A Busy Year: The Islam of ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ

That completes the events of the seventh year of the hijrah. Now to the events of the eighth year of the hijrah, and this is a very busy year: there is the Islam of Khālid, ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ and ʿUthmān ibn Ṭalḥah; then the Battle of Muʾtah, the first proper battle between the Muslims and the Roman Empire; and then there is the Fatḥ of Makkah, and the great Battle of Ḥunayn, and the siege of al-Ṭāʾif. So it is a very busy year.

It starts with the story of the Islam of ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ and Khālid. ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: I fought against the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) in the Battle of Badr, and Allah saved me; and then I fought against Muḥammad in the Battle of Uḥud, and Allah saved me; and then I fought against Muḥammad in the Battle of al-Khandaq, and Allah saved me. Now when is ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ saying this? He is saying it after he became Muslim. So now he is looking back at his memories, thinking about it and saying: man, I was fighting the Messenger of Allah — what in the world was I doing? Back then, being a mushrik, a disbeliever, the way he would think about things was different. And now, when he looks back at it, he is saying: wait a minute, I was fighting against the Messenger of Allah. And these are the Companions who loved the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) more than anything in the world. So after every battle he would say: and Allah saved me — meaning, if I had died then, I would have been in the hellfire. So he is going through his history.

He said: I fought against the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) at Badr, and then I fought against him at Uḥud, and then I fought against him at al-Khandaq, and I was beginning to feel that no matter what, Muḥammad was going to win. His armies were getting better and better; his daʿwah was spreading more and more; and we were getting more constricted and narrowed in our movement day after day. So ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ was starting to feel this conflict and depression that a kāfir would have when he sees the victory of Islam. There is so much built-up envy, jealousy and hatred in the hearts of the kuffār; and one has to keep in mind that Shayṭān is the one who dominates the heart of the disbeliever. So all of these feelings were bottled up inside the heart of ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ, and he just had enough of it, and he decided that he was going to leave Makkah and go and stay in a place called al-Waḥṭ. He took his family and his wealth, and he went there, and he said: wa aqlaltu min al-nās — and I stayed away from people. He just wanted to stay away from everyone.

And then came al-Ḥudaybiyah — when the contract of al-Ḥudaybiyah occurred, when Quraysh were forced to admit the existence of the Islamic state, and forced to admit the authority of Muḥammad (peace be upon him). When some of the Companions complained about Uḥud^*, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) reminded them of the days of Uḥud, the early days of Islam, and told them: now Quraysh have accepted peace from you. He was turning their attention to the great developments that were occurring; and it was said before that al-Ḥudaybiyah was a great victory for Islam. So when al-Ḥudaybiyah happened, ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: tomorrow Muḥammad will enter Makkah; it is inevitable; Muḥammad is going to come in. If it has reached the degree that Quraysh have been unable to fight him when he is at the doorstep of Makkah, and they have accepted to sign a treaty with him, this is a sign that sooner or later Muḥammad will enter Makkah. So he ruled out staying in Makkah, and he ruled out staying in al-Ṭāʾif — and these are the two major cities of al-Ḥijāz.

He called some of the members of his clan. ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ was a man who was respected among his people; they used to listen to him and see him as their guide. So he called these people who had trust in him, and he told them: I can see that the affair of Muḥammad is rising above all others in a horrible way. He was seeing the events unfolding in front of his eyes, and through his wisdom and intelligence he could read through these events and history and see that Muḥammad (peace be upon him) and Islam were slowly but surely rising, and rising, and rising, against everything else. I can see this with my own eyes. He was a disbeliever, but he could sense and feel that; he could see it — just as some of the kuffār today can see it, while unfortunately many of the Muslims are failing to see it. They are deep in their sleep, and they cannot see what is happening and unfolding in the events of the ummah today, and they are failing to see the victory of Allah (swt) that is on its way.

So ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ told his people: therefore I do not think it is a good idea for us to stay in Makkah; rather, I believe that we should go and stay with al-Najāshī in Abyssinia. ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ had a good relationship with al-Najāshī, so he wanted to put that to use, and he said: let us go and stay over there. If Muḥammad is victorious, then we are away from him; and if he loses and Quraysh wins, then Quraysh already know who we are and what our position is. And ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said about himself: and I would see that if all Quraysh became Muslim, I would never become Muslim. That is how much hatred he had in his heart for Islam: if all of my people, every single one of them in Quraysh, becomes Muslim, I will not. So they agreed with his assessment and opinion, and they decided to travel together and go to Abyssinia — to leave their land, to make hijrah. And what was the driving force behind that? It was hatred towards Islam.