such a situation, but also on the other hand it was more terrifying for Abū Rāfi’ to hear this man calling him inside his room, inside his own bedroom. So ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq is calling [out], “Abū Rāfi’!” Abū Rāfi’ woke up and said, “Who are you?” ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq said, “So I struck with my sword at the source of the voice.” He could not see anything, he just called him, and the reason he did so was because he wanted the man to speak so he could recognise the source of the voice and attack it. So he struck with his sword at the source of the voice. He said, “Falam Ughnī ‘Anhu Shay’an – My blow was futile.” Yes he did hit him, but it was not an accurate enough strike, and obviously there is confusion in such a circumstance, so it did not kill him. Abū Rāfi’ yelled out for help, he screamed out. What did ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq do?

Ya’nī Māshā’Allāh, ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq had a very good response and intelligence on the spot, thinking on his feet. When Abū Rāfi’ called out for help, ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq retreated and then he came back changing his voice and said, “Abū Rāfi’, what do you need?” Abū Rāfi’ said, “Woe unto your mother! There is a man right here and he struck me with his sword!” So ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq struck him again, again at the source of the voice. Abū Rāfi’ called out for help again. ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq retreated another time, came in changing his voice and said, “Abū Rāfi’, what do you need?” He said, “Woe unto your mother! There is a man in here trying to kill me!” ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq said, “This time I came to him and he was lying on his back.” Now he was already struck with the sword two times, now he was lying on his back; still alive, but lying on his back. ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq said, “This time I thrust my sword into his stomach until I found out the bone and then I cracked it.” What bone are we talking about? He struck the spinal cord. So that was it, he said, “I heard the bone crack,” meaning that the man was dead. If the spine is broken then it is certain death. So now ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq said, “I retreated.”

Now, the inner chambers, this bedroom of Abū Rāfi’, was in the upper level, and there was a wooden ladder that would lead up to it. When ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq was coming down in this ladder or stairs, he said, “I came down, and in my confusion, I thought that I had hit the last step of the ladder when there was one more left.” So he fell down and he broke his leg. He said, “And then I made it out to my companions and told them that I had killed Abū Rāfi’.” But ‘Abdullāh Ibn ‘Atīq, Subhān’Allāh, still wanted to make sure, definitely, that he was dead, so he told his companions, “Go back and deliver the news to Rasūlullāhﷺ and I am going to hang behind and wait until I hear the announcement of his death.” Keep in mind that he had broken his leg. So he stayed behind and he heard the news of the death of Abū Rāfi’. In the narration of Ibn Is’hāq, he said, “I heard his wife come to Abū Rāfi’ and say, ‘Fādā Wa Ilāha Yahūd – He is dead, in the name of the God of the Jews.’” What did ‘Abdullāh Bin ‘Atīq say? And I want you to pay attention to his words, he said, “And I swear I never heard words sweeter to my ears than those.” And we will get back to this statement. Why was Abū Rāfi’ killed? Ibn Hajar says, “Abū Rāfi’ used to harm Rasūlullāhﷺ and assist against him. And Ibn ‘Ā’iz said that he was one of those who supported Ghatafān and other Polytheistic Arabs with money to fight Rasūlullāhﷺ.” So his support was financial support and also by word.

13.7.5 Assassination of Khālid Ibn Sufyān

Another event that happened within this period was the assassination of Khālid Ibn Sufyān Ibn Nabīhal Hudhalī329. Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Innahū Qad Balaghanī Anna Khālid Ibn Sufyān Ibn Nabīhinal Hudhalī Yajma‘a Liyannās Liyaghzūnī Wahuwa Bi ‘Uranah, Fa’tihī Faqtul – Ihave been informed that Khālid is gathering a force of men to attack me. He is at ‘Uranah, go to him and kill him.” Khālid Ibn Sufyān was an outstanding leader of his people, he was one of those charismatic figures who have the ability to mobilise men and to make out of nothing something, he was a successful leader. He belonged to the tribe of Hudhail; Hudhail are Bedouins in Hijāz, and they are famous for being very eloquent, Qālū Hudhail Ash‘arul ‘Arab –they were the best poets of the Arabs, and they lived on the outskirts of Makkah. Khālid Ibn Sufyān was mobilising men to fight Rasūlullāhﷺ. Here we were in a situation where the people were in need of a leader and the leader was Khālid Ibn Sufyān. So Rasūlullāhﷺ did not see the need to fight his army but to pre-emptively attack and get rid of Khālid Ibn Sufyān, because if he does so, he would avoid a lot of bloodshed; if Khālid Ibn Sufyān is out of the arena Hudhail are not going to fight him, unlike with Quraish; the fight with Quraish did not depend on leadership, the people of Quraish were going to fight regardless. When Abū Jahl was there they fought, and after he was killed they carried on the fighting, in fact the fight only became worse after Abū Jahl was killed, but here, the situation was different. So we find that Rasūlullāhﷺ never targeted the leadership of Quraish with special operations to assassinate them, but he did this with some of the leaders of Al-Yahūd, and he did it also with Khālid Ibn Sufyān because this is going to avoid killing other people, it is going to prevent a larger battle escalating and more war happening.

So Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “Go and get rid of Khālid Ibn Sufyān.” ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais never met Khālid Ibn Sufyān Al-Hudhalī in his life, so he asked Rasūlullāhﷺ, “How can I recognise him? Give me a sign.” Rasūlullāh told him, “Idhā Ra’aytahū Shārata Lahū Qash‘arīrā – When you see him, you will shiver.” Now Allāhu A’lam, was this shiver because Khālid Ibn Sufyān had such a great presence or was it going to be a special sign just then for ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais to recognise him? Allāhu A’lam, but regardless, Khālid Ibn Sufyān was a special individual. ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais moved out – he was alone, an army of his own; this is the courage that the Sahābah had – and he was going to travel deep into enemy territory in ‘Urunah, next to Makkah. So he made it there and he found out the location of the army camp where Khālid Ibn Sufyān is gathering the men. He saw him and he felt a shiver, the sign that Rasūlullāhﷺ mentioned, and ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais said, “I never shivered from anyone in my life.” This was the first time that he ever felt such a shiver. It was time for Salātul ‘Asr, and ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais said, “Fa Khashītū An Takūna Baynī Wa Baynahū Mujāwalah Tamna’nī Minas Salāh – Ifeared that there might be a conflict between me and him that would prevent me from Salāh.” Meaning this conflict could take time and he would not be able to pray. So what did he do? He prayed while he was walking towards his target. “Wa Kuntu Ūmi’u Lirrukū‘i Was -Sujūd Bi Ra’sī –And Iwould make Sujūd and Rukū’ by movements of my head.” So he walked up to him and greeted him. Khālid Ibn Sufyān said, “Man Ar-Rajul? – Who is the man?” He said, “Ana Rajulun Minal ‘Arab Sami‘a Bika Wa Bi Jam‘ika Li Hādhar Rajul – Iam a man from amongst the Arabs who heard about you and you gathering a force for this man.” He said, “Ana Fī Dhālik – That is what I am doing.” He said, “I came to follow you.” So then he held a conversation with him to break the ice, and when Khālid Ibn Sufyān was comfortable with ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais and the opportune moment arrived, ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais struck Khālid Ibn Sufyān and killed him. He walked away and he said, “Taraktuhū – I left him with his women crouched over him.” Rasūlullāhﷺ greeted ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais by saying, “Aflahal Wajh – May your face be successful.” ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais said, “Wa Aflaha Wajhaka Yā Rasūlullāh – May your face be successful too, O Rasūlullāh.”

And then Rasūlullāhﷺ took him into his house and gave him a stick. ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais walked out without saying a word. Now, what was the stick for? Why did Rasūlullāhﷺ give it to him? What is he going to do with it? ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais dared not to ask. You see, they were very shy in dealing with Rasūlullāhﷺ, so he just walked out without saying a word. This was the gift that Rasūlullāhﷺ gave him – a stick. So his people asked him, “What is this stick?” He said, “Rasūlullāh gave it to me.” “Why did he give it to you?” He said, “I do not know.” They said, “Go back and ask him.” He went back to Rasūlullāhﷺ and asked, “O Rasūlullāh, why did you give me this stick?” He said, “Āyatan Takūnu Baynī Wa Baynaka Yawmal Qiyāmah, Inna Aqallannāsi Yawma Idhin Al-Mutakhassirūn –This is a sign between me and you on the Day of Judgement, there will be very few that day with something to lean upon.” Rasūlullāhﷺ gave him this stick as a gift so that on the Day of Judgement it would be a sign between him and Rasūlullāhﷺ. ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais coupled that stick with his sword, he kept it with his sword, and then in his will he asked that the stick be buried with him. So it was put inside his coffin with him so that on the Day of Judgement when he is resurrected, he will pick up that stick and go to Rasūlullāhﷺ and it will be a sign between him and Rasūlullāhﷺ on that very difficult day when there will be very few people with something to lean upon, and this Riwāyah is in Musnad Al-Imām Ahmad.

13.7.6 Importance of Salāh

One important lesson, brothers and sisters, from this story; the importance of Salāh. The thing that concerned ‘Abdullāh Bin Unais when he was walking towards Khālid Ibn Sufyān was Salātul ‘Asr, and the thing that concerned the Sahābah when Rasūlullāhﷺ was talking to them about the signs of the end of time, when he was talking about Ad-Dajjāl and that one day of Ad-Dajjāl will be like a year, what did the Sahābah say? How is that explained physically? Can you give us the astronomical explanation of how that is possible? What did they say? They said, “Hal Takfīna Fīhi Salāta Yawm? – Is it enough for us to pray in that day the five daily Prayers?” [Meaning] prayers of one day. They were thinking about Salāh. And ‘Abdullāh Bin Unais, in this life and death situation, in this confusing situation [where] a person in that situation would be perplexed, and as we just said that his body shivered when he saw this man, but Salāh, Salāh, Salāh; he prayed walking towards him.

Brothers and sisters, there is no excuse in leaving Salāh. If you do not have money, you are excused from paying Zakāh, if you are ill, you are excused from fasting and you can pay a Fidyah instead, if you do not have the financial ability and the road to Hajj is not safe, you do not have to make Hajj, but there is no situation in which a Muslim is excused from Salāh; even in the battlefield we have to pray and we are given the Fiqh of it in Salātul Khawf. In fact, the Sahābah considered Salāh to be so important [that] ‘Umar Ibn Al-Khattāb used to say that if a Muslim leaves one Salāh intentionally then he has disbelieved. We know that after that the ‘Ulamā’ discussed the issue of the Kufr of Tārik As-Salāh, [of] whether the one who leaves Salāh is Kāfir or not, and one can go back to the books of Fiqh to see what they said about that; it is the opinion of Imām Ahmad that if a person leaves it out of laziness then he is a Kāfir, while the other ‘Ulamā’ said that a Muslim is Kāfir only if he leaves it intentionally. Anyway, this is not the place to discuss the issue, but it is very important, it is the most important ‘Ibādah, so we should never dismiss our Salāh. And for those Muslims [who] because of their employment leave for example Salātul Jumu‘ah, or they leave some Salawāt, we say to them Ittaqullāh – fear Allāh. ‘Abdullāh Ibn Unais, in this situation that is more important than your employment, more dangerous than your situation, he did not leave Salāh, so we should never leave Salāh.

13.8 Marriage of Rasūlullāhﷺ to Zainab Bint Jahsh

Rasūlullāhﷺ Marries Zainab to his Adopted Son Zayd Bin Hārithah: The next event that happened within this period is regarding Zainab Bint Jahsh. Zainab Bint Jahsh , Al- Azdiyyah, from Quraish, she was the sister of ‘Abdullāh Ibn Jahsh – and we talked about his story in the earlier lectures – and her mother is Umaimah Bint ‘Abdul Muttalib, the sister of Hamzah, so her mother is the aunt of Rasūlullāhﷺ which makes her his cousin. Rasūlullāhﷺ visited Zainab Bint Jahsh and he proposed to her marriage to his adopted son Zayd Bin Hārithah. Zayd Bin Hārithah was a slave, and he was asking Zainab Bint Jahsh, who comes from the nobility of Quraish, to marry a slave. Rasūlullāhﷺ wanted to break the barriers of discrimination and racism that existed, and he wanted to start [this] among his own family and asked that Zayd Bin Hārithah marry his own cousin Zainab Bint Jahsh. She said no. He said, “Yes, you will marry him.” She said, “O Messenger of Allāh, let me think about it.” And while they were talking, the Āyah was revelead: It is not for a Believing man or a Believing woman, when Allāh and His Messenger have decided a matter, that they should [thereafter] have any choice about their affair. And whoever disobeys Allāh and His Messenger has certainly strayed into clear error. Al-Ahzāb: 36

If our desires are contrary to something that Rasūlullāh wants us to do, we still do what Rasūlullāhﷺ wants us to do, and it is important that we do not follow our whims and desires but we follow the Sunnah of Rasūlullāhﷺ. What excuse do we have in not following his Sunnah? What excuse do we have in not following the Law of Allāh? Just because we did not like it? Just because it did not suit our Hawā – our whims and desires? We are slaves of Allāh and we are followers of Muhammadﷺ, and whatever we are told to do, we do; it is not up to us. So when this Āyah was revealed, Zainab Bint Jahsh said, “Lā A’sī Rasūlullāh Wa Qad Zawwajtahū Nafsī – Iwill not disobey Rasūlullāhﷺ and I marry him myself.”

Rasūlullāhﷺ Marries Zainab after her Divorce: But Subhān’Allāh, things did not work out, there was no compatibility, [and] after a year they were divorced. Zayd Ibn Hārithah was coming to Rasūlullāhﷺ and complaining about his wife, he was not happy with her and she was not happy with him, but Rasūlullāhﷺ would tell him, “Ittaqillāha Wamsik ‘Alaika Zawjak – Fear Allāh and keep your wife.” But things just could not continue on so divorce was a must and the marriage was ended after a year. And then Rasūlullāhﷺ married her and that caused a storm of talk against Rasūlullāhﷺ. In Arabia, it was a no-no for a man to marry the wife of his adopted son. Adoption was serious then; this is before it was made Harām in Islām. So Rasūlullāhﷺ adopted Zayd and he was called Zayd Ibn Muhammad, so now all of the rules of Sharī‘ah that apply between a son and his father applied between Muhammadﷺ and his son Zayd, and one of the rules that existed in those days was that a man could never marry the wife of his adopted son. So Allāh wanted to break this tradition among the Arabs, and what better way to do so than Rasūlullāhﷺ breaking that rule himself? It carries more weight when Rasūlullāhﷺ does it than when he speaks about it. So now Rasūlullāhﷺ married Zainab Bint Jahsh. There were two rulings here; the first ruling is that there is no more adoption, and the second ruling is that a man can marry the wife of his formerly adopted son. Allāh says: Allāh has not made for a man two hearts in his interior. And He has not made your wives whom you declare unlawful your mothers. And he has not made your adopted sons your [true] sons. That is [merely] your saying by your mouths, but Allāh says the truth, and He guides to the [right] way. Call them by [the names of] their fathers; it is more just in the sight of Allāh. But if you do not know their fathers – then they are [still] your brothers in religion and those entrusted to you. And there is no blame upon you for that in which you have erred but [only for] what your hearts intended. And ever is Allāh Forgiving and Merciful. Al-Ahzāb: 4-5

Now, I just want to make a clarification here; what is meant by adoption here is not the meaning that we know of adoption today where you adopt an orphan; no, that is something very good to do, it is very rewardable, Rasūlullāhﷺ says, “Ana Wa Kāfil Yatīm Kahātaini Fil Jannah – I will be a neighbour of the one who sponsors the orphan.” The adoption that is not allowed in Islām is where the adopted son or daughter carries the family name of the ones who adopt him. In Islām, we must carry the names of our ancestors and not carry the names of the ones who have adopted us. So this is just a clarification, because the word adoption in English might carry a different meaning.

Zainab Bint Jahsh was a Righteous Woman: Zainab Bint Jahsh was a very righteous woman, in fact, amongst the wives of Rasūlullāhﷺ, she held a very important status with Rasūlullāhﷺ. ‘Ā’ishah says, “None of the wives of Rasūlullāhﷺ used to compete with me in my status with Rasūlullāhﷺ but Zainab.” And Rasūlullāhﷺ said about her, “Asra‘a Kunnā Lihāqam Bī Atwala Kunnā Yadā – The fastest among you to die after me will be the one of you with the longest arm.” So ‘Ā’ishah used to say, “We the wives of Rasūlullāhﷺ would measure our arms to see who has the longest arm.” But they did not understand what Rasūlullāhﷺ meant; what he means by ‘longest arm’ is not literally [the longest arm], but it means the one who gives out Sadaqah the most, and that was Zainab Bint Jahsh and she was the one who died the fastest amongst the wives of Rasūlullāhﷺ after Rasūlullāhﷺ passed away. ‘Ā’ishah said about her, “I have never seen a woman better than her in her religion, [nor a woman] more fearful of Allāh than her, [nor a woman] more truthful in her speech, [nor a woman] more attentive to the family relationships than her, and I have never seen a woman who used to give more Sadaqah than her, and she would give herself totally to the deed that she would be doing, and the only thing with her was that she had a temper, but she would very soon come back to her normal state.” .

Marriage of Rasūlullāhﷺ to Zainab Has Been a Point of Controversy with Kuffār: This marriage of Rasūlullāhﷺ to Zainab has been a point of controversy with the Kuffār, they try to use it as an attacking point against Rasūlullāhﷺ. And it is interesting to see that there are two particular marriages that the Kuffār speak about the most, and that is the marriage to ‘Ā’ishah because of her young age and the marriage to Zainab because they surrounded it with many tales and legends. And it is interesting to see that these are the particular two marriages that were commanded by Allāh , because Zainab Bint Jahsh would say to the other wives of Rasūlullāhﷺ, “You were married by your parents while I was married by Allāh from on top of the seven heavens,” because Allāh  says in Qur’ān: Zawwajnākahā – We married her to you. Al-Ahzāb: 37

Sowhen Rasūlullāhﷺ was married to ‘Ā’ishah, there was no ‘Aqd or anything, he just walked into her room because the marriage was performed by Allāh , and with ‘Ā’ishah  it happened because he had seen her in a dream, and we know that the dreams of the Ambiyā’ are Wahī. So that is the marriage of Rasūlullāhﷺ to Zainab.

Also in this period, Rasūlullāhﷺ married Habībah Bint Abī Sufyān, the daughter of Abū Sufyān. She was in Al- Habashah at the time, she was with the Muhājirīn in Abyssinia, and her husband ‘Ubaydillāh Ibn Jahsh, Subhān’Allāh, he was one of the Muhājirīn but he had a change of heart, he was deceived by Shaitān, he became a Murtadd and became a Christian, and he used to make fun of the Muslims and say, “You are looking with half of your eyes open while I have seen the light.” He was referring to Christianity. He died as a Murtadd. After he passed away, Rasūlullāhﷺ sent ‘Amr Bin Umayyah Ad-Damrī to An-Najāshī to marry him to Habībah Bint Abī Sufyān, and the marriage was performed. The Walī of Habībah was her cousin Khālid Bin Sa‘eed Bin Al-‘Aas, and the representative of Rasūlullāh in performing the contract was An-Najāshī. And by this, Umm Habībah became Umm Al-Mu’minīn, and Mu‘āwiyah became the Uncle of Al-Mu’minīn because he is her brother. Radiyallāhu ‘Anhu Wa ‘Anhā Wa Ardullāhu ‘Azza Wa Jall Jamī’ As-Sahābah.

Ghazwat Dhī Qarad and Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’: This is our second session of the Madīnah Series Stage Two, we are talking about the last five years of Rasūlullāhﷺ in Madīnah. We talked last session about some events that occurred between Al-Khandaq and Ghazwat Al-Hudaybiyyah, so we carry on now. We are in the sixth year of Hijrah, and Ibn Kathīr starts this year with mentioning Ghazwat Dhī Qarad or Ghazwat Al-Ghābah. This story has been mentioned by Al-Bukhārī, Muslim, Al-Imām Ahmad, and also Ibn Is’hāq mentioned it, so there are various narrations for this story, and I will read to you the one by Imām Ahmad which is here in [the book of] Ibn Kathīr, and I will translate it as I read it. Tayyib.

Al-Imām Ahmad narrates from Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’ that he along with one of the slaves of Rasūlullāhﷺ, Rabāh, went out of Madīnah for the camels to graze, and it mentions in another narration, I believe it is by Al-Wāqidī, that they used to take them first to a place called Bayād and then that place ran out of pasture so they had to move further on to a place called Al-Ghābah in order for the camels to graze. Salamah was not with the camels of Rasūlullāhﷺ, he was not appointed shepherd, it was Rabāh who was the shepherd, but Salamah went out because he had the horse of Talhah Bin ‘Ubaydillāh; Talhah Bin ‘Ubaydillāh is one of Al-Muhājirīn, one of the 10 who are given the glad-tidings of Jannah, and Salamah Bin Al-Akwa’ is also a Muhājir although he is not from Quraish. You see, you have Muhājirīn and Ansār; who are Al-Ansār? Al-Ansār are Al-Aws Wal-Khazraj – that is it, there is no other Ansār. [So] Al-Ansār are two tribes, two tribes make up Al-Ansār, it is only these two tribes, it is Al-Aws and Al-Khazraj. And these two tribes are brethren in terms of genealogy, Fī Shajaratin Nasb – they are from the same descendants of Al-Azd. And Al-Muhājirūn were everyone else who made Hijrah to Madīnah. The most important group Al-Muhājirīn obviously are Quraish, the tribe of Rasūlullāhﷺ, so Abū Bakr, ‘Umar, Talhah Bin ‘Ubaydillāh, Sa’d Ibn Abī Waqqās, Abū ‘Ubaidah, ‘Amr Ibn Al-Jarrah, Sa‘eed Bin Zayd; all of these are from the Muhājirīn from Makkah. But then you had Muhājirīn from other tribes also, you had [Muhājirīn] from Banū Sulaim, you had [Muhājirīn] from Ghifār, for example Abū Dharr Al-Ghifārī – Ghifār are Bedouin tribes in Hijāz, and Abū Dharr Al-Ghifārī was a Muhājir from there – then you have Abū Mūsā Al-Ash‘arī who is also considered a Muhājir, he came from Yemen. So all of these people who came from outside Madīnah are called Muhājirīn.

So Salamah Bin Al-Akwa’ is a Muhājir but he is not from Quraish. He was serving some of the other Sahābah, he was working for Talhah Bin ‘Ubaidillāh; he would take out his horse for it to go out and graze on the pasture outside of Al-Madīnah. And they had to leave early in the day; in another narration it says that they left before Fajr, before the first Adhān, so very early on in the day they had to go out. Regarding the camels of Rasūlullāhﷺ, they would leave early in the day and they would come back at the time of Maghrib, and then they would milk them and have their dinner. When it was Ghalas – Ghalas is the time of Fajr but [when] it is still dark – ‘Abdur Rahmān Ibn ‘Uyaynah, and these were from the tribe of Ghatafān, they attacked and they stole the camels of Rasūlullāhﷺ and they killed the shepherd. Salamah said, “So I told Rabāh, ‘Take this horse and go back to Madīnah and deliver it to Talhah Bin ‘Ubaidillāh, and let Rasūlullāhﷺ know that his camels have been taken away.’” Salamah, rather than taking the horse himself, he gave it to Rabāh in order to take it back to Madīnah and he depended on his legs, he was a very fast runner. He wanted the news to get back to Madīnah very fast so he sent Rabāh with his horse, but he himself climbed over a small mountain or on top of a hill and then he cried, “Wā Subāhā! Wā Subāhā! Wā Subāhā!” three times. Wā Subāhā is the call of emergency, it is like 911; when there is something urgent, when there is an emergency, that is what you say, and it is especially said when an army has attacked, you say Wā Subāhā, and that is the call that Rasūlullāhﷺ made when he wanted to announce to the people of Quraish the Message. So when a person calls [out] Wā Subāhā, people were definitely going to come and listen to him. Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’ stood on the mountain, on this hill, and he called, “Wā Subāhā!” and his voice was heard in Madīnah, and when the men heard his call, that is when they were saying, “Yā Khailallāhil Kabi!” And this was the first time this slogan was used, “Yā Khailallāhil Kabi! – O horses of Allāh, ride on!” The Sahābah responded to the call very fast and they came rushing towards Rasūlullāh when they heard the call of Salamah.

Now, Salamah himself after that followed ‘Abdur Rahmān Bin ‘Uyaynah and he said, “I had with me my sword and my bow and arrow, and I would shoot at them and I would kill their horses.” He would target the horses and kill them. “And I would do that when there would be a lot of trees.” Because he could ambush them and he could also take a position of hiding that would protect him. He said, “I would shoot them when I would be in between trees, and whenever one of their horsemen would come back to me, I would hide for him behind a tree and I would shoot at him while I would call out to them the battle-cry of ‘Khudh’hā Wa Ana Ibnul Akwa’, Wal Yawmu Yawmur Rudda’” This is a line of poetry that he made, it means ‘Take it, Iam the son of Al-Akwa’, today the wicked will die’, and he would repeat on this battle-cry again and again. He said, “When I would be in the trees, I would burn them with my arrows, and if we came through mountain passes (narrow trails in the mountain), I would climb on top of them and throw them with rocks.” So Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’ was driving these men crazy; he is alone and he is fighting this entire group of men. So first of all he is alone and they are a large group, number two, he was on foot and they were on horseback. But Salamah was courageous and he was fast and he was a good archer, and the most important of all he was a Mu’min. He said, “Everything that they had taken away I left it behind my back.” These men were running away from Salamah, and to make themselves light and faster in running away from him, they left behind the camels and then they in fact started leaving behind some of their own belongings, it says in one narration that they left behind them 30 spears and 30 cloaks – Burad. They had to leave all of this behind them to lighten their weight, and whenever Salamah would come across something they would leave, he would put some stones on top of it to mark its location.

[He continues,] “And then they received reinforcements from ‘Uyaynah Bin Badr Al-Fazālī. He came to them and they were in a narrow mountain pass, so I climbed on top of them. And then ‘Uyaynah said, ‘What is this that I see?’ They said, ‘We have seen such a difficult time from this man! He has not left us since early in the day until this moment, and he has taken everything away from us!’” ‘Uyaynah told them, “If this man sees that you are pursuing him [then] he would not follow you,” meaning why are you leaving him alone? You are the ones who are giving him that chance, “but pursue him and he will leave you alone.” So four of them, at the command of ‘Uyaynah, started climbing up the mountain to go up to Salamah. They started climbing the mountain until they were in his voice-range, then Salamah asked them, “Do you know who I am?” They said, “No.” He said, “I am the son of Al-Akwa’. In the name of the One who has honoured the face of Muhammadﷺ, none of you would follow me and reach me, and none of you whom I follow will escape me.” If you try to chase me, if you try to get me, you will not be able to, but if I pursue you, I would hunt you down. One of them said, “I think he is right,” and then they descended!

[Salamah said,] “At that time I started seeing the knights of Rasūlullāhﷺ approaching, I could see them between the trees. The first among them was Al-Akhram Al- Azdī, and following him was Abū Qatādah, the Fāris of Rasūlullāhﷺ – the knight of Rasūlullāh. And after Abū Qatādah was Al-Maqdād Ibn Al-Aswad. When the Polytheists saw that, they ran away. The first was Al-Akhram Al-Azdī, so I came down and I held on to the reigns of his horse and I told him, “O Akhram, be careful from them, because I fear that they will cut you off.” Al -Akhram was ahead of the rest and he was alone, and Salamah wanted to warn him that if you carry on pursuing the Kuffār alone and you do not wait for the rest of the Muslims to follow, they would cut you off and surround you. What was the response of Al-Akhram Al-Azdī? He said, “Yā Salamah, In Kunta Tu’minu Billāhi Wal Yawmil Ākhir, Wa Ta’lam Annal Jannata Haqq Wan Nār Haqq, Falā Tahul Baynī Wa Baynash Shahādah – OSalamah, if you believe in Allāh and the Last Day, and you believe that Jannah is true and An- Nār is true, then do not stand between me and martyrdom.” Allāhu Akbar, look at the love that Al-Akhram had for meeting Allāh, he wanted to meet Allāh as a Shahīd. Salamah said, “I let him. So he pursued ‘Abdur Rahmān Ibn ‘Uyaynah and ‘Uyaynah turned around to face him. Each one of them stabbed the other; Al-Akhram stabbed the horse of ‘Abdur Rahmān, but ‘Abdur Rahmān stabbed him and killed him.” So now the horse of ‘Abdur Rahmān was killed and Al-Akhram was killed, so ‘Abdur Rahmān now took over the horse of Al-Akhram. Then the opposite happened; Qatādah attacked ‘Abdur Rahmān, and in this case it was ‘Abdur Rahmān who stabbed the horse of Qatādah and killed it while Qatādah stabbed ‘Abdur Rahmān and killed him, so now he took over the horse that ‘Abdur Rahmān had which was originally the horse of Al-Akhram.

This is amazing here, Salamah said, “And now I started running after the enemies of Allāh until I could not see from the dust of the Companions of Rasūlullāh a thing.” All of the horsemen of Rasūlullāhﷺ were now behind Salamah while Salamah was running on foot. “Now it was almost Maghrib time, sunset, and they reached to a valley that had some water in it, it is called Dhū Qarad, and they wanted to drink from that water, but when they saw me running after them pursuing them, they left it and they started running up the hills. And now the sun had set so I followed one of them and I struck him with an arrow and I told him, ‘Khudh’hā Wa Ana Ibnul Akwa’! Wal Yawmu Yawmur Rudda’! –Take it! Iam the son of Al-Akwa’, today the wicked will die!’” What did that man say? He said, “Woe to your mother! Are you the Akwa’ of this morning?!” Meaning, are you the same man who has been following us since the beginning of the day?! He continues, “I said, ‘Yes, you enemy of yourself!’ And this happened to be a man whom I had already struck with an arrow in the morning so now he had two arrows sticking out of him.” He said, “They left behind them two horses, so I took them over, and now I went back to Rasūlullāhﷺ and I found them sitting on the same water that was in this valley that the Mushrikīn wanted to drink from, and I found Rasūlullāhﷺ with 500 men, and Bilāl was slaughtering for them one of the camels that I had left behind me, and he was roasting part of its liver, and I came to Rasūlullāhﷺ and told him, ‘O Rasūlullāh, let me choose 100 from amongst your men, and I would pursue with them the Kuffār until we leave none of them alive.’ He said, ‘Would you do so O Salamah?’ I said, ‘Yes, in the name of Allāh who has honoured you.’ Rasūlullāhﷺ laughed until I saw his teeth from the light of the fire. [Then he said,] ‘Now they are already being fed in the land of Ghatafān.’” They passed by a certain man from Ghatafān so he slaughtered for them a camel, and when they started skinning the camel they saw some dust, so they left it and ran away. They thought this was Rasūlullāhﷺ and his Companions, so they did not even enjoy their meal.

“The next morning, Rasūlullāhﷺ said, ‘The best of our horsemen today is Abū Qatādah and the best of our foot- soldiers is Salamah.’ Rasūlullāhﷺ gave me spoils of war equal to that of a knight and a foot-soldier together, and he had me ride with him on his camel Al-‘Adbā when we were going back to Madīnah. When we were around half a day distance from Al-Madīnah, amongst us was a man from Al -Ansār who was not defeated in racing, he would call out, ‘Is there anyone who would race me?’” This was the best from among Al-Ansār, a fast runner. “[He would say,] ‘Is there anyone who would race me to Madīnah?’ And he kept on repeating that again and again, while I was behind Rasūlullāhﷺ, so I told him, ‘Do you not honour the honourable and do you not fear the noble?’ He said, ‘No, except Rasūlullāhﷺ.’” What Salamah meant by that was that you have been challenging us too much, do you not have respect for anyone? Obviously he was joking with this Ansārī and saying do you not respect the noble and fear the powerful, so this man said no except Rasūlullāhﷺ, he is the only one whom I would not challenge. When he said that, Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’  had [already] been running the entire day before, but this challenge was too much for him to pass on because this man had been repeating it again and again, so he says, “So I said, ‘O Messenger of Allāh, may my father and mother be sacrificed for you, let me race this man.’ He said, ‘If you want.’ So he [the man] said, ‘I will come to you.’ At this he jumped off his mount and I bent my leg and jumped down from the camel.” And then Salamah let the man get ahead of him while he was holding himself back, because he wanted to preserve his breath, so he was allowing this man to be ahead of him for a particular distance, “Until we got close to Madīnah, then I ran hard. And when I was behind him, I slapped him between his shoulders with my hand and told him, ‘I beat you, in the name of Allāh!’ The man laughed and said, ‘I agree.’” So he went into Madīnah. So for the entire race, this Ansārī was ahead of Salamah, but when they were close to Madīnah, Salamah picked up speed, and then when he was passing next to the Ansārī he patted him between his shoulders and told him I beat you by the name of Allāh! The man said, “In Adhunn – you are right.” This was the fastest runner among Al-Ansār, but no one could beat Salamah Ibn Al-Akwa’.

This is the story of Ghazwat Dhī Qarad, or what is also called Ghazwat Al-Ghābah.

Al-‘Adbā – The Camel of Rasūlullāhﷺ: And then Ibn Kathīr talks here about the camel of Rasūlullāhﷺ, Al-‘Adbā, and the story of the camel Al-‘Adbā, because here we mentioned that Rasūlullāhﷺ was riding on Al-‘Adbā and he had Salamah  ride with him, so what is the story of Al- ‘Adbā? Al-‘Adbā was a very fast camel and it belonged to a man from Banī ‘Aqīl, so how did it end up in the hands of Rasūlullāhﷺ? This Hadīth is narrated by Al-Imām Ahmad Bin Hanbal, he says, “Al-‘Adbā belonged to a man from Banī ‘Aqīl and it was a racing camel, it was a very fast camel, it was a Hajj racing camel. This man was taken captive by the Muslims along with his camel. Rasūlullāhﷺ passed by him when he was tied up and Rasūlullāhﷺ was riding on a donkey, so the man called out to Muhammadﷺ and said, “Yā Muhammad, why did you take me and take the ‘Adbā, the racing camel of Hajj?” This man from Banī ‘Aqīl is protesting why was he arrested, why was he taken captive? He was travelling somewhere in Arabia and the Sahābah saw him and they captured him and brought him to Madīnah and they tied him up. So now when he saw Muhammadﷺ passing by him, he asked, “Why have you taken me?” And the reason why this man was protesting was because his particular tribe were not in a state of war with the Muslims, they were not fighting the Muslims, there was no battle between them and the Muslims, so why was I taken? Rasūlullāhﷺ answered back and told him, “Na’khudhuka Bi Jarīrati Hulafā’ika Thaqīf – We take you because of the fault of your allies Thaqīf.”

Now, Thaqīf were in war with Rasūlullāhﷺ; up until that moment there were no battle between the Muslims and Thaqīf, but Thaqīf were supportive of Quraish in their efforts and they were against Islām in general, and we know the story of Rasūlullāhﷺ when he went to At-Tā’if; Thaqīf are the tribe that lives in At -Tā’if, and we know what happened to Rasūlullāhﷺ in that journey. So Rasūlullāhﷺ said, “We have taken you captive because of the actions of your allies Thaqīf.” At that particular moment, Thaqīf had taken two Muslims as captives, you see, so now Rasūlullāhﷺ had taken this man as captive as a revenge against Thaqīf even though this man himself was not from Thaqīf but he was from Banī ‘Aqīl, the allies of Thaqīf. So what did the man say? He said, “I am a Muslim.” What did Rasūlullāhﷺ tell him? He told him, “Law Qultahā Wa Anta Tamliku Amrak Aflahta Kulla Falāh –If you said it when you had authority over yourself, then you would have been successful.” Meaning if you had said so when you were free – now you are a captive and you are trying to claim that you are a Muslim – this would have benefitted you before. The man said, “O Muhammad, I am hungry so feed me and I am thirsty so quench my thirst.”

Rasūlullāhﷺ told him, “Hādhihī Hājatuk – This is your need.” In this regard, there are rights for the prisoner; he is fed and he is provided for, so Rasūlullāhﷺ told him this is your need, here, take what you need. Like we have stories in the Battle of Badr when Rasūlullāhﷺ told the Ansār to treat the prisoners well, the Ansār would give the prisoners who were Mushrikīn from Quraish, who came out to fight against Rasūlullāhﷺ, they would give them the wheat bread and they the Ansār would eat the dates, and it is considered that wheat bread is a better quality food, so they would give them the bread and they would keep the dates for themselves. So now Rasūlullāhﷺ told him that this is your need, we are not going to prevent you from eating and drinking. What happened next? He was used as a ransom for the two Muslims who were taken prisoners, however, he was not given his camel back, Rasūlullāhﷺ took that camel for himself. So this man from Banū ‘Aqīl was used in this prisoner exchange, he was exchanged for the two Muslim prisoners, and Rasūlullāhﷺ took Al-‘Adbā for himself and it was a very fast and good camel.

Now, when the Mushrikīn had taken over camels of Rasūlullāhﷺ, they had also taken with them a Muslim woman from Banū Ghifār, and whenever they would rest at night, they would leave their camels in this area with them. So one night while they were asleep, this woman started walking towards each camel in order to take it and run away on its back to Madīnah, but the camels would refuse; Raghā – it would make this noise that a camel makes, until she came to Al-‘Adbā and ‘Adbā was silent, and when she rode on Al -‘Adbā, it was very well domesticated and very simple to lead. So she made a Nadhr – a promise to Allāh [that] if Allāh saves her on the back of this camel, she would slaughter this camel for the sake of Allāh. So look at what her promise is, that if she rode safely to Madīnah on this camel that would save her, she would slaughter the camel for the sake of Allāh. Now, she did arrive to Madīnah, and she told Rasūlullāhﷺ about her promise, Rasūlullāhﷺ told her, “Bi’si Mā Jazaitihā! – What a bad reward you are rewarding this camel!” This camel has saved you and brought you to Madīnah and now you want to slaughter it! And then Rasūlullāhﷺ told her, “Lā Wafā’a Li Nadhrin Fī Ma’siyatillāh Walā Fī Mā Lā Yamlik Ibn Adam – Youdo not have to fulfil a promise that includes a sin,” and we are talking about Nadhr here, not a promise with a human being, [but] if you make a Nadhr to Allāh, a promise to Allāh, and also if you do not own a thing; because she did not own this camel – this camel belonged to Rasūlullāhﷺ – Rasūlullāhﷺ told her not to sacrifice the camel.

13.9 Lessons

Fitness of Sahābah: First of all, in the Ghazwah of Dhī Qarad, we can see the fitness of Salamah Bin Al-Akwa’ , and we can see some of the activities that the Sahābah  would practice, such as running; Salamah and this man from Al-Ansār had a competition in running and that was approved by Rasūlullāhﷺ. So the Sahābah were fit, and they were strong, and this is part of Al- ‘Ibād which the Muslims were commanded to do, the Muslims were told to prepare for the sake of Allāh Fee Sabeelillāh. We can see here that Salamah Bin Al-Akwa’  was pursuing this enemy for an entire day without tiring out, in fact they were getting tired, and their beasts were getting tired, because as we mentioned in the end of the Hadīth that they had left behind them two horses; why did they leave behind those two horses? Did you think about that? Why would they leave behind them two horses? And horses were very valuable things in those days, very expensive. Why would they leave behind a horse unless they had to? Because the horse was tired; the horse was tired out, so they had to leave these two horses behind them. Salamah Bin Al-Akwa’ was a very fit Sahābï.

Travelling of Women Alone: From the story of the woman there is a lesson mentioned by An-Nawawī, and this is regarding the travelling of women alone. An- Nawawī says, “In this Hadīth we can derive the ruling that it is allowed for a Muslim woman to travel alone without her husband and without a guardian and without anyone else if it is a necessary travel, (and this is an important point that he mentions:) such as Hijrah from the land of war to the land of Islām, and such as running away from those who want to sin with her, and similar situations. And a Muslim woman is prohibited from travelling alone when there is no necessity in her travel.” So this statement by Al-Imām An-Nawawī clarifies this issue of the travelling of women. Sometimes a Muslim woman is in great need of travelling alone and it is a necessity for her; in this case she is allowed to, and he mentions as an example making Hijrah.

Prisoners of War: It is also probably beneficial here to talk about the rulings regarding POWs in general, because we have covered a few cases up until this moment of how Muslims treat the POWs, so we will summarise it all now because we have already talked about prisoners who were taken in Badr and here we talked about this man from Banī ‘Aqīl. What is the ruling regarding prisoners of war? Can they be executed? Can they be ransomed? Or should they be released? What is it exactly? Because we have seen that they were treated differently in different situations. To summarise this point, Ash-Shawkānī says, “The Madhhab of the majority of scholars is that the issue of Disbelieving prisoners of war is up to the Imām. The men who are Kuffār, who are prisoner of war, it is up to the Imām to do with them what is the most beneficial for the Muslims.” So what does this mean? It means:

Option One: Release without Compensation: They could be released without any compensation, and the example of this is what Rasūlullāhﷺ did with Abū ‘Azzah in the Battle of Badr. Abū ‘Azzah was one of the 70 captives who were taken in Battle of Badr. Abū ‘Azzah pleaded to the Messenger of Allāhﷺ and told him, “I have daughters who are left alone and I do not have wealth to ransom myself, so for the sake of my daughters release me,” and Rasūlullāhﷺ released him without asking him for any compensation whatsoever, he was only released on condition that he does not fight against the Muslims again, and he consented to that.

Option Two: Ransom: The second option is to ransom them, and this is what happened with the rest of the prisoners in the Battle of Badr such as Al-‘Abbās; they had to pay for their ransom and they were released.

Option Three: Prisoner Exchange: The third option [is that] they could be exchanged for Muslim prisoners, and the example of that is what we just talked about with this man from Banī ‘Aqīl; he was exchanged for two Muslim prisoners.

Option Four: Execution: The next option is to be executed, and this is what Rasūlullāhﷺ did with An-Nadr Bin Hārith and ‘Uqbah Bin Abī Mu‘ait in the Battle of Badr, and Abū ‘Azzah when he was arrested again in the Battle of Uhud; when he was captured again in the Battle of Uhud he had already promise that he would not fight against Rasūlullāhﷺ, and now he was caught fighting against the Muslims so he was executed. And also the entire fighting force of Banū Qurayzah, the Jewish tribe; Rasūlullāhﷺ ordered that they be put to death.

So these are the different options that the Imām has regarding the prisoners of war.