Meeting Muhammad
3 / 31
His Blessed Demeanor | Meeting Muhammad ﷺ Episode 2
Purposeful, humble, thoughtful, cheerful: the personality of the Prophet ﷺ was well-rounded and modest. What aspects of his demeanor might you notice if you spent time with him?
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. So much of the Qur'an when speaking about character emphasizes body language. In fact, when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la talks about Ibadur Rahman, when he talks about the servants of the most merciful, what's the very first description? Allatheena yamshoona AAala al-ardi hauna, they tread the earth lightly. When Luqman Al-Hakeem Alayhi As-Salam is giving his son advice and he talks to him about the way that he raises his voice or the way that he walks. When Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la talks about the way we respond to our parents, not to say uff, not to grunt at them or turn away from them. And you find this in the hadith of the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam as well. The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam saying that a person should not be treacherous with their eyes, winking and looking and making facial expressions behind a person's back in a way that betrays them. And so when you look at the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam's demeanor, everything about the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam's body language is prophetic. First and foremost, you're probably not used to the idea of someone who is so beautiful being so shy. But the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said that the khuluq of Islam, the characteristic of Islam, the key quality of Islam is haya, is modesty. And when you look at the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, he was the shyest person. He was the most bashful of people, even though he had these supreme traits SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. So what were his traits like? What was his demeanor like? So we already said his smile was constant and he's described as bassaman tahakan. He was always smiling and causing others to smile and he was always laughing and causing others to laugh. But his laughter Alaihi Salatu Wasalam was also dignified and shy. When he would laugh SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, all that really was was an extremely wide smile and he would laugh in a way that his smile would open up to where you could see the back of his teeth
SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. And even when he chose to laugh Alaihi Salatu Wasallam, says something about him. So he would laugh when others would laugh, but he also would laugh SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam widening his smile when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la gave him good news. Ali ibn Abi Talib radiAllahu ta'ala anhu mentions the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam having that wide smile, that laughter after his ibadah, after his worship. He would laugh when he shared narrations about Allah's mercy, the famous narration about the man who would enter paradise last and he would think that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la is mocking him because he cannot comprehend the generosity and the mercy of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la and the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam laughs and says Allah laughed at that man when the man said, Ya Allah, are you making fun of me? And you are the Lord of the worlds. So his laugh was not audible, but it was clearly distinct from his usual smile SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and it would show his back teeth. The Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam also was noted for these long periods of silence. You know, sometimes when a person is eloquent, powerful, beautiful, whatever it may be, they tend to dominate every single gathering. They tend to dominate every single conversation. This is the messenger of Allah SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and he's noted for his silence. He was always in this place of reflection and you could tell when you were looking at him SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam that he was deeply perceptive and when he sat around people, he would only speak SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam in a way that was proportionate to the gathering itself. He's also described as having beautiful logic and coherence. He spoke and he spoke to the point. As we said, his articulation was crisp and he would speak slowly and he would repeat himself SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. So everything he said, you would immediately understand it and you would remember it from him SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. Despite his beauty, he generally looked down Alaihi Salatu Wasalam
and when he looked at people, he wouldn't stare. He would just glance at you and then he would look back down SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and that's from his humility. However, if you were enjoying his eye contact, then he maintained it. If you were intimidated by him looking at you, then he looked away as well SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and that's how striking his beauty was. Amr ibn al-As radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. He says that if you ask me to describe the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, I would not be able to describe him because even though I would be right in front of him, I couldn't look at him Ijlalan wa ta'zeeman because of how awe-inspiring his presence was, because of how beautiful he was SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and because of the admiration that I had for him, I just couldn't look up at him SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. Now when the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would turn to you when you would speak, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam was amazing at giving people attention. And so Idhal tafata when he turned SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, he wouldn't just turn his head towards you, he would turn his entire body to you when you would speak to him SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam to let you know that you're the only person he's listening to at the moment. And if you asked for his ear, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would give you his ear and he would not remove his ear until you were done with everything that you had to say. And if you shook his hand SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam, the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would not remove his hand until you removed yours, letting you know that he was all yours when you were speaking to him SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. One of my favorite narrations about the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam in this regard and one that has serious consequences for us in regards to our cell phones is that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam had this ring that he liked and the ring of the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam was a silver ring, it had a ruby stone from Abyssinia. And one time the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam was wearing this ring and he looked at it a few times in the middle of a conversation and then he was disappointed with himself SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam being distracted by his ring from his companions as they were
speaking. So he actually took off his ring SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and he cast it aside and he said that I was looking at this ring a few times but I wanted to get it out of the way because it was distracting me from you SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam. When he would point towards you Alaihi Salatu Wasalam he would not use a finger because if he pointed with his finger towards you then you might feel like he's casting blame towards you. So the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would only point with his entire hand so that you didn't feel like you were being blamed by his finger SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam Itha ta'ajaba when the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam was amazed by something or when he was in the midst of something and something amusing was said the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would tap his thigh and he would say SubhanAllah SubhanAllah. When the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam would walk he was a man that would walk with a sense of purpose. Ali radiAllahu ta'ala Anhu said that the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam's walking was like a man walking downhill. Abu Huraira radiAllahu ta'ala Anhu said you couldn't even keep pace with him and that's because the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam had the walk of someone who had something important to do. He didn't walk arrogantly SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam nor did he walk with laziness but he walked fast and that was a sign that he was always motivated and he was always productive SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and even in his manner of sitting there was humility and there was an intentional humility to it. Allah sent an angel to the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam to ask him if he wanted to live his life as Nabi An Malika or Nabi An Abda as a prophet that lives like a king or a prophet that lives like a humble slave and the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam chose Nabi An Abda to live like a humble slave and he said that's why he would always sit up SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam and eat his food in a certain way and not recline like an arrogant man or like a wealthy man or like a king. So everything the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam did with his demeanor lent itself to his supreme
humility to his modesty to his bashfulness to his shyness and to his sincerity to Allah and to the people SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam
Welcome back!
Bookmark content
Download resources easily
Manage your donations
Track your spiritual growth
1 items
1 items
1 items
25 items
50 items
9 items
