Abu Musa al-Ash'ari

ProfileAbu Musa al-Ash'ari

Abu Musa (may Allah be pleased with him) was Abdullah ibn Qays of the Ash'ari tribe of Yemen. According to the early biographies, he heard of the Prophet ﷺ from traders when he was still a youth, travelled to Makkah to see him, accepted Islam, and was sent back to call his people, and his brothers and tribe became Muslims. According to the early biographies, he was short and thin, and he did not have an imposing presence, but when he came into a gathering everyone turned to him because of his voice.

When the news of the Hijrah reached them in Yemen, he said, they set out as emigrants. They were three brothers, he the youngest, with Abu Burdah and Abu Ruhm, and fifty-two or fifty-three men of his people. They boarded a boat, and it took them to the Negus in Ethiopia, where they met Ja'far ibn Abi Talib and stayed with him. Then they all came to Madinah and met the Prophet ﷺ at the time of the conquest of Khaybar (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, they were blown off course, and the Negus had boats ready for Ja'far and his companions in case he fell. The Prophet ﷺ kissed Ja'far on the forehead and said that he did not know which made him happier, Ja'far's coming or the conquest of Khaybar. According to the early biographies, the people of the boat were told that they had the reward of two migrations, one to the Negus and one to the Prophet ﷺ, and they were given a share of the spoils of Khaybar. When the people of Yemen came, the Prophet ﷺ said that they were gentler and softer in heart (Sahih al-Bukhari). He said that when the Ash'aris ran short of food on campaign, or in Madinah, they gathered what they had in one sheet and divided it equally by a measure, and that they were from him and he from them (Sahih al-Bukhari).

His voice in the Quran was his distinction. The Prophet ﷺ said that he knew the voices of the Ash'aris when they recited the Quran at night, and knew their houses by the sound of their recitation, though he had not seen where they stayed in the daytime (Sahih al-Bukhari). He told Abu Musa that he had been given one of the flutes of the family of Dawud (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, the Prophet ﷺ and Aishah once stopped at his house at night to listen, and when he heard of it he said that he would have recited better had he known. Abu Uthman an-Nahdi said that he never heard an instrument sweeter than Abu Musa's voice, and that when he led them in prayer they wished he would recite al-Baqarah. According to the early biographies, the wives of the Prophet ﷺ went out to listen to him, and Umar would say to him, "Remind us," and he would recite while Umar listened. He told how the Prophet ﷺ said to commit oneself to the Quran, since it runs away more readily than a camel from its rope (Sahih al-Bukhari).

He had a part in the Hunayn campaign. The Prophet ﷺ sent his uncle Abu Amir with an army to Awtas, and Abu Musa was with him. Abu Amir was hit in the knee by an arrow. He showed his nephew who had shot him, and Abu Musa chased the man and killed him. Abu Amir asked him to take out the arrow, and then to give the Prophet ﷺ his greeting and ask him to seek forgiveness for him, and he made Abu Musa commander of the army, and died soon afterwards. Abu Musa told the Prophet ﷺ, who asked for water, made ablution and raised his hands until Abu Musa saw the whiteness of his armpits, and prayed that Allah forgive Abu Amir and raise him above many of His creatures on the Day of Resurrection. Abu Musa asked for himself, and the Prophet ﷺ prayed that Allah forgive the sins of Abdullah ibn Qays and admit him to a noble entrance on the Day of Resurrection (Sahih al-Bukhari; Sahih Muslim). He was with the Prophet ﷺ at al-Ji'ranah when a Bedouin said that the Prophet ﷺ had not fulfilled his promise. The Prophet ﷺ told him to be glad, and when the Bedouin said that he had given him much good news already, the Prophet ﷺ turned to Abu Musa and Bilal and said that the man had refused the good news, so they should take it. He asked for a bowl of water, washed his hands and face in it, rinsed his mouth into it, and told them to drink some of it and pour some on their faces and chests. Umm Salamah called from behind a screen to leave some for her mother (Sahih al-Bukhari).

He told how he once went to look for the Prophet ﷺ, and found him sitting at the well of Aris with his legs hanging into it. Abu Musa sat at the gate and said that he would be the Prophet's ﷺ gatekeeper that day. Abu Bakr came, and the Prophet ﷺ told Abu Musa to let him in and give him the glad tidings of Paradise. Then Umar came, and then Uthman, who was told that he would be in Paradise after a trial that would befall him (Sahih al-Bukhari). He told how the Prophet ﷺ heard him say, on the road to Khaybar, that there is no might or power but with Allah, and told him it was a treasure of Paradise (Sahih al-Bukhari). When his first son was born he took him to the Prophet ﷺ, who named him Ibrahim and rubbed a date on his palate (Sahih al-Bukhari). When Abu Musa and another man asked the Prophet ﷺ to appoint them to posts, he told them that they did not appoint those who asked for it, and yet he sent Abu Musa, with Mu'adh ibn Jabal, to Yemen, each to a province, with the order to make things easy and not hard, and give good news and not drive people away (Sahih al-Bukhari). When they visited each other, Mu'adh asked how Abu Musa recited the Quran. Abu Musa said that he recited it regularly, in portions, and asked Mu'adh in turn, who said that he slept in the first part of the night and then rose to pray, and hoped for reward for his sleep as for his prayer (Sahih al-Bukhari).

According to the early biographies, in every town he went to, he asked after the noon prayer whether anyone wanted to learn the Quran, and taught until the afternoon prayer, and sometimes until sunset. He fought in the conquests, among them Isfahan, Nahawand and Tustar, and Umar made him governor of Basra, and later of Kufa under Uthman. According to the early biographies, Umar would not leave governors in a post for more than a year, but let Abu Musa stay four years in Basra, and he turned it into a city of the Quran, with people crowding round his house at night to hear him pray. According to the early biographies, he left Basra with only six hundred dirhams. He narrated that whoever draws a weapon on us is not of us (Sahih al-Bukhari). He did not take part in the fighting between the Muslims. According to the early biographies, he was Ali's representative in the arbitration after Siffin, and when Mu'awiyah asked him later to take a post, he refused, and said that he could not stand before Allah and answer for the affairs of the community. According to the early biographies, he fasted much, even on hot days, after hearing a voice at sea promising a drink on the day of thirst to those who fasted on a hot day, and when he was dying, he told his wife not to wail for him. He died in 44 AH, aged about sixty-three, and most of the hadith from him come through his son Abu Burdah.

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