The Firsts (Sahaba Stories) | The Forerunners of Islam
57 / 152
44
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Khawla Bint Hakim & Uthman Ibn Madhun: The Righteous Couple | The Firsts
52
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Al-Shifa bint Abdullah (ra): The Healer and Scholar | The Firsts Shorts
58
Life of the Prophet (seerah)
Shurahbil Ibn Hasana (ra): The Scribe and Commander | The Firsts Shorts
125
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
Utbah ibn Ghazwan (ra) | The Humble Governor | The Firsts Shorts
Utbah ibn Ghazwan (ra) was one of the first 10 people to embrace Islam, He lived to take it far into Iraq yet he remained in a simple tent and preferred a life of obscurity.
Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Salamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh, dear brothers and sisters. Welcome back to the first shorts where, alhamdulillah, I mean, we are looking at the lives of those early Muslims who we only have a few paragraphs about, but whose lives are rich with lessons for us today. And inshallah ta'ala, as we get to this last set of companions, what I want to start to do is group them inshallah ta'ala to the best of my ability, to where we can start to see some trends inshallah ta'ala. So this next set of companions, precisely the next three men that we're going to be covering, are men who were commanders in the battlefield, but did not narrate many hadith from the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam. In fact, none at all from these three that we're going to be covering. They were not really involved in any social life outside of being recognized as warriors, but their contributions to this religion are significant in that the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam entrusted them with some of the most important missions in Islam, as well as those amongst them who lived in a time of khulafa ar-rashideen, in the time of the righteous caliphs. So these three inshallah ta'ala are going to be very similar in regards to their biographies, but at the same time, there are little things to pay attention to. And the first person we're talking about is a man by the name of Utbah ibn Ghazwan radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. And as you might be surprised by the title and how we refer to him, that this is a man who is as early as the seventh Muslim after the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam. The seventh Muslim. Now I'm just, I want you to sit with that for a bit inshallah ta'ala and think about what the implications of that are. Abdullah ibn Mas'ud radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, of course, is referred to as one of the earliest of those Muslims, the third or the sixth person after the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam. And here you have this man who is the seventh Muslim according to a narration from him.
And of course, even if he was not exactly the seventh, because as we know, there were a few people that were becoming Muslim in the very early days, then he is certainly in the first 10 or 15 maximum of those who accepted Islam. Utbah ibn Ghazwan radiAllahu ta'ala anhu is the son of a man by the name of Ghazwan ibn al-Harith. And this is a small tribe that is related to Quraysh, but not from Quraysh. And they are known as Banu Mazin. And so at that time you had people that were known as Halif. They are people who have pledged their allegiance to a larger tribe. And the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam said, the Halif of a people, the one who pledges allegiance to a tribe is one of them. He's to be considered as one of them. And so his allegiance was to a larger tribe of Quraysh by the name of Banu Nawfal. And Banu Nawfal was a famous tribe. The chief of that tribe is the famous Mut'im ibn Adi. So he's not from Quraysh per se, but he becomes a Halif and one who pledges allegiance to Banu Nawfal of Quraysh. And he's someone who is known for his physical strength, for his beauty, for his intelligence. He's described as taweelan jameelan, tall, handsome, strong, a person with great command of speech, a person who had large eyes, a person who had much light that came from his face. So Utbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu is described as having an imposing presence in that sense. And when he embraces Islam, he's about 10 years younger than the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam. So that would put him just around the age of 30 years old when he embraces Islam. We don't have much about him in regards to his early days, because as we said, this was a man whose seerah speaks through the battlefield. And because there were no battles early on, Utbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu really doesn't have anything narrated about him early on, except that he made the two hijras to Abyssinia,
and he was one of the first to make the hijrah to the Medina of the Prophet salallahu alaihi wasalam. So he's one of those people who made three hijras in total, twice to Abyssinia and once to Medina as well. What we know of his family life, his sisters both embraced Islam along with him. One of his sisters is named Fakhita, and Fakhita radiAllahu ta'ala anha, bint al-Harith, would later on marry Uthman ibn Affan radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. So Fakhita marries Uthman radiAllahu ta'ala anhu later on in life. And so Uthman becomes the brother-in-law of Utbah. His other sister is named Basra, Basra with a sin, not a Saad. And I'll talk about why that distinction is important inshAllah to us. So Basra, his youngest sister also embraced Islam with him, and she would marry none other than Abu Huraira radiAllahu ta'ala anhu much later on. And so this man then becomes the brother-in-law of both Uthman and Abu Huraira, may Allah be pleased with them all. So we don't have anything narrated about him in Abyssinia. We don't have anything narrated about him in regards to the hijrah itself. It's really when he gets to Medina that we get to see Utbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu shine. The Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam paired him off with none other than the famous Abu Dujana radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, the great warrior from the Ansar. So that kind of gives you an idea of the type of person Utbah was, because the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam's pairings of the Muhajireen and the Ansar were not random. So he has a very similar type of character, build and presence like Abu Dujana radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. And then we see that he's someone that fought bravely in Badr. He fought bravely in Uhud. So he's a veteran of Badr. He's a veteran of Uhud. He fought in Khandaq. He fought in all of the battles with the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam. And Rasulullah salAllahu alayhi wasalam used to appoint him to some of the special raids because of his particular expertise.
And we also see that he fought in the battle of the apostates under Abu Bakr as-Siddiq radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. So all of this that we know of him, we don't have a single incident between him and the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wasalam narrated in that regard, except that he was someone that was known in the battlefield and he would attract a presence to him when he was in the battlefield. We really see his most famous story in the time of Umar ibn al-Khattab radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, which is not uncommon that as the battles raged on under Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and Islam spread to many parts of the world. That's where some of these companions who did not have much of, you know, much narrated about them before you start to see some of the stories about him. So what is he most noted for under Umar ibn al-Khattab radiAllahu ta'ala anhu? Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu dispatched him against the Persians in particular, and he had a battalion of anywhere from 300 to 2000 men. So it wasn't a large group of people that would fight with him, but he had an experienced group of people, mainly men from Banu Thaqif that were very severe, that were very noted for their bravery in battle, for their courage. And he was someone that was able to make massive gains against the Persian empire under Umar ibn al-Khattab radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. And he particularly reaches a city by the name at that time of Al-Ubullah. Al-Ubullah was a main point of the Persians, a strategic city that belonged to the Persians. And he asks Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu for permission to attack, to go in. And once this falls, this is going to be a major change in the battle against the Persians. Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu gives him permission and he is able to conquer Al-Ubullah with his small battalion.
And Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu appoints him the governor of that city for six months. Now, what is the city known as in history? This is the city of Basra, the city of Basra with a Sa'ad. So not his sister Basra, Basra. And this becomes very significant because Iraq would be known as the two Iraqs, Basra and Kufa, right? These were the two major strongholds, the two major cities of Al-Iraq. And he was able to conquer one of them. And of course, much of our Islamic scholarship would come out of Basra. Much of our civilization would come out of Basra. And some of the historians, they mentioned that Basra comes from Basr, which refers to obviously vision and eyesight, because they said that if you were at that place, then you had an overview of all of Iraq. You could really see all of Iraq from there in the sense of how strategic the location was and how central it was to everything that existed in Iraq at the time. So he is the one who Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala opened Basra on his hands. And when he conquered Basra, Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, as we said, he ordered him to take the position of being a governor of that city. And he was the governor for six months. Now, when Uthbah was there and the sahaba and the tabi'een that were with him conquered that strategic place, Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu noted that many of the people around him, you know, saw all of this dunya, all of these material things suddenly come into their possession. So suddenly there were big homes that were being built. Suddenly the spoils of war were falling into the hands of these many men. And Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu was uncomfortable with all of this material wealth that was suddenly coming into the possession of the Muslims. And so Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu, though he was the governor, he actually did not pitch or he actually did not build a home for himself, but rather he pitched a tent.
So think about the scenery, right, where the governor and the head commander does not build a home, does not take one of the homes or one of the palaces that is left behind after that battle. But instead Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu pitches a tent while others are taking homes. And this is where you find the one narration from Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. It's in Sahih Muslim in Kitab al-Zuhd wa al-Raqa'iq, the book of asceticism and heart softeners, where Khalid ibn Umair, he narrates that Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu stood up and he gave a khutbah. So you're hearing a narration about Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu from his khutbah as he is speaking to the people. And this is all that we have from him. It's in Ibn Majah as well. He says, laqad ra'aytunee saabiAAa sabAAatin maAAa rasoolillahi sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. He said that I found myself as the seventh amongst seven who had been with Allah's messenger sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. So that's why we say he's possibly as early as the seventh person to accept Islam, because these are his words. I remember being the seventh of seven with the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. And he says ma taAAamuna illa waraqul hubla. He says that the only thing that we had to eat were the leaves of this particular wild tree. And he says until our gums were ruptured. Okay, so he says hatta qarihat ashdaqudah, that our gums actually became ruptured because of the nature of what we were eating. And some of the scholars say this is referring to the boycott of the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. So he's saying that, look, we lived through some very hard times, and I was with the Prophet sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. And that's why I can't see myself being in this position with you all. And then he goes on to say, and this is not in the hadith, but some of the books of Siyar, that I remember when Sa'd ibn Abi Waqas radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and myself only had one garment to share amongst ourselves.
Why is that significant? Because Sa'd radiAllahu ta'ala anhu would be the main commander and the governor of Kufa while he would be the governor of Basra. The two Iraqs were by these two men. He's saying subhanAllah, we're in charge of the two biggest cities in Iraq right now, or these two major outposts at the time that will develop into those cities. And I remember when there was a time when we only had one garment to share between ourselves. And he said, a'udhu billah an akuna azeeman nda nafsi saghiran nda Allah, I seek refuge in Allah from being great in my own eyes and being small in the sight of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So I seek refuge in Allah from seeing myself in such a way, whereas Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala would see me very small. So Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu was uncomfortable by the developments because he's used to being a field commander. He's used to living a very harsh life for the sake of Allah and for the messenger sallAllahu alayhi wa sallam. And he really doesn't want to get involved in the distribution of wealth, and he wants to instead continue fighting. Now, here's what interestingly happens between him and Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. Uthbah did not want to be the governor of a city. He didn't want to stop being in the field. And Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu had appointed him as such, so he could not relinquish his post without permission from Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. So that next year, he asks for permission to go to Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and hajj. So he goes to meet Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu and hajj, and then he accompanies Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu to Al-Madinah. And in Madinah, he begs Umar bin al-Khattab radiAllahu ta'ala anhu to relieve him from being the governor of that city. Right? And Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu insists upon him and says, look, you're not going to leave me as the singular person holding a post. None of us, meaning the companions of the Prophet salAllahu alayhi wa sallam, like these
positions of leadership or prestige, but this is a trust from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So no, you're not going to leave me to be the only one that's holding this post. So Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu insists. He tries to say that, look, you know, by virtue of me preceding you or coming before you in regards to having embraced Islam, Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu says, this doesn't take away from your virtue, but Uthbah, you have to remain in charge. This is your post. How this made Uthbah feel subhanAllah is really interesting here because we think about how people kill each other over positions of leadership today, how power corrupts people and how the pursuit of power leads to all sorts of persecution and corruption. Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu was so saddened that Umar radiAllahu ta'ala anhu would not relieve him from that position that when he was getting on his camel in Medina, he looks to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and he says, Allahumma laa tarudani ilayha. Oh Allah, don't return me to it. Oh Allah, don't return me to that post. His whole life, he was mujahid fee sabeelillah. He was a field commander. He does not want to be in that position of leadership, in that position of comfort. So he says, Oh Allah, do not return me to it. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala answered his dua that Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu who could take on massive armies, was always outnumbered, dies on his way home to Al-Iraq by falling off of his camel. SubhanAllah, out of all types of deaths that could have happened to him, a man who could control multiple animals in war and dictate large armies, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala decreed that on his way home, he would fall off of his camel and he would pass away radiAllahu ta'ala anhum. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala accept Uthbah radiAllahu ta'ala anhu. SubhanAllah, this man who could have been as early as the seventh man to embrace Islam that we only hear about with a few paragraphs, but his contributions are of course huge.
When you look at the khair, the goodness that came out of Basra and Allah knows best what else he accomplished as a silent soldier for the sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. May Allah be pleased with him and may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala allow us to inherit that same level of dedication. Allahumma ameen. InshaAllah ta'ala. Next time, we will continue by speaking about another person very similar to Uthbah by the name of Shurhabeel. JazakumAllahu khayran, wasalamualikoum wa rahmatollahi wa barakatoh.
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
