Abu Muwayhibah

ProfileAbu Muwayhibah

Abu Muwayhibah (may Allah be pleased with him) was a freed servant of the Prophet ﷺ, of the tribe of Muzaynah, whose land lies towards Yanbu on the coast. According to the early biographies, he was probably taken captive in a raid, and freed by the Prophet ﷺ. Nothing is recorded of his early life. According to the early biographies, he was one of the people of the Suffah, who lived in the mosque and learned there. According to the early biographies, he was at the expedition of al-Muraysi', and one early author says that he was the man who led Aishah's camel on that journey, the one where she was later left behind and slandered.

Uqbah ibn Amir told that the Prophet ﷺ went out and prayed over the martyrs of Uhud, eight years after they were killed, as if bidding farewell to the living and the dead. Then he went up to the pulpit and said that he was a forerunner for them and a witness over them, that he was looking at his pool at that moment, that the keys of the treasures of the earth had been given to him, and that he did not fear that they would worship others besides Allah after him, but that they would strive against each other over the world (Sahih al-Bukhari).

According to the early biographies, in the report in Musnad Ahmad, Abu Muwayhibah said that the Prophet ﷺ woke him in the night and told him that he had been commanded to ask forgiveness for the people of al-Baqi', and told him to come. In the middle of the night they went to al-Baqi', and the Prophet ﷺ greeted the dead and told them that they were fortunate in their state, and that trials were coming like pieces of a dark night, one after another, each worse than the one before. Then he turned to Abu Muwayhibah and said that he had been offered the keys of the treasures of this world and to live in it to its end and then Paradise, or to meet his Lord and Paradise. Abu Muwayhibah begged him to take the keys of this world, and to live, and then have Paradise. The Prophet ﷺ said that he had chosen the meeting with his Lord. According to the early biographies, he asked forgiveness for the people of al-Baqi' and returned, and his illness began soon after.

According to the early biographies, this is the only report he narrated, and the place and time of his death are not recorded.

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