Jarīr and Wāʾil

And then Jarīr ibn ʿAbdullāh al-Bajalī came to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him). According to the narration of Imām Aḥmad, Jarīr says: lammā danawtu min al-Madīnati anakhtu rāḥilatī, thumma ḥalaltu ʿaybatī, thumma labistu ḥullatī, thumma dakhaltu fa-idhā Rasūlu Allāhi yakhṭub. Jarīr made his camel kneel by the masjid, and then he entered while the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was speaking, giving a khuṭbah. And people were staring at me. Why were they looking at him? He assumed that the reason was that the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) must have said something. Did the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) mention me? He said: yes; dhakaraka ānifan bi-aḥsani al-dhikr — yes, he mentioned you just now, and mentioned you very well. While the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was speaking in his khuṭbah, he said: now a man will come in through this door, and you will see on his face the signs of a king. He was very handsome; and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: you will see on his face the signs of a king.

Jarīr said: fa-ḥamidtu Allāha ʿazza wa jall — I praised Allah (swt) for that. And Jarīr says: mā ḥajabanī al-nabiyyu mundhu aslamtu, wa lā raʾānī illā tabassama fī wajhī — the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) never refused to see me after I became Muslim, and whenever he saw me he would smile in my face (al-Bukhārī 3035). Wa la-qad shakawtu ilayhi annī lā athbutu ʿalā al-khayl, fa-ḍaraba bi-yadihi fī ṣadrī wa qāla: Allāhumma thabbit-hu wa-jʿalhu hādiyan mahdiyyā — and I told him that I could not stay firm on horses, so he struck me on my chest and said: O Allah, make him firm, and make him a guide and one who is guided. Jarīr said: I never fell off a horse after that. This is how the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) won the hearts of people: he would smile in their faces; he would meet them; he was close to his followers.

And then there was another son of the kings, of Ḥaḍramawt, whose name was Wāʾil ibn Ḥujr. He came to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) and met him, and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) hosted him and treated him very well; and then the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) gave him a piece of land. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) wanted to show him the land, its location, so he sent Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān with him. Muʿāwiyah at the time was a young man, unknown. He was sent with Wāʾil to show him the location of the land. So Muʿāwiyah was going with Wāʾil to guide him to the land, and Wāʾil was riding his camel, and Muʿāwiyah was walking — apparently barefoot, or something like that. And Muʿāwiyah said to him: I want to ride with you on your camel. He said: you are not going to ride with a king; and he refused to let him ride. In another narration it says that Muʿāwiyah said to him: I want to ride; he said: you are not a king, to ride with kings. And then Muʿāwiyah told him: the ground is very hot. So Wāʾil told him: walk in the camel's shadow.

So Muʿāwiyah, obviously, would not forget how badly he had been treated. And the days passed, and Muʿāwiyah became the caliph of the Muslims; and who visited him? Wāʾil ibn Ḥujr. So when Wāʾil came in, Muʿāwiyah had him sit with him, next to him, on his sarīr, which is the couch of the king — unlike when he had wanted to ride the camel and was not allowed. And Muʿāwiyah reminded him of what had happened that day. Wāʾil would later say: wadidtu annī kuntu ḥamaltuhu bayna yadayy — I wish that I had not only let him ride with me on the camel, but had had him ride in front of me.