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