Sayedaty
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Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. As-salamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu and welcome back to another episode of Sayyidati. Today I want to discuss the story of Zubaydah bint Ja'far ibn Mansur, who was the wife of the famous Harun al-Rashid during the Abbasid Khalifa. For those of you who might be familiar with her story, or not, her real name was actually Amat al-Aziz and she was later given the kunya or agnimun of Umm Ja'far to reflect her lineage as the granddaughter of the Khalifa Abu Ja'far al-Mansur. As for her name Zubaydah, it was actually a nickname she received from her grandfather when she was a child. Fun fact, if you know Arabic, you might be familiar with the term Zibdeh, which means oil or butter. And Zubaydah is the fu'id form of Zabada, so her name literally means like little butter, which is really cute and a great conversation starter for those of you who know or meet a Zubaydah. Anyways, back to our main story. So Zubaydah's father Ja'far was a half-father to the then sitting Abbasid Khalifa al-Mahdi. She married her cousin Harun in 165 Hijri when al-Mahdi's caliphate was in Baghdad, and she soon gave birth to her son al-Amin, who would eventually become Khalifa for some time. As for her personality, one author described her as among the greatest women of her time in terms of her religion, heritage, beauty, eloquence, mind, and her cultural competence. Talk about a rounded personality. Her literary and grammar knowledge was so impressive that once when one of her workers presented her with a book to read, she read it all and told him to fix the mistake. Now as you can imagine, she only hired the best of workers to start off with, so the man was sort of taken aback. What mistake could I have possibly made? So he went through it over and over again and he couldn't find anything. And then finally he requested the help of other experts in the field, and they pointed out this one dua he wrote slightly incorrectly in the entire book. So of course he fixed it and immediately returned it to Zubaydah. But really the whole
incident just goes to show her sharp perceptiveness and acute grasp in the field. Now what she's most usually renowned for is her construction of wells and other water reservoirs for Hajjaj, or pilgrims along the route from Baghdad to Mecca and Medina, which are still present till today and were renamed in her honor as Darbi Zubaydah. The reason she took this project upon herself was a result of her own experience during her fifth pilgrimage to Mecca in 186 Hijri. Upon her route, she noticed that the drought that was occurring at the time was so devastating that even the Zamzam well was down to a trickle of water. In order for more Zamzam to be retrieved, she called her treasurer and asked him to gather all the engineers and workers from around the land to improve the water supply throughout Mecca and the surrounding areas, as well as deepening the Zamzam wells in order to increase their water supply. At her request, the workers hesitated and informed Zubaydah that her plans were enormous and would cost a large sum of money. Yet she persisted in her demand and offered to pay any amount needed to get the job done. Her generosity wasn't limited here either. She was also known for spending on a regular basis on the poor and needy. One of my favorite facts about Zubaydah was that she had 100 maids who were memorizing the Quran. If you've ever heard someone reviewing or memorizing the Quran, it's kind of an entertaining sight. I for one paced around my room endlessly murmuring, and you can always find that one little boy or girl in the masjid sitting on the floor rocking back and forth reciting under the breath, Bismillahirrahmanirrahim, Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen, and you can hear them murmuring. But what's even more interesting is when there's a whole bunch of people doing it at the exact same time. So here you had 100 of her maids memorizing together, and the sound of the recitation was so captivating that her palace was described as a beehive because it constantly sounded like 100 bees were buzzing. SubhanAllah. I mean, that's a lot of barakah right there. What an environment to be in. My respect for Zubaydah stems from her concern
of others. When she went to make hajj as the wife of the khalifa, no doubt she had plenty of water to suffice herself. In fact, she probably could have arranged for all the travelers in sight to be granted water as well. But she had a bigger picture in mind. Not only did she want to help the pilgrims of that year, but she wanted to ensure that no hujjaj would face this problem again. And so she dedicated her time and her money in making sure this project was successfully carried out. Allah Subhanu wa Ta'ala allowed for her work to be established and remain until today. Can you imagine the number of good deeds Zubaydah receives every time a thirsty pilgrim crunches his or her thirst on their way to worship Allah Subhanu wa Ta'ala? Now think about your own community and the challenges they might face. Is there an older khala or uncle who always needs help grabbing a chair when they come to sit for jama'at? Does the city you live in have refugees, homeless people or others in need of help? Identify the issues in your community and think of creative ways for solutions. Tag team with a friend before every Friday to make sure that there are chairs set up in the prayer hall. Organize a clothing or furniture donation drive for local members of your community in need. What my husband and I like to do is keep a whole bunch of food gift cards in our car so anytime we see a homeless person we can offer them a meal for the day. Take time to reflect on your own challenges and remember the reward you'll get every time the little girl you donated just to smiles in happiness. May Allah Subhanu wa Ta'ala put barakah and blessings in our efforts and may He reward us for simply sincerely trying. Ameen. Jazakum Allah khayran. Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.
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