Three Men on the Road to Madīnah

So ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ reached a place called al-Shuʿaybah, and then he reached Marr al-Ẓahrān. When he got to this place called Marr al-Ẓahrān, travelling towards Madīnah, he saw two men: one of them was in a tent, and the other was tying the camels. Who were these two men? Khālid ibn al-Walīd and ʿUthmān ibn Ṭalḥah. He walked up to them and said: what are you doing? Where are you going? Khālid ibn al-Walīd said: there is no one left — no one worthy is left — and Muḥammad is prevailing, so we want to go and become Muslim. ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: this is the same reason that brought me.

And this also is a striking thing: these men were among the leaders of the effort to fight Islam — ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ and Khālid ibn al-Walīd. Khālid ibn al-Walīd belongs to the family of Banū Makhzūm, who were enemies of Islam — his father: many āyāt were revealed about his father; and Abū Jahl also belongs to the same family. And then there is ʿUthmān ibn Ṭalḥah. ʿUthmān ibn Ṭalḥah belongs to Banū ʿAbd al-Dār, a very noble family in Quraysh: they were the ones who carried the banner in war, and they are the ones who hold the key of the Kaʿbah. And by the way, they still hold it to this day; the key is inherited from father to son all the way down to this day. And the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: the key shall remain among you until the Day of Judgement; no one shall take it from you but a transgressor. So these three men belonged to these prominent families in Quraysh, and they were very important figures.

And, subḥān Allāh, they all met — what a coincidence; and nothing is a coincidence: everything happens through the qadar of Allah (swt); it is preordained. These were men with twenty years of fighting Islam, and they met along the path to Madīnah, so that they would travel and enter Madīnah together, the three of them. They reached the outskirts of Madīnah, and they heard somebody call out: yā Rabāḥ, yā Rabāḥ, yā Rabāḥ. Rabāḥ is derived from ribḥ, and that means profit — something one gains. So ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: we took it as a good omen.

And then someone saw us and said: Makkah has handed over its reins to you after these two men — referring to ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ and Khālid ibn al-Walīd. Meaning: what is left? Who is left in Makkah after ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ and Khālid ibn al-Walīd have become Muslim? It is as if Makkah had handed over its reins to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) after these men became Muslim. Because, as was said, these men constituted the second generation of the leadership that was fighting Islam. There is the first generation: Abū Jahl, Abū Lahab, Umayyah ibn Khalaf, Ubayy ibn Khalaf, Abū Sufyān, al-Walīd ibn al-Mughīrah. These were the prominent personalities who led the effort to fight Islam in the early days, up to the Battle of Badr.

The Battle of Badr was the day on which the forces of evil were crushed, and the entire first generation of leadership was exterminated. The only one who remained of those men was Abū Sufyān; he is the only man who survived, and the reason he survived is that he did not attend Badr — because the whole reason Badr occurred was to protect the caravan he was leading. ʿUtbah ibn Rabīʿah, Shaybah, al-Walīd, Abū Jahl, Umayyah ibn Khalaf, Ubayy ibn Khalaf — they were all killed. And some of them had already died, like Abū Lahab: he did not die in the Battle of Badr; he died in Makkah. So the next generation that took over the leadership were people like Khālid ibn al-Walīd, ʿIkrimah ibn Abī Jahl, Ṣafwān ibn Umayyah and ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ. They represented the new blood, the new leadership in Makkah, and for these men to become Muslim was such a devastating blow to the people of Makkah. That is why this man saw it as if Makkah had lost: that is it — they are handing over the reins of leadership to the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) after the Islam of these men.

They came into Madīnah, and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was eagerly waiting for them, smiling all the time while they were walking towards him. They could see this beaming smile on the face of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him); he was so happy at their Islam. And this is true daʿwah. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) did not hold anything against them, even though they had fought against him on the battlefield, spoken against him, harmed him, and driven him out of his land. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was looking at the interest of Islam, and he was happy because these men were now going to become soldiers of Allah.

ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: I told the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him): O Messenger of Allah, I pledge my allegiance to you on condition that Allah forgives me all my past sins — and he said, I forgot to ask him to forgive my forthcoming sins. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) told me: O ʿAmr, do you not know that Islam erases everything before it, and that hijrah erases everything before it, and that Ḥajj erases everything before it? (Muslim 121). So these three deeds erase everything. One can see how important Ḥajj and hijrah are: the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) equated them with Islam, in that they erase everything that occurred before them. ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ said: the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) took a lot of care of us, and he used to put us ahead of many of the Companions, and that remained the case until he passed away. And then the same thing with Abū Bakr: he took a lot of care of me and Khālid ibn al-Walīd. And then in the time of ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb, he used to give a lot of attention to me and appoint me to important positions of responsibility. However, as for the relationship between ʿAmr and Khālid, as he says, he disapproved of some of the actions of Khālid ibn al-Walīd. So this is the story according to the narration of ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ.