There are so many companions of the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, who knew for certain exactly how they would die. Why? Because the one who spoke to them on behalf of God, who they knew God would disclose future events to, would tell them just that. On one authentic occasion, Anas ibn Malik, may Allah be pleased with him, narrates that the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, climbed Mount Uhud, a mountain beside Medina. And with him was Abu Bakr, his right-hand man, and also Umar, his right-hand man after him, and also Uthman, his son-in-law and right-hand man after Umar. May Allah be pleased with them all. Uhud began to tremble beneath their feet. The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, informed them that Uhud is a mountain in paradise. It will be relocated to paradise. And Uhud is a mountain that loves the believers and loves us, he said, and we love it. And then he tapped Uhud with his foot and he said, Uthbut Uhud, be calm, be still, O Uhud. Fa inna alayka nabi, because standing upon you is a Prophet himself, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, and a Siddiq, one of the strongest confirmers of truth, meaning Abu Bakr, may Allah be pleased with him, and two shaheeds, two martyrs. The remaining two men are Umar and Uthman, may Allah be pleased with them both. And in fact, Umar and Uthman were the two out of those four men who were neither a Prophet and not the most known to be the Siddiqs and were martyred during their respective rules, just as the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, told them they would be. Then there is Ammar ibn Yasir, may Allah be pleased with Ammar, one of the senior most, earliest veteran companions of the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam,
whose mother was the first martyr of Islam. When the Muslims migrated to Medina, as they were building the prophetic mosque in Medina, the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, noticed the distinct toughness of Ammar. He noticed that as everyone was carrying one brick, Ammar was carrying two. And so the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, went over to him and began to dust off his clothing with his own two hands, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, and saying to him in approval, woe to Ammar! He will be killed one day by al-fi'atu al-baaghiya, the transgressing party. When the Battle of Suffin took place three decades later, it was in fact a transgressing party of Muslims that, without due right, opposed the rightful Muslim leader, although with the good intentions of seeking to avenge the murdered caliph, Uthman at the time, may Allah be pleased with him. And so Ammar was of those who was with the rightful Muslim leader to try to keep them at bay and died in the process, may Allah be pleased with him. Interestingly, by the way, when that transgressing army found out that Ammar had been killed, and they were presented with this hadith, the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, called those who kill Ammar, the transgressing army, they did not claim the hadith was fabricated because all of the companions knew that it was unfathomable for any of them to lie about the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, and forge a hadith. And so what they did instead was reinterpret the hadith. They say yes, in fact, Ammar was killed by the transgressing party, but that's not us. The transgressing party are those who put this innocent, virtuous man in front of us when we were going after the murderous villains who had killed Uthman. And so notice they never differed
over the authenticity of that hadith, rather how to understand it or interpret it. And moments before Ammar left this world, in the battle of Suffin, they were passing around a vessel, a container of milk. And so he smiled, may Allah be pleased with him. They asked him about the reason behind his smiling. And he said, the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, said to me, the last thing I would take away from this world, consumed from this world, would be a drink of milk. And I guess here it is. Then he rose from there to meet the promise of the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, and fought valiantly until that death. Another very difficult, very bearing on the heart example are his whispers, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, in his daughter's ears. Aisha, radiyaAllahu anha, narrates that when the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, was in his final illness, his daughter Fatima, radiyaAllahu anha, enters the room, walking just as her father used to walk. And he said, welcome my dear daughter, and he motioned her over. She sat by his side, and he whispered in her ear, and she began to weep heavily. And then he whispered in her ear again, and she began to laugh. And so Aisha, radiyaAllahu anha, said, I never saw someone pivot from crying to laughing so fast. And so I asked her, what did he say to you? She said, I would never disclose the secret of the Messenger of Allah, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. And then when he died, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, I repeated the question, Aisha says, and Fatima felt it was okay, radiyaAllahu anha, to explain now to me. She said, the first time he whispered in my ear, he says that Gabriel, peace be upon him, the archangel, used to review the Quran with me in Ramadan every year. And this year, he reviewed the Quran with me two times. And this is an indication of my time. It has arrived. And you will be the first of my family
to be reunited with me in the hereafter. She said, so I wept. And then he whispered in my ear and said, doesn't it please you that you will be the queen of the believing women in paradise? And so I smiled. The great scholar, Imam al-Nawawi, rahimahullah, he says this is actually not one prophecy, but rather two. The Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam foretold here that he would die from this illness, and he never said this in any illness before it. And he also foretold that young Fatima radiallahu anha, who was in her early 20s at the time, would be the first of his household to die after him. And that in fact happened. Both of those prophecies proved true exactly as he stated them, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. Aisha radiallahu anha narrates, and both of these ahadith are both in Bukhari and Muslim, highly authentic chains, that we asked the Prophet salallahu alayhi wa sallam which of your wives would be reunited with you first in the hereafter. He said the one with the longest arm. She said, so we began to speculate, all eager to be reunited with him after his death, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. And Sawada bint Zam'a, she was the tallest of them, she had the longest arm, we assumed it would be her. And then when Zayna bint Jahsh died first, we understood that we had misunderstood. That by the longest arm, he meant the one who spends the farthest, the one who reaches furthest, extending their charities. And Zaynab was a craftswoman. She would do things with her hand, and she would donate her earnings.