A Nation That Filled the Horizon

The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) says: ʿuriḍat ʿalayya al-umam, fa-raʾaytu al-nabiyya wa maʿahu al-rahṭ, wa al-nabiyya wa maʿahu al-rajulu wa al-rajulān, wa al-nabiyya wa laysa maʿahu aḥad — the nations of the world were presented to me. I saw some prophets who had a small group. Some of the prophets had a man, or two, following them on the Day of Judgement. Imagine: a nabī comes with one man, or two men, with him — that is it. All of his life he was making daʿwah, and the result was one or two men. That is it. And then the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: and I saw some of the anbiyāʾ with no one with them. There were some anbiyāʾ who had no followers whatsoever.

The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: thumma ʿuriḍa lī sawādun ʿaẓīm — and then I saw a huge nation. The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: I desired — I wished — that this would be my ummah. The Messenger of Allah asked the two angels who were with him, Jibrīl and Mīkāʾīl — this was a dream the Messenger of Allah was seeing; Jibrīl came and took his right hand, and Mīkāʾīl his left hand, and they took him on this journey. So the Messenger of Allah said: is this my ummah? The Messenger of Allah wanted this to be his ummah, because it was huge. They said: no — hādhihi ummatu Mūsā — these are Banū Isrāʾīl; this is the ummah of Mūsā, Banū Isrāʾīl.

But look to the right side. So I looked to the right side, and I saw a nation filling the horizon. And then they told me: look to the other side. So I looked to the other side, and I saw a nation filling the horizon. They said: this is your ummah, and Allah (swt) will include with them 70,000. 70,000 of your ummah will enter Jannah without going through the regular reckoning that everyone else goes through. 70,000 of this ummah will enter Paradise without going through the stage of accountability that everyone else has to go through. This is the karāmah of Allah (swt) to this ummah. But we also learn from the hadith that the second largest nation is the nation of Banū Isrāʾīl, the children of Israel.