The Firsts (Sahaba Stories) | The Forerunners of Islam
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Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Khawla Bint Hakim & Uthman Ibn Madhun: The Righteous Couple | The Firsts
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Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Al-Shifa bint Abdullah (ra): The Healer and Scholar | The Firsts Shorts
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Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Shurahbil Ibn Hasana (ra): The Scribe and Commander | The Firsts Shorts
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Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Khalid ibn al-Walid (ra): The Legendary Military General | The Firsts
126
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Amr ibn al-As (ra): His Wicked Father and “Better” Brother | The Firsts
146
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Tulayha ibn Khuwaylid (ra): From False Prophet to Shaheed | The Firsts
147
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Zayd ibn al-Khattab (ra): The Quiet Brother of Omar (ra) | The Firsts
Hassan Ibn Thabit (ra): The Master of All Poets | The Firsts
Dr. Omar Suleiman presents the story of Hassan Ibn Thabit (ra), the most talented of poets who was aided by Jibreel (as) as he defended the Prophet ﷺ against his enemies. While that same tongue fell into tragic error, we honor him for his years of service to Islam.
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. So, when we talk about companions of the Prophet ﷺ, who have a story which is completely glory, and it's this uphill trajectory, you can admire them and you can marvel at their righteousness and their virtue, and you can come away from that thinking, you know, subhanAllah, I'll never be at that level. And honestly, that is the story of Abdullah ibn Rawaha, radhiAllahu anhu, right? When we're talking about the three poets of the Prophet ﷺ, the story of Abdullah ibn Rawaha that we covered, radhiAllahu anhu, is a man who was a warrior, a worshipper, a poet, someone who you just see complete devotion, and you don't really see him trip up at any point in his biography. And then we moved on to Ka'b ibn Malik, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, who you see makes a mistake, but the mistake that he makes is not one that causes you any type of serious aversion, right? It's, okay, he got distracted by his circumstances, and his story of repentance and redemption is absolutely beautiful. He used to fight in the battles in general, and he missed out a couple of battles for whatever reason. And then you get to the story of Hassan ibn Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, and you come across a man who actually does get tripped up, but for not a moment do we ever think that we're better than any of the companions of the Prophet ﷺ, especially not someone who was supported by Jibreel alayhi salam in his craft, in the things that he used to do. And so the story of Hassan ibn Thabit, radhiAllahu anhu, is refreshingly complex, in that the lessons that we can take from the story are so numerous and so relevant and direct to us, bi'idhnAllahi ta'ala. So I'm actually very excited about covering Hassan ibn Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu. Again, the opening scene. You walk into the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ, and you see the minbar of the Prophet ﷺ, you see the pulpit of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ,
and then a few feet away you see another pulpit. And it is not like the pulpit that the Messenger would speak from, alayhi salatu wassalam. But it's a pulpit that a man would stand up on and defend the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, when the lyrics of poetry would come striking against the Prophet ﷺ, who was always patient with his enemies. And you have a man who's an artist, Hassan ibn Thabit, the master of all poets, sayyid ash-shu'ara, the greatest poet of all time, we can say as believers, the greatest poet of all time, standing up and defending the Prophet ﷺ, extolling his honour and humiliating his enemies who seek to humiliate him ﷺ. So if you walk into the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ, man, who is this person that has a minbar, that has a pulpit in the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ? And so we start off once again with the shu'ara. You'll remember this for the rest of your life, inshaAllah. When someone asks you, who are the poets of the Prophet ﷺ, you'll easily be able to say who? Say them really quickly for me, inshaAllah. Abdullah ibn Rawaha, Ka'b ibn Malik, and Hassan ibn Thabit, the three poets of the Prophet ﷺ. As we said, Abdullah ibn Rawaha was the man whose poetry surrounded the virtue of belief over disbelief. And Ka'b ibn Malik would speak of the courage of the Muslims and the believers, and the victorious days of the believers, and would speak about the cowardice of the enemies of the believers. And Hassan ibn Thabit had the type of poetry, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, where he would crucify the enemy with his words, and he would bring out their flaws and essentially demonstrate superiority in that way. Now when we get to his story, it's very interesting, subhanAllah, to study the world around him.
And this is something you typically won't hear in a lecture about Hassan ibn Thabit or reading about him. And this first three minutes is for the note-takers, inshaAllah. The background of Hassan, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, is actually fascinating. It's actually significant. So Hassan ibn Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, from a family perspective, is from Banu Najjar of Khazraj. These are the maternal relatives of the Prophet ﷺ. So in a way, he's going to be a distant relative of the Messenger ﷺ from Medina. Banu Najjar is the same family that Abu Ayyub al-Ansari comes from, the same family of Umm Surayn, Umm Haram, the maternal relatives of the Messenger ﷺ. So he's from that sub-tribe of Khazraj. And he was a famous poet from a very young age, and he's probably the only Arab poet from that area that was famous throughout the world. His fame was not limited to Medina. Now in Medina, you have two tribes that are fighting each other, obviously from the Ansar, Aus and Khazraj. Aus and Khazraj are the two tribes from Yemen that make up the Ansar, and they had these tribal differences. So Hassan was the poet of Khazraj against Aus. The poet from Aus was a man by the name of Qais ibn al-Khatim. And Qais ibn al-Khatim also lived to see Islam, but he did not embrace Islam when it came to him, and he died shortly after he learned about the Prophet ﷺ. So basically these were the two poets that would face off. Aus and Khazraj would fight with their spears and their arrows. Hassan ibn Thabit from Khazraj and Qais ibn al-Khatim from Aus. So they'd face off.
So Qais died shortly after the Prophet ﷺ came to Medina. The wife of Qais became a companion, became a sahabiya. Her name is Hawwa bint Yazid. So you have Hawwa bint Yazid, the wife of the poet of Aus who passed away, not as a Muslim. And then you have Hassan ibn Thabit, the main poet of Khazraj. And as I said last week, and I'm just being real, his poetry was mean. His poetry would literally take the enemy and just split them into pieces. And so what he ends up doing is he starts getting invited by the kings of the world to basically go there and put down their enemies and put down their opponents. And it's even said, subhanAllah, so he was called by the Ghassas in Syria. He goes to Syria. He has lines of poetry for the Romans. And he also goes to the Persians, who of course are the rivals of one another, the Romans and the Persians. But Hassan manages to sneak between all of the elites of the world and deliver poetry on their behalf. So it was not uncommon to walk into a palace at that time in different parts of the world and Hassan would stand up and Hassan would just go. And no poet stood a chance against Hassan. So his prominence is sort of around the world, even though he's the poet of Khazraj against Aus. So Aus and Khazraj have, you know, they've got their issues. He puts down Aus, then he goes around the world, puts down people on behalf of different kings and leaders. That's kind of his reputation, right? His reputation is that genre of poetry. Now here's something very interesting when I say this is for the note-takers. Hassan, radhiAllahu anhu, has two parents and all eight of his siblings actually became Muslim.
They all became sahaba. And this is fascinating, subhanAllah. His father, Thabit ibn Mundhir, was in his 80s and he embraced Islam. And he's one of the veterans of Badr, according to Ibn Hajar, rahimAllah, which would have made him probably, if not the oldest sahabi at Badr, one of the oldest companions at the Battle of Badr. His mother, Al-Furayya bint Khalid. Sorry, Dallas allergies. It's happening. Al-Furayya bint Khalid, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, was so known for her intellect that Hassan at times would refer to himself as Ibn al-Furayya, the son of al-Furayya. So his mother was an intellectual woman, was a smart woman and a noble woman as well. And she converted to Islam, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu. You go through his siblings, both of his brothers. One of them, Abu Shaykh Ibn Thabit al-Ansari. So his brother, Abu Shaykh, was also a sahabi. He witnessed Badr and Uhud and he died as a shaheed in Bitma'una. So he's a martyr. His brother, Aus ibn Thabit, also becomes Muslim and witnesses the battles and passes away as a shaheed as well. So a sahabi and a shaheed. And the reason why this is going to get interesting is because you'll see how different these siblings actually end up becoming. Because anyone who has multiple kids can tell you they don't all come out the same way, right? Kabsha bin Thabit, we go to his sisters. He has a sister by the name of Kabsha bin Thabit. Kabsha bin Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu. Kabsha has one hadith. It's so beautiful. She narrates one hadith in the entire tradition. And she narrates that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam visited her home one day. And she had a water skin that was hanging in her home.
And RasulAllahu SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam took that water skin and he drank from it. And she said, I cut the top of it where the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam drank from and I kept it with me for the rest of my life. That's her one hadith from Kabsha bin Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, in a tirmidhi. I also found a Lubna bin Thabit. So shout out to the Lubnas there. We found the Lubna who's a sahabiya. Bin Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, was present at the bay'ah with the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. She took allegiance with the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. He then has a sister named Layla bin Thabit, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, who is also a companion. And then lastly, two sisters, Fari'ah bin Thabit, Fari'ah, the daughter of Huray'ah. Fari'ah bin Thabit and Khawla bin Thabit, both of whom were poets. Okay? Interesting eight siblings, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu. So you have eight siblings, all became Muslim, and Hassan, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, was going to be one of them. Now Hassan was 60 years old when the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam got to Medina. Sometimes you lose the age of a person when you're thinking about context. He was 60. That's not common for someone to be that old in Medina. Why? Who can tell me why? Because they killed each other in Bu'ath. The elders killed each other in the wars, the tribal wars that existed before. So he's one of those that survived the Bu'ath wars because some of the, you know, and this is honestly at this point, interpretation, some of the scholars said that perhaps it's because Hassan was known to never pick up a sword in his life. Not before Islam or after Islam. We're going to see this with Hassan ibn Thabit, radhiAllahu anhu. He never picked up a sword. He was not a man of the battlefield, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu. Some of them said perhaps it was his traveling around the world or, you know, maybe something else,
but it's unlikely that the poet, the man who was insulting Uth for a living, managed to escape the Bu'ath wars where people his age were killed. But he escaped. He's one of the few elders when the Prophet ﷺ comes to Madinah. And that makes him seven years older than the Prophet ﷺ. Okay, so he's actually older than the messenger of Allah ﷺ, who came to Madinah when he was 53 years old, alayhi salatu wa salam. Now, the general story of Hassan, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, is that he's a disartist. He puts you down. So some of the people who were not happy about the Prophet ﷺ rising from Mecca, they basically hired Hassan, gave him some money and said, you know, go out and see this man. And when you see him, do your thing, right? Slice him into pieces. Find some flaws in him. And Hassan, radhiAllahu anhu, he wouldn't leave anything off. Your physical features, your background, the way you walk, the way you talk, everything about you was going to be put down in his poetry, right? So he goes out, he says, okay, I've done this before. Goes out, waits for the Prophet ﷺ, sees all these people in Madinah who are excited about the Prophet ﷺ coming. He's not fazed, right? Okay, I've seen impressive people in my life. And when he sees the Prophet ﷺ, he automatically falls in love. I have nothing bad to say about this man. And the famous poem of Hassan, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, Wa ahsanu minka lam taraqattu a'inin, wa ajmalu minka lam talidin nisa'u, khuliqta mubarra'an min kulli a'ibin, ka'annaka qad khuliqta kama tashau. He said, radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, wa ahsanu minka lam taraqattu a'inin, that better than you, my eye has never seen before. It's Arabic to English, right? My eye has never seen anything like you before. Wa ajmalu minka lam talidin nisa'u, and more beautiful than you, no woman has ever given birth to.
No woman has ever birthed a creature more beautiful than you ﷺ. Khuliqta mubarra'an min kulli a'ibin, you were created without any flaws. There is no flaw in how you are, not in your physical appearance or in your character. Ka'annaka qad khuliqta kama tashau, as if you were created exactly as you wished. It was as if you created yourself because of the way that you were ﷺ. Now this is his description of the Prophet ﷺ and how impressed he was by the Prophet ﷺ. Even if this wasn't said at the initial appearance, it gives you an idea that Hassan saw the Prophet ﷺ and said, this is him, this is it. I have nothing to say bad or negative about this man ﷺ, and indeed he never actually did. Now before we get to his poetry, this is where you start to see the differences in the companions. Hassan would not fight in a battle. And when we say would not fight in a battle, it wasn't like he kind of was afraid. Hassan, for whatever reason, could not see the battlefield and did not witness a single battle alongside the Prophet ﷺ, which indicates that this was a serious fear that he had and an anxiety that he had from the battlefield. And this is narrated by more than one of the authors, that not a single battle was he with the Prophet ﷺ, and the Prophet ﷺ allowed him to stay back because of his condition. So it wasn't simply that I don't feel like it, it wasn't like I used to fight in Jahliyyah, I used to fight in the days of ignorance, and now when Islam comes I'm not really committed to this. It's that I really cannot be in the battlefield in any capacity whatsoever.
Now, one of the narrations you might remember is from Safiyyah bint Abdul Muttalib. Safiyyah bint Abdul Muttalib was the aunt of the Prophet ﷺ, and she was the mother of Az-Zubayr ibn Awam. And remember Az-Zubayr was known as Ibn Safiyyah, the son of Safiyyah, because Safiyyah bint Abdul Muttalib raised Az-Zubayr by herself. She was a single mom, she raised him by herself, and she was an extremely strong woman. So if you go back to her biography, which we covered ages ago, you'll find this incident where when the Battle of the Trench was taking place, Khandaq was taking place, Safiyyah was with the women and the children, and they were in one of the fortresses, hiding obviously from the oncoming massacre. Now what happened? Khaybar, Bani Qurayza, obviously betrays and breaks the covenant and seeks to attack the women and the children from the inside. So Safiyyah bint Abdul Muttalib is in this area with the women and the children, and with them was Hassan ibn Thabit. Now mind you, Hassan ibn Thabit is almost 70 years old, so he's also an elderly man. He's not just a poet who never goes into the battlefield, he's an elderly man. So she sees someone, she sees the figure of a man coming to attack them, and she tells Hassan radiAllahu ta'ala anhum, she says, you know, go ahead and do something about it, can you go and attack him? And he says, يَغْفِرُ اللَّهُ لَكِ يَا بِنْتِ عَبْدِ الْمُطْلِبِ وَاللَّهِ لَقَدْ عَرَفْتِي مَا أَنَا بِصَاحِبِ هَذَا May Allah forgive you, O daughter of Abdul Mutalib, you know, I'm not the one for this. It's not my thing.
Safiyyah bint Abdul Mutalib, the aunt of the Prophet ﷺ, elderly woman, what does she do? She goes and she takes a pole, she waits till the man gets close to the door, and then she pops him on the head with the pole, she pulls his body in, and she says to Hassan radiAllahu ta'ala anhum, Hassan is scared, he's terrified by what he's witnessing. She says to Hassan radiAllahu anhum, Ya Hassan anzil fastalibhu, Hassan, you know, go ahead and take his stuff off, right, go through his stuff. And she says the only thing that's stopping me from doing it, annahu rajul, is that he's a man, so I'm not going to go into his stuff and take out his weapons. And he said, I can't even do that. So Safiyyah, the daughter of Abdul Mutalib, what does she do? She basically takes his body, right, this is an old woman, but this is the mother of Az-Zubair, the type of mom that raises Az-Zubair radiAllahu anhum, and she throws his body out, and when the people that were with that man saw the man's body fly out, they thought there was an army there. So they all went running away. So Safiyyah bint Abdul Mutalib radiAllahu anhum is the one who narrated this incident. So Hassan radiAllahu anhum seriously could not, could not enter into the battlefield at all whatsoever. The man's battle was his poetry. That's what he could do, that's what he stuck to radiAllahu anhum, and you start to see the stories of how he would defend the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam with his poetry. One narration, as the people were starting to author lyrics, and poetry was the art of the Arabs, right, as they started to author lyrics against the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, qala qa'ilunni Ali ibn Abi Talib radiAllahu anhum, uhju'anna alqawman ladheena yahjoonana. Some of the people said to Ali radiAllahu anhum, go ahead and respond. And he said, if the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam gives me permission, fa'alt, I will do so. The Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam said about Ali radiAllahu anhum,
inna aliyyan laysa indahu ma yuradu fee thalika minhu. This is not Ali radiAllahu anhum's specialty. He's an eloquent man, but Ali has no experience in this type of poetry. In these lyrics, he's not the one for this particular task. So the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam looks around the world, and the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam knows who's in the room at that time. He says, ma yamna'ul qawmu alladheena nasaru rasoolAllahu salAllahu alayhi wa sallama bisilahihim an yansuroohu bi al-sinatihim. What's stopping the Ansar who took in the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam and defended the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam with all that they had with their weapons from defending him with their tongues? And Hassan radiAllahu anhum said, I got the cue, ana laha, ya RasulAllah, it's me. I've got this. In another narration, Ka'b ibn Malik radiAllahu anhu said, ana, me, and the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam was quiet in that particular setting. Abdullah ibn Rawaha said, ana, me, and the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam was quiet in that setting. And Hassan said, ana, me, and the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam said, na'am, you, uhjuhum anta wasayu'eenuka alayhim roohul qudus. You respond, and the angel Jibreel alayhi wa sallam will support you. So it's you, Hassan. This task is for you. Now, as Hassan says, this is what I've been waiting for. This was my art before Islam. I put it aside, you know, when I became Muslim. Now it's my turn to get up there and to start responding with lyrics. The Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam says, wait a minute, but before you start, he says, kayfa tahjuhum wa ana minhum? How do you plan on authoring your lyrics against them? When I am from them? Meaning, Hassan's whole poetry was about where you came from, I mean, your family and your tribe, and he put down everything about your tribe and everything about you.
So the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, he said that, you know, how is it that you're going to put them down when I'm one of them? He says, kayfa tahjuhu aba Sufyan wa huwa ibn ammi? How are you going to put down Abu Sufyan? And he's my cousin, right? So he says, wallahi la asullanaka minhum kama tasulla shara tu minal ajeen. He said, ya Rasulullah, I'm going to take you out or extract you from them the way that you would take a hair out of the dough. Meaning, I've got this, ya Rasulullah. I'll make sure that I attack them and I'm going to finally extract you from them when I go after them. And the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam says, iti aba Bakr, go to Abu Bakr radiAllahu anhu, fa innahu a'lamu bi ansabi alqawmi mink. Abu Bakr radiAllahu anhu knows the lineage of everyone. So Hassan says, I've got this. So he goes to Abu Bakr radiAllahu anhu and you could see Hassan going to Abu Bakr, taking notes, studying the people of Mecca. Yas'alu an fulan wa fulan, wa man fulan, wa man ibn fulan. So he's asking, who's this person? Who's this person's father? Who's this person's daughter? Who's this person? So he basically goes to Abu Bakr radiAllahu anhu and gets all the tribes and the sub-tribes and all the lineages of Mecca. Because Abu Bakr radiAllahu ta'ala anhu knew, you know, everything about the people of Mecca. So once Hassan radiAllahu anhu stands up and he starts to author his poetry and he goes into his lyrics and he starts dissecting all the tribes and the sub-tribes of Quraysh, somehow never touching the Prophet ﷺ, perfectly mentioning the maternal side and the paternal side when it was necessary. They look at him and they say, wallahi inna haathash sha'ar maa ghaaba anhu ibn Abu Khuhafah. He said, this person, wallahi, Abu Bakr has a hand in this. There's no way he knows all of this about us.
Like there's no way this poet from Medina figured all this out about us and is so skilled at mentioning every single tribe and every single sub-tribe and everyone this and that. And then somehow never touching the Prophet ﷺ. So in one of the poems, and this is in Sahih Muslim, the Prophet ﷺ, as he told Hassan radiAllahu ta'ala anhu to respond, this is so beautiful and I'm going to recite it in Arabic first. Qala Hassan, hajawta Muhammadan fa ajabtu anhu, wa inda Allahi fee dhaakal jaza'u. Hajawta Muhammadan barran taqiyyan, rasool Allahi, shimatuhu alwatha'u. Fa inna abi wa walidahu wa irdi li irdi Muhammadin minkum wika'u. Fakiltu buniyati inn lam tarawhaa tuthiru alnaqaa min kanafi kadai. Yubarina al-a'innata mus'idatin ala aktaafiha al-asalu dhimau. Tadallu jiyaduna mutamattiratin tulattimuhunna bil khumri al-nisau. Fa inna a'radtumu a'annaa itamarnaa wakana al-fath wa nkashafa al-ghitaa'u. Wa inna fasbiru li dhirabi yawmin yu'izzu Allahu feehi man yashaa'u. Wa qala Allahu qad arsaltu abdan yaqulu al-haqqa laysa bihi khafaa'u. Wa qala Allahu qad yassartu jundan humu al-ansaru. Ardatuha al-liqaa'u lana fee kulli yawmin min ma'adin seebaabun aw qitaalun aw hijaa'u. Faman yahju rasool Allahi minkum wayamdahuhu wayansuruhu sawaa'u. Wa jibreelun rasool Allahi feehina wa roohul qudusi laysa lahu kifaa'u.
This is a long narration, Sahih Muslim. And I guarantee you that everyone in here who speaks Arabic got lost at some point. Because it's very poetic. Alright, so he says, I'm going to go through it bit by bit insha'Allah. He says, hajawta muhammadan fa ajabtu a'anhum. Wa'inda Allahi fee dhaakal jaza'u. That you mocked Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, and I responded on his behalf, and I expect from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala a reward. Hajawta muhammadan barran taqiyyan rasool Allahi sheematuhu al-watha'u. He says, you mocked Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, a man of virtue and righteousness. The messenger of Allah whose nature is always watha', whose nature is always nobility and loyalty. And in essence, as some of the scholars would say, this is saying, you know, he doesn't respond on the part of himself because the lion doesn't respond to the barking dog. So you keep on barking at him, but you've mocked a man who is noble and who has absolutely nothing that you could find in him to mock him with. And he said, may my father, may my mother, may my honor be sacrificed for Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. And he said, may I lose myself. Now when he says in this part of it, fa kiltu buniyyati innam tarawha, it actually means, may my daughter lose me. So he's not actually making du'a against his daughter. He's saying that may I perish if you don't see the horses going forward and kicking up the dust as they enter into Mecca. So he's praising the Muslims fighting back against the humiliation. And he says, yubarina al-a'innata mus'idatin ala aktaafiha al-asal al-dhima'un, that these horses as they come forward have, you know, they go upwards and on their shoulders are spears that are thirsting for their enemies.
So he starts to praise the horses and he starts to praise the armies as they are coming forward. And he says, fa inna'arattumoo anna itamarna wakana al-fath, or actually before that, tazallu jiyaduna mutamattiratin tulattimuhunna bilkhumurinnisa'u, which basically means that the women are wiping the sweat off of the horses' steeds because of the eagerness of the horses. You see, this is why it gets awkward to translate poetry. But the horses as they're going forward with such zeal, with people of zeal on them, the women are wiping off the sweat from those horses who show absolutely no sign of letting up. And he says, fa inna'arattumoo anna itamarna wakana al-fath wankashaf al-ghita'u. If you would have left us alone, we would have done umrah. Because what was happening here, they ran them out of Mecca, they persecuted them, and now they violated all the rules of sanctity. They're not letting them carry out their umrah, their pilgrimage. So if you would have let us go forth for our umrah, then we would have gone forth, and the opening would have came, and the veil of darkness would have been lifted. Wa inna fasbiroo. But if not, then be ready. Lidhiraabiyawmin yu'izzu allahu feehi man yashaa'u. For a day that Allah will honor whom He wishes. Of course, as we said, Hasan's not going to be on the battlefield, but he's praising those that will be on the battlefield for that day. Wa qaala allahu qad arsaltu abdan yaqoolu al-haqqa laysa bihi khafa'u. And Allah said, I have sent to you a servant with the truth, and there is no ambiguity whatsoever about his message. Wa qaala allahu qad yassartu jundan humu al-ansaru, urodatuha al-liqa'u. And Allah says, I have sent forth a group of people from the Ansar, and they have absolutely nothing that is holding them back. They are determined to fight. And he goes on to say,
lana fee kulli yawmin min ma'adin sibabun aw qitalun aw hija'u. Every day we hear from you people, does anyone know who Ma'ad is? Ma'ad is Banu Adnan, the Meccans. So he's saying, we always get from you people your abuses, your mockery, your attacks, like you've been picking on us for all of these years, attacking us for all of these years, and we've never had a day where we have not dealt with the abuse that comes from you, your tongues or your hands or whatever it may be. Faman yahju rasool Allahi minkum, wayamdahuhu wayansuruhu sawa'u. And whether you attack the Prophet ﷺ, or you praise him, or you honor him or humiliate him, it doesn't actually matter. Meaning what? The Prophet ﷺ doesn't need you to honor him in order for him to be honored. Wajibreelun rasool Allahi fee'na, waroo'hu alqudusi laysa lahu kifa'u. And Jibreel, the Messenger of Allah, is amongst us. And the Holy Spirit has no match. Meaning, gather up who you want, we have Jibreel on our side, find a match that's going to fight against Jibreel ﷺ. So this was just a glimpse of the poetry of Hassan ibn Thabit radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu that we find in Sahih Muslim. And again, he always made it a point to extract the Prophet ﷺ skillfully, as he was responding to the Meccans and responding to their habits and things of that sort. One of the things that we see with Hassan radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu once again, is that the Prophet ﷺ said about Hassan, Allahumma ayyidhu bi roohil qudus, O Allah, support him with Jibreel ﷺ. And the Prophet ﷺ said that when Hassan stands up to speak on behalf of the Messenger ﷺ, the angel Jibreel ﷺ supports him every single time he stands up to do so.
So this is a man radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu who is the spokesperson of the Prophet ﷺ in this regard. He's not a warrior, but he's very, very skilled at what he does, and he has a clear edge when it comes to his poetry. Now, what happens next in this story is subhanAllah, once again, a sign that never think that you are safe from the plotting of the devil and from the whispers that can come within you and from falling into something. And essentially, he falls into a grievous error. And that grievous error was that he was one of the people who spread the slander of Aisha radhiAllahu anha. When he heard Hadithatul Ifk, imagine he's the one who defends the Prophet ﷺ, but as the slander is being passed around, and not everyone is slandering with the exact same terminology. But you know, there are people who are social commentators, right? And Allah ﷻ warns us from being people who are hasty with their tongues, right? Your tongue, talaqawnahu, your tongue meets the slander. And before you can even process it and think about whether or not you should verify it or the implications of that slander, when you become a social commentator, then you just quickly throw it out there. So it's not that Hassan radhiAllahu anhu is the chief hypocrite, Abdullah ibn Ubaid bin Salud, who purposely generates this slander of Aisha radhiAllahu anha, accusing her of zina, right? Accusing our mother radhiAllahu anha of some form of adultery. It's not that. It's that Hassan radhiAllahu anhu did not hold his tongue when he heard it and he ended up repeating it, okay? This is a serious lesson. If you take a step back, that sometimes your greatest strength can also be your greatest weakness.
Hassan had a quick tongue, radhiAllahu anhu, and that quick tongue tricked him in this moment. Right? That quick tongue, quick intellect. When he heard something and he naturally had that posture, right? Of being combative and responding. He unfortunately took that and he spread it. Also keep in mind he's an older man. So his filters are less. It just comes in and it goes out. And that is one of the sad things about his story, but something that we're going to learn a great lesson from. Now, this is the human side of us, right? That we have to talk through for a moment. When we talked about Ka'b ibn Malik radhiAllahu anhu and the three men that stayed behind, him being one of them, we said they're kind of the outliers because they're not the hypocrites who are making excuses to stay behind, nor were they like the believers who went forward. There are three men who got distracted and ended up missing tabook, right? But they're righteous companions of the Prophet ﷺ. Three people that ended up engaging the slander that were not the hypocrites at the time of Madinah. The hypocrites were looking for any means of generating chaos and dysfunction and disunity within Madinah. But three people, Mistah who is the cousin of Aisha radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, Abu Bakr radhiAllahu anhu used to spend on him every single day and he slandered his daughter. And what did we learn from Abu Bakr radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu? When he found out that Mistah was one of those people who spread the slander, Abu Bakr radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu said, I've been spending on this guy all this time, I'm not going to give him any more charity. And what did Allah reveal? بِيَعْفُوا وَلْيَصْمَحُوا أَلَا تُحِبُّونَ يَغْفِرَ اللَّهُ لَكُمْ Forgive and pardon, don't you want Allah to forgive you? And imagine Abu Bakr radhiAllahu anhu says,
I'm going to keep spending on the man that slandered my daughter. I'm going to forgive him, he sought forgiveness, Allah forgave him, I'm going to forgive him and I'm going to spend on him. He passed it, may Allah forgive him and I will continue to spend on him even on the day that he's punished. SubhanAllah. So Mistah radhiAllahu anhu was one of those who slandered. Abu Bakr as-Siddiq radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu was someone who said, I'm not going to allow the Shaytan to take hold of me the way he took hold of Mistah for that moment. Abu Bakr radhiAllahu anhu rose to the moment. That shows you the character of Abu Bakr as-Siddiq radhiAllahu anhu. Another person, the second, obviously Hassan is one and then you have Mistah and then you have Hamna bint Jahsh radhiAllahu anhu. Hamna is the widow of Mus'ab ibn Umair. Right? Mus'ab ibn Umair radhiAllahu anhu's widow is Hamna bint Jahsh, the sister of Abdullah bint Jahsh radhiAllahu anhu. The sister of Zainab bint Jahsh radhiAllahu anhu. And she got caught up. So some people took it and just repeated it. And you know, here's the thing that's important when you're talking about Hadithat al-Ifk, the slander of Aisha radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu, that everyone expects the hypocrites to rumble about it and to do their thing. They're kind of a dismissed group of people amongst the Muslims in the sense that, you know, we expect this from the coroners of Abdullah ibn Ubaid bin Sulayman and those who always try to wreak chaos amongst us. But when it comes from within, it gives it some level of credence which makes it so much harder to distinguish, right? And to put things aside and to arrange them. So these three people are not munafiqeen, they're not hypocrites. They're three companions who made a serious mistake. And Hasan bin Thabit radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu happened to be one of those who made a serious mistake. Now by the way, sometimes we forget there was another person that got slandered,
not just Aisha radhiAllahu anhu, but Safwan radhiAllahu anhu, the man who she was accused of, you know, that horrific rumor with. Safwan radhiAllahu ta'ala anhu was innocent. He didn't have a tribe. And all Safwan did was he was helping Aisha radhiAllahu anhu when she got left behind. And he merely pulled her camel in and he kept his gaze away from her the entire time and he never engaged in anything that was indecent. Safwan didn't have a tribe. He didn't have people to protect him. Now Safwan had a human moment. Safwan radhiAllahu anhu, when he found out that Hasan bin Thabit was one of those who said it, what Safwan does is he goes and he hides behind a path where Hasan radhiAllahu anhu would walk. And then when Hasan is walking out one day, Safwan basically jumps him. Safwan jumps on him and he says, تَلَقَّ دُوبَابُ السَيْفِ عَنِّي فَإِنَّنِي غُلَامٌ إِذَا هُوَ جِيتَ لَسْتُ بِشَاعِرٍ He says, listen, it's actually a line of poetry. He said, I'm a man who when my blood boils, I don't know how to say poetic lines. I only know how to give a beating. So I'm not a poet like you, but you went too far. And Safwan basically jumps on him and starts beating on him. Right. Now, when that happens, this is chaos, right? This is what fitna does. This is what dissension does in the community, right? This is a community that's used to fighting off their enemies together, surviving all these plots. And now, unfortunately, this is penetrating on the inside. So, you know, some of Hassan's people walk by from Khazraj, from Banu Najjar. They see Safwan on top of him beating him, right? So they go and they pull Safwan off. They give him a few hits and they take Safwan to the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. And Hassan radiAllahu anhu is covered in blood. And Safwan radiAllahu anhu is covered in blood.
And the thing is, is that the case of Hassan radiAllahu anhu has not yet been decided. Like Allah did not give revelation yet, confirming who did what and sorting the things out. So Hassan radiAllahu anhu is covered in blood. And technically speaking, Safwan radiAllahu anhu was in the wrong. Now, naturally, humanly, if he heard that you're one of the people that said this, he had a human reaction, right? So he jumped on him and he took justice into his own hands. And the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam told Hassan, Ahsan ya Hassan, Ahsan ya Hassan, let it go, oh Hassan, let it go, oh Hassan, right? This is, you can understand why this is happening. Even if this was not the right way of rectification of this situation, it's understandable why it happened. Ahsan ya Hassan and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam diffuse the situation, even though, again, his wife. Aisha radiAllahu anhu has also been hurt with this. Now, here's the thing. This story is actually one of the stories in which you really see the virtue of Aisha radiAllahu anhu, who we're gonna have to do an extensive biography on her, radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. Aisha radiAllahu anhu forgave all of the people that slandered her. And she would defend them in the presence of people who would attack them. Hassan radiAllahu anhu felt horrible for what he did, and he was punished. The revelation came down, he was punished, as was Mistah, as was Hamna bin Jahsh. But again, they're not excommunicated from the community, they're not people that no longer have a place within society. He made a serious mistake. So he says about Aisha radiAllahu anhu, when Aisha radiAllahu anhu said, do not, la tasubbu Hassan, don't say anything bad about Hassan, fa innahu kana yunafiha an rasulillah salAllahu alaihi wa sallam. He used to defend the Prophet salAllahu alaihi wa sallam. Do you imagine, subhanAllah, how righteous this woman is? She was hurt by him, but she says, but he used to defend the Prophet salAllahu alaihi wa sallam.
So if anyone started to say anything bad about Hassan, Aisha radiAllahu anhu would step in and say, no, no, he used to defend the Messenger of Allah, salAllahu alaihi wa sallam. Don't attack him. Don't think you're doing me any favors when you start to put him down in this regard. So the author is a poem about Aisha radiAllahu anhu. He says, Hassanun, razanun, ma tu zannu bi ribatin, wa tusbihu ghartha min luhumil ghawafili, aqilatu hayyin min luayy ibn ghalibin, kiramil masa'i, majduhum ghayru za'iri, muhadhabatun qad tayyaballahu kheemaha, wa tahharaha min kulli suu'in wa baatiri, fa in kuntu qad qultu allathi qad za'amtum, fala rafa'at sawti ilayya anamili, wa kayfa wa wuddi ma hayyitu wa nusrati li ali rasulillahi zaynu almahafili, lahu ratabun alin ala an nasi kullihim, taqasara anhu suratul mutataawili, fa inna allathi qad qeela laysa bila'itin, walakinna hu qawlum ri'in bi maa hili. This is so profound. He says, hasanun, razanun, ma tu zannu bi ribatin, wa tusbihu ghartha min luhumil ghawafili. So basically, he's praising Aisha radiAllahu anhu. He says, a chaste, pious woman who never backbites anyone. She never talks bad about anybody. And, tusbihu ghartha min luhumil ghawafili. Ghartha, she wakes up hungry, or she basically starves herself from the meat of the unsuspecting. She starves herself from the meat of the unsuspecting. Now, let me break this down. Obviously, Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la likens gossip and backbiting to eating the dead meat of a person.
And what he's saying is, Aisha radiAllahu anha would never eat the meat of the unsuspecting person. She would never backbite. An innocent person. So she's someone who, no matter what the circumstances, no matter what happens, Aisha radiAllahu anha never backbites. Aqeelatu hayyin min lu'ayyibni ghalibin. This shows you the poetic nature of Hasan here, by the way. He says, the wife of the best man, from lu'ayyibni ghalib. Lu'ayyibni ghalib is the ancestor of the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and Aisha radiAllahu anhu. So a common ancestor. He basically went up the chain and he praised them as the children of their common ancestors. So he mentioned their common ancestors. And he says, Kiramil masa'i majduhum ghayru za'iri. Honorable, noble people who will never fall. They never will fall out of grace, no matter what anyone says about them. Muhadhabatun qad tayyiballahu kheemaha. A woman of the best manners and from the best origins. Watahharaha min kulli su'in wa ba'tari. And Allah protected her and purified her from every type of evil and every type of falsehood. Fa'in kuntu qad qultu allathee qad za'amtum. So indeed, if I said that which you have said, that I have said, Fala rafa'at salti ilayya anamili. Basically saying, then let my hand not even be able to raise my whip towards me. So he's saying, may Allah paralyze me if I engaged in this slander in the way that some of you are saying I engaged. Some of the scholars are saying here, what Hassan was saying is that, I was not one of those who was at the head here. Yes, I made a mistake and I said it when it came to me and I should have done better. But, you know, if I was one of those people who originated this and who took it to that level, then may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala paralyze me. I have no right to continue onwards and walking onwards. And he says,
Wakayfa wawuddee maa hayyitu wa nusrati li aali rasoolillahi zaynu al-muhafiri. And how could it be? When I have sworn that as long as I live, my love and my passion is that I would defend the Prophet ﷺ and his family, the best man who ever lived. And he continues and he says, Lahu ratabun alin ala nasi kullihim. The Prophet ﷺ has a rank that is way higher than anyone other than him. Taqasara anhu suratul mutataawili. That even a person who has high ambitions to strive to become something great, would still fall short of being like the Prophet ﷺ. Fa inna allathee qad qeera laysa bila'iqin walakinna hu qawlum ri'in bimaahilin. And he said that what has been said could not be further from the truth, meaning about our mother Aisha radiyallahu anha, but was said by someone who spurns evil of the worst kind, who spurns fitna of the worst kind, which is of course this originated with the enemy of the Prophet ﷺ, the chief of the hypocrites who wanted to cause havoc and succeeded temporarily. In causing havoc in the community of the Prophet ﷺ by trying to scandalize the house of the Prophet ﷺ. Right? So this is Hassan radiyallahu ta'ala anhu in trying to, you know, make up for what has happened. However, the stain of this mistake would live with him for the rest of his life. And there are multiple narrations about this afterwards. Hisham ibn Urwa ibn Zubair. So I don't want to lose you all here. But if you remember Asma' bint Abi Bakr was the wife of Zubair, therefore the mother of Abdullah ibn Zubair and Urwa ibn Zubair. So therefore, the children of Asma' bint Abi Bakr were the maternal nephews of Aisha radiyallahu anha, which is why we have so much of the seerah, right?
Urwa ibn Zubair used to enter upon Aisha and collect seerah, collect narrations from Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha because they were the nephews of Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha. So Urwa one time walked into the house of Aisha and saw Hassan ibn Thabit sitting there. And Hassan ibn Thabit lived to be 120 years old radiyallahu anhu and went blind. And he walked in and he describes, he said, I saw Aisha radiyallahu anha tukrimuhu and she was honoring him. And so I started to curse him. And Aisha radiyallahu anha said, No, no, innahu kana yunafihu an rasulillahi sallallahu alaihi wasallam. No, no, he used to defend the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. We're not going to do that. And when one of the times when she did that, Hassan radiyallahu anhu started to say the poem where he's praising her. And the first line of poetry was once again that she does not backbite, that she would never backbite. And Aisha radiyallahu anhu said to Hassan in that moment, walakinaka anta lasta kadhalik. But you're not like that. You slipped. So you keep on saying this phrase about not backbiting, not backbiting. But let's not forget you did make that mistake. So just because I'm defending you against these guys, I haven't forget, I have not forgotten that you also said those words. So, you know, basically Hassan radiyallahu anhu, you know, jazakallah khair for defending the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. But you don't have to keep on reciting that line of poetry as if nothing happened in the past. And subhanAllah, there was one time where there were some women that were doing tawaf with Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anhu. And they saw Hassan radiyallahu anhu and they started to say bad things about Hassan. And she said, la tasubuhu, do not, do not say anything bad about Hassan radiyallahu anhu.
And she said, waqad amia, and he's blind, like he's old and he's blind. And he used to defend the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. Like there's no point. Don't fall to that and saying bad things about him. And she said, wallahi inni la arju an yudkhila hullahu aljanna bi kalimatin qalahunna li abi sufyan hajawta muhammadan fa ajabtu anhu. She said, I swear by Allah that I hope Allah will enter him into Jannah for these lines that he said to Abu Sufyan. And it was the first poem that I recited in Sahih Muslim, the long poetry defending the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. So she said, no, no, we're not going to say anything bad about him. We will only speak good about him for the good that he did. And he's forgiven for the bad that he did. Ibn Abbas radiyallahu anhu had an incident where Hassan radiyallahu anhu came in. And someone, a young person said, qadima Hassan al-la'in. The cursed Hassan came forward. And Ibn Abbas radiyallahu anhu says, wallahi ma huwa bi la'in. How dare you say that? I swear by Allah, he's not a cursed person. Qad jahad ma'a rasoolillahi sallallahu alaihi wasallam bi nafsihi wa lisanihi. No, this is a person that strove alongside the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam with his self and with his tongue. And he should not be put down because of this one mistake that he made. Abu Huraira radiyallahu ta'ala anhu also. And this is, you know, subhanAllah, perhaps one of the things that shows you the spiritual maturity of the companions. The spiritual maturity of the companions, right, that they saw people make significant mistakes and come back from those mistakes in the time of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. They saw people come back from apostasy. Right. And some of the next generation, they couldn't handle, like, you know, they had this level of piety to live up to. And so they heard the good and the bad and they took the bad sometimes and they started to say things like that. So one time Hassan radiyallahu anhu, as an old man, he noticed that some of the people were not treating him well.
And Abu Huraira radiyallahu anhu was there and he said, Ya Abu Huraira, O Abu Huraira, I ask you by Allah, Hal sam'ata Rasool Allahi sallallahu alaihi wasallam yaqool, Ya Hassan ajib a'an Rasool Allah, Allahumma ayyidhu bi roohil khudus. Didn't you hear the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam say, O Hassan, O Allah, support Hassan with Jibreel alaihi wasallam, with the Holy Spirit. And Abu Huraira radiyallahu anhu said, Allahumma na'am. I swear by Allah I heard it. Meaning we shouldn't put Hassan radiyallahu anhu down for that mistake. Instead, we should extol his virtue. He made a mistake, he sought forgiveness and he was forgiven, radiyallahu ta'ala anhu. And ultimately what he goes down in history as is not the man who slandered Aish radiyallahu anhu, but the man who defended the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. And it's important for us sometimes to come across stories like this from the companions, sometimes. Because redemption is to the gravity of the mistake. And so this was a serious path back because he didn't just commit any sin, he committed the sin of slander. And he didn't just slander any person, he slandered Aish radiyallahu anhu. But the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam made a way back for him and the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam honoured him. He forgave him. Aish radiyallahu anhu forgave him. Abu Bakr radiyallahu ta'ala anhu forgave him. And ultimately, of course, we know that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has made it so that he would go down as the poet of the Prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam. And the one al-mu'ayyad bi ruh al-Quds, the one who was supported by Jibreel alayhi wasallam. As we said, he lived 120 years. And subhanAllah, Ibn Sa'd said, Aasha sitteena sana fil jahiliya wa sitteena sana fil islam. It's interesting, subhanAllah. He lived 60 years before Islam and 60 years in Islam. 60 years in the days of ignorance and 60 years in Islam. And became a person who would, of course, you know, still go down as the legend of the poet that he was.
But it's interesting, and I'll end with this as well. None of the poetry that he did on behalf of any of those tyrants, none of the poetry that he did, the dispoetry and the hit poetry of the time is preserved. Which tells you something, right? That what is not done for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala goes down in the dustbins of history and absolutely has no relevance whatsoever. That Hasan al-Diallah was celebrated, and it was a test for him to give that up to become a Muslim. Because Hasan al-Diallah, you know what he could have done? He could have took money from the people of Medina. Imagine how much the hypocrites would have paid him to make poetry against the Prophet ﷺ. Imagine if he went to Mecca and joined the ranks of those people that were hurting the Prophet ﷺ in every way, and wrote poetry against the Prophet ﷺ. But instead he chose to use his skill on behalf of the Prophet ﷺ. And we have the beautiful poetry that he spoke on behalf of the Prophet ﷺ. We ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to be pleased with him, to forgive him, and to allow us to be amongst those people that defend our Messenger ﷺ in the most beautiful ways. Allahumma ameen. I believe before we cut, we have a brother who actually is going to take shahadah insha'Allah ta'ala with us. So we're not going to do the questions and answers insha'Allah. Would you like to do it now or you want to do it after? I caught you off guard, didn't I? Do you want to wait until after the prayer or would you rather do it now? After the prayer, okay. So insha'Allah we will do it after the prayer insha'Allah ta'ala. So those of you that are here, please stay behind after Salat al-Isha' insha'Allah ta'ala. We'll be giving shahadah to our brother. And insha'Allah next week we're going to talk about Nusaybah bin Ammarah radiyaAllahu ta'ala anha. So insha'Allah please do join us next week as well for Nusaybah bin Ka'b radiyaAllahu ta'ala anha. Wa salat wa salam be upon our Prophet Muhammad ﷺ and his family and companions.
Wa salamu alaikum wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh.
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