Abu Jandal ibn Suhayl

ProfileAbu Jandal ibn Suhayl

Abu Jandal (may Allah be pleased with him) was the younger son of Suhayl ibn Amr, and the brother of Abdullah ibn Suhayl and of Sahlah, the wife of Abu Hudhayfah. According to the early biographies, he was a boy when the Prophet ﷺ received the revelation, and he followed his older brother into Islam in secret, while his father did not know. According to the early biographies, when his father found out, he put him in chains in a room of his house. He had no chance to spend time with the Prophet ﷺ or the other Muslims.

Al-Miswar told that while the treaty was being written at Hudaybiyyah, Abu Jandal bin Suhayl bin Amr came from the valley of Makkah, staggering in his fetters, and fell down among the Muslims. Suhayl said that this was the first term of the treaty, that he be returned to him. The Prophet ﷺ said that the treaty had not yet been written, but Suhayl refused to give way. Abu Jandal cried out, "O Muslims! Will I be returned to the pagans though I have come as a Muslim? Don't you see how much I have suffered?" He had been tortured severely for the sake of Allah (Sahih al-Bukhari). Sahl ibn Hunayf told that he had seen himself on the day of Abu Jandal, and that if he could have refused the Messenger of Allah's ﷺ order then, he would have refused it (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, the Prophet ﷺ told him to be patient, for Allah would make a way out for him and for the other weak believers. According to the early biographies, Umar walked beside him as he was taken away, and urged him to kill his father, offering his own sword, but Abu Jandal would not.

The account in Sahih al-Bukhari goes on that Abu Basir, another believer from Makkah, who had been sent back and had killed one of the two men taking him, went to the seashore. The Prophet ﷺ said of him, woe to his mother, what a stirrer of war he would be if he had supporters. Abu Jandal bin Suhayl then freed himself from the Quraysh and joined Abu Basir. Whenever a man of Quraysh accepted Islam, he joined Abu Basir, until they were a strong group. Whenever they heard of a caravan of Quraysh going to Syria, they stopped it and attacked it. The people of Quraysh then sent a message to the Prophet ﷺ, asking him for the sake of Allah and of kinship to send for them, and saying that whoever came to him would be safe (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, they came to Madinah, and Abu Jandal lived there with his brother Abdullah.

According to the early biographies, in the time of Abu Bakr and Umar he went to Syria to fight, with his father Suhayl, now a Muslim, and fought in the front lines, and he is said to have died of the plague of Amwas, with much of his family.

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