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When the Sahaba Met a Racist King | Virtual Khutbah
Dr. Omar Suleiman recalls the story of 'Ubadah ibn al-Samit RA when he was confronted by the racist ruler Al-Muqawqis during the conquest of Egypt.
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Hello everyone. Assalamualaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh Audhu Billahi Minash Shaitanir Rajeem Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen Wa la'udhu billahi minash shaitanir rajeem wa la'aqibatu lilmuttaqeem Allahumma salli wa sallim wa barakar abdika wa rasulika Muhammadin Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam tasliman kathira So in the midst of all of the important conversations that are happening right now in our community and inshallah ta'ala I pray that we are all able to grow obviously one of the things that is being discussed is the racism that goes unchecked in our own communities and I wanted to use this opportunity, this particular moment to speak about a very special incident in Islamic history to help us understand the shift of mindset that the companions of the messenger of Allah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam experienced in the midst of all that was happening. To speak about the shift in their thinking and then how they were able to articulate that shift in their thinking both internally with those who had not undergone the tarbiyah, the process of purification and mentorship and character building that they had gone through and those that lived outside of their context and in neighboring nations of the world the neighboring tribes of the Arabs and they were able to convey a shift in perspective and some of the greatest lessons in what Islam was meant to bring to the world come through those initial conversations between rulers and the ambassadors, the emissaries of Muslims as they were going out to meet these different rulers and these different leaders in the world because they were forced to encapsulate in just a few sentences what Islam meant to them, what Islam meant to the world and what it was to mean particularly to that group of people now that were being approached with Islam and so the initial conversations between
the sahaba, the companions that had lived with the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and undergone that transformation and the people of Mecca in Fath Mecca and the opening of Mecca where racist comments were hurled towards Bilal radiAllahu Anhu as he ascended the Kaaba to make the adhan for the first time and those people had not been in the presence of the Prophet peace be upon him and undergone what the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam had put the companions through to purge that evil disease from their hearts and from their societies and then you have the story of the Muslims as they were on the Hijrah prior to that, the migration the famous incident between Abu Dhar radiAllahu Ta'ala Anhu and Bilal radiAllahu Anhu where Abu Dhar insulted Bilal many of the companions or many of the scholars point to the fact that Abu Dhar was not amongst those that were present with the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam for all of that time, he came and he accepted Islam and he left and when he came back on the Hijrah to join the Muslims on the migration he had not gone through the Tarbiyah the character building yet that the Muslims had gone through and so he hurled what was very common in the days of ignorance at Bilal radiAllahu Anhu when he said, Ya Ibn Al Saudah, O son of a black woman, so a lot of these conversations took place between Muslims who had been around the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and nurtured with the prophetic methodology for so long and those that had not experienced the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam before those moments so I want to speak about this particular companion, this particular incident and frame it in a certain way InshaAllah that hopefully we can all benefit from and I'll start with a story that many of you may have heard the story is one in which the Prophet Peace be upon him visits the house of Umm Haram bint Milhan and Umm Haram bint Milhan, may Allah be pleased with her, is the aunt of Anas Ibn Malik
radiAllahu Anhu, the sister of Umm Sulaym radiAllahu Anha and she's one of the first to accept Islam from Medina, she's an Ansari woman and one of the first to accept Islam in Medina and was very close to the messenger Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and some of the narrations say she was his sister through Rida'a, through breastfeeding so the ties of kinship had been established as well and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam once fell asleep on a visit, he took a nap on a visit to the home of Umm Haram bint Milhan radiAllahu Anhu and he woke up smiling Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and when the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam woke up smiling she said to the messenger of Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, may Allah keep you smiling what is it that caused you to smile and so the Prophet peace be upon him goes on to say that I had this dream last night and in this dream or rather in this short nap that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam took in this dream he said I was shown some of the people of my Ummah and they were traveling through the seas, they were traveling through the seas and so as they were traveling through the seas to spread Islam the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam he was amazed by that because these were not people, the companions had not seen the water, they were, they lived in the desert, they were not used to that and the fact that they were spreading Islam through the seas was very special and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam described them like kings on their thrones, so the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam described the special group of his Ummah that would spread the message of Islam through the seas and Umm Haram bint Milhan did not think at that moment about any obstacles to her she didn't think at that moment well that can't be me she immediately asked the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam O Messenger of Allah, pray that I am amongst them, pray that I am amongst them, supplicate that
Allah include me amongst those people that you have just seen and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam recognizing the sincerity and of course Allah recognizing the sincerity of Umm Haram bint Milhan said you are amongst them you will be amongst them Subhanallah later on we fast forward and we find that this woman Umm Haram bint Milhan traveled with the companions on battle and she was with the Muslims that went to Cyprus, that traveled on ships to Cyprus and she was with her husband and as she got to Cyprus as she got off of the ship she tripped and fell and died as a result of that fall and was the first of the Muslims to die in Cyprus and they actually have a grave for her today, they still have a tomb for her today in Cyprus that is marked and well known a woman that had her sincerity acknowledged and recognized by the Prophet of Allah and then was given that great reward was one of those people that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam had saw in that dream of a group of kings, of a group of leaders, of a group of special people from this Ummah so she passed away in Cyprus in the year 27 after Hijrah radiAllahu ta'ala anha now who was her husband and who was the person that brought Islam to her in the first place? Her husband was Ubadah ibn Samit radiAllahu anhu, Ubadah ibn Samit and before I talk about Ubadah ibn Samit I want to say that one of the problems with how we talk about black sahaba, black companions, you know a few years ago I did a lecture called Black and Noble a long class on some of the black prophets and companions that are often not spoken about and this comes from Ibn al-Jawzi radiAllahu anhu, this is not something that was just done now Ibn al-Jawzi radiAllahu anhu wrote Tanweer al-Ghabash a book on the notable
black companions we find this from Imam al-Suyuti rahimahullah you know writing about some of these great black scholars and prophets in history and Sidi Dawood Waleed, Sheikh Dawood Waleed may Allah bless him, actually compiled a book on black nobles and we find so many different sources to pull from that talk about this and one of the problems with how we talk about Bilal radiAllahu ta'ala anhu in particular is that we exoticize Bilal to a point that we leave some of those other companions out so if you watch the movie The Message and Wallahi it was a beautiful movie and it's a great contribution to our time the movie Al-Risala brought great pride and love to the religion for many people who were exposed to Islam were exposed to Islam in a very unique way when they watch the movie Al-Risala The Message is that Bilal radiAllahu anhu stands out as if he's this lone black companion of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam and then the story of Bilal radiAllahu anhu gets exoticized now when I say it gets exoticized that doesn't mean that it's overestimated or that his position in Islamic history is overestimated if anything his position is underestimated the role of Bilal radiAllahu anhu in so many different ways is underestimated, the virtues of Bilal radiAllahu anhu but Bilal radiAllahu anhu being looked at as this unique black companion that was saved by the rest of the Muslims who were not black gives us a distorted image of the early Muslims and we leave some of the people out, some of them that were the mother of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam after his mother Umm Ayman radiAllahu anha Usama ibn Zaid radiAllahu anhu the first commander of the Muslim army and the list goes on and on and on and on of people that were surrounding the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam put in important positions
and in the process of that chipped away at any ism that would take away from Islam tribalism, nationalism, racism all of the isms that would take away from the beauty of Islam shining forth in a wonderful way and so Rubadat ibn Samit radiAllahu ta'ala anhu is the man that I want to talk about today and get to a very particular incident with him, he is the husband of Umm Haram bint Milhan he is a man who served as a companion of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam, he was a leader he was a judge he was a scribe, he was a warrior he held many roles in the time of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam he was one of the first Ansar you know there were two Bay'ahs two pledges, Bay'at al-Aqaba took place with the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam twice Rubadat radiAllahu anhu was one of the first group which was a handful of people that came from at that time from Bethreb, which is Medina to meet the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam in Mecca privately to take the pledge with him and then came back the next year to take the pledge with the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam once again with a larger group brought their people with them Rubadat radiAllahu ta'ala anhu is one of those people and he is one of those that's distinct in that he accompanied the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam in every battle and on top of that the Quran that you read, the Quran that you read Rubadat ibn Samit was one of Kutab al-Wahi, he was one of those that the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam entrusted with writing the revelation as it came from Allah through Jibreel alayhi wasalam to the heart of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam and then to the tongue of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam captured in the pen of very special people Rubadat ibn Samit radiAllahu anhu was one of Kutab al-Wahi, one of those that wrote the Quran as the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam spoke the Quran as it was revealed to him alayhi salatu wasalam so he holds an incredible position in Islamic history from the
early days of the Prophet salallahu alayhi wasalam throughout the lives of Khulafa ar-Rashideen ultimately dying in Palestine as a judge in Palestine as a judge and someone that was notable for many reasons but one of the things about Rubadat ibn Samit radiAllahu anhu is that he had an imposing presence, he had a distinct presence he is described radiAllahu ta'ala anhu as being shadeed al-saud very black, very black so not just kind of dark but very black he is described radiAllahu ta'ala anhu as being very tall so not just tall but very tall he is described as being very handsome, okay a person of extreme beauty that if you looked at Rubadat ibn Samit radiAllahu anhu you were captured by his beauty, defined features this is how Imam al-Dhabi rahimallah describes him that every part of him radiAllahu ta'ala anhu was extremely pronounced that he was extremely strong and very defined and his muscles were very defined so he was a strong man radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and they said that if you, one of the one of the books mentions that his forearm was too big to be grabbed by two hands because of how strong he was radiAllahu ta'ala anhu so he had an imposing physical presence and then he had an incredible command of speech and so when he spoke, he spoke in a very strong way and everyone in the room would naturally be silenced by the speech of Rubadat radiAllahu ta'ala anhu because of how eloquent he was so he he's really a person who has a presence radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, an imposing presence in a beautiful way radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and as someone who was Badri who accompanied the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam in the Battle of Badr throughout all of his battles and accompanied and led expeditions and armies under the Khulafa' ar-Rashideen
you know his presence was not just felt amongst the companions radiAllahu ta'ala anhu ajma'een but there's a very particular incident where Ubadah leads the first delegation under Amr bin As radiAllahu ta'ala anhu to Egypt, to Masr and as he is on his way to or as he arrives in Egypt and this is the year 641 641 where the Muslims arrive in Masr and this is within the overall battles between the Byzantines and the Muslims at the time and they are an army of many but in front of that army there are 10 men that serve as a delegation to speak to the ruler of Egypt at the time and that is a man by the name of Al-Muqawqis so the Egyptian king or the Egyptian ruler Al-Muqawqis is holed up and he comes out to meet this delegation that is representing this large army of Muslims that have come and Ubadah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu steps forward as the leader of this army and this was not something that these people, again this is a Roman installed leader, they don't understand what they are seeing right now they don't get it and it's really interesting because you know of the very famous incident between Rabi'i ibn Amr radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and Rustam in Persia like who is this guy right that speaks and says we are a people that binukhrija al'ibad min ibadat al'ibad ila ibadati rabb al'ibad that we are a people that have been sent to liberate people from being slaves to other slaves to being slaves to the lord of all slaves and from the constriction of this world from the constriction of this world to the expanse of this life and the hereafter
and from the injustice of all other systems to the justice of Islam so they articulate themselves beautifully to describe Islam and encapsulate Islam well here al-Muqawqis comes out this ruler of Egypt and he sees this large delegation of companions this large army and they are being led by a very black man a very black man and so he sees Ubadah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and as Ubadah steps forward al-Muqawqis disrespects him in many ways so first he looks around him to suggest this can't be the guy that's actually going to speak to me, right, this can't be your leader who is sending Ubadah ibn Samit or who's sending this man to speak on their behalf I want to see who the actual leader is and so he looks around him and then realizing that Ubadah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu is actually the leader of this army he says to he says to him, he says iba'du anni zalikal aswad he said send this black man back wa qaddimu ghayrahu liyukallimuni and put forth someone else to speak to me put forth someone else to speak to me so iba'du anni zalikal aswad take this black man away from me and put someone else forward to speak to me, I'm not even going to speak to him and he's speaking to the inferiors of Ubadah ibn Samit radiAllahu ta'ala anhu in this regard because he is the one that is leading this delegation leading this army and the response was from those other people innahatha afdaluna ra'yan wa ilma that this person is the best of us in knowledge and wisdom and they said and he is our leader amiruna, he is our leader and he is the best of us and he's been appointed over us and he said that they responded and they said
we defer to him both in terms of opinion and in terms of orders, in terms of taking orders because he has been placed over us wa inna al aswada wal abyadaa indana sawaa and verily to us both black and white are the same, no one is superior to the other except by their deen, no one is superior or made more noble in the sight of Allah, except by their religion, except by virtue of their piety and that's how we consider a person to be greater and that's how we give people you know, the position in our religion now when they said that to Muqawqis this is not normal to him and so al Muqawqis, he speaks to the delegation once again over Ubadah so he's still not even acknowledging the presence of Ubadah ibn Samit and he says how could you accept this black man to be the best amongst you where he should be the least amongst you, so this is a person that should be considered the least amongst you and he's speaking over Ubadah which is just inherent disrespect right, he's the one who's leading the delegation and they respond and they say that even though he is black he is the best in status amongst us, he is the foremost amongst us and the wisest and we do not deem blackness as something that is bad amongst us, so we don't see blackness as an issue we don't see it as something that detracts so it's not that he's exceptional you know, even though he's black, he is exceptional and his skin color does not matter that's not how we judge in our religion and amongst our ummah, amongst our people, subhanAllah you're seeing these concepts being floated in this conversation, inna akramakum aindallahi atqaqum, the most noble of you in the sight of God is the one who is most pious so in muqawqis
he finally resigns himself to having to speak to Ubadah ibn Usamit after disrespecting him this way, after failing to even acknowledge his presence and he says to him come forward oh black man, and he said and speak gently because your blackness scares me and if you speak harshly you'll scare me even more so now he makes a racist insult towards Ubadah ibn Usamit himself to his face addressing him directly Ubadah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, he comes forward and listens to what Ubadah says to him, Ubadah is a smart man and he is he's using the moment to his advantage, so he says that I've heard what you said, I've heard everything that you just said about me and everything that you just said to the people around me and he responds and he says but if you're scared of me inna fee man khalaftu min ashaabi alfa rajulin aswad kulluhum ashaddu sawadan minni, he said listen I have left behind me this army of thousands of people behind me, there are a thousand men who are all as black as me, in fact they're blacker than me and they will scare you even more, so he's speaking to him using the moment to humiliate him and to say look I'm not the only black man that's here, I'm leading this army but there are a thousand men behind me that are as black as me and if you're scared of me you're going to be scared of them as well, and he said but nevertheless I would not be scared if a hundred men of my enemy would face me all at once, and he said and the same is true for each one of them, meaning each one of us is willing to fight a hundred of you, each one of us is willing to fight a hundred of you, I'm not scared, Ubadah by the way at this point is an older man, so he acknowledges, he says my youth is gone but I'll still fight as many of you as you put forward
and he said for our hope and our desire to strive in the way of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is to strive in the way of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and to seek the pleasure of Allah, and then he continues on, Ubadah radiallahu anhu gives this long speech, and you could look it up the speech between Ubadah and Muqawqis, but he talks about how we are not a people who fight out of the desire to accumulate wealth, we're a people that fight in the desire to please Allah, we're a people that do not care about how much gold is put forward, about what spoils are put forward, we're a people that are fighting out of something that's more noble than this, and so he immediately deters any element of Muqawqis to try to buy him off and to try to bribe him to stop what is going to happen, and so Al-Muqawqis as he hears the speech of Ubadah ibn Samit and the power of those words, the integrity and the nobility of those words, he says to him, he says to those that are around him, he says, Muqawqis says to those that are, the Byzantine commanders, he says have you ever heard a person speak the way that this man is speaking have you ever heard a person speak the way that this man is speaking he says, he said I was afraid of the way that he looks, he said but what he said actually scares me more than how he looks I was alarmed by his looks because he's a racist, right, and he put him down and he degraded him and he tried to use that as an excuse and he tried to demoralize the Muslims and it didn't work, and he said but the words of Ubadah, the words of Ubadah capture me even further
than the scene, than the sight of Ubadah ibn Samit radiyaAllahu ta'ala anhu, dear brothers and sisters I shared this incident with us for many reasons, that it's not enough for us to simply cling to the Bilals of the world and the one or two stories of the world and to say that Islam has done away with these things it has to be a shift in mindset, it has to be a shift from within the community, and so listen carefully listen carefully to the experiences that people have had in the community, particularly black people have had in the community of racism, listen carefully to what we need to do as a Muslim community to live true to our Islam because the only way that we can give Islam to the world as a solution is if we are applying Islam as a solution to racism within our community right now and that's actually the point, is that Ubadah ibn Samit was not speaking to the resentment of those that were behind him, the people behind Ubadah spoke on his behalf, repelling the racism that was being thrown at Ubadah radiyaAllahu ta'ala anhu Ubadah did not have to highlight what Islam had done to bring equality and to bring justice, Ubadah radiyaAllahu ta'ala anhu stood there in his full earned nobility and dignity while the other companions came forward and the others made it a point to say this is what Islam has done for us, this is how the words of the Prophet ﷺ as he was giving his last farewell address and the Prophet ﷺ mentioned that there is no superiority of an Arab over a non-Arab or vice versa, no superiority of a white man over a black man or vice versa, this is how it penetrated our hearts, this is how
inna akramakum indallahi atqaakum that the most noble of you in the sight of God is the most pious has actually penetrated our behaviours this is how things have shifted for us, and so when we post empty quotes to the world, when we use Malcolm's words from Hajj while ignoring Malcolm's politics post Hajj and Malcolm's pleas and cause post Hajj as well, when we put out there Islam as a solution to the world but we are not living that solution within our Muslim community, then we have to ask ourselves why and what do we do better, what do we do better, and so no amount of conversation is going to change that unless our hearts are open to those conversations and we start asking ourselves you know how do I contribute bindinallahi ta'ala to living that reality that we see here from the companions of the Prophet ﷺ as a result of the presence of the Prophet ﷺ, we have the message of Muhammad ﷺ amongst us, and that message should have that same effect on us bindinallahi ta'ala, so we pray that Allah expel this disease of racism and all of its political, social cultural, theological manifestations, we pray that it be expelled from our masajid, we pray that it be expelled from our community lives we pray that it be expelled from our family lives, we pray that it be expelled from our systems, we pray that it be expelled in all of its monstrosity in the most meaningful way and that we are able to usher in the Muhammadan spirit that way of the Prophet ﷺ that transformed his community first to our own community to live that way of the Prophet ﷺ and then to bring that
to the world around us as well. Allahuma Ameen. JazakumAllahu Khayran.
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