Ammar ibn Yasir

ProfileAmmar ibn Yasir

Ammar (may Allah be pleased with him) was the son of Yasir and Sumayyah. According to the early biographies, Yasir had come from Yemen looking for a lost brother and settled in Makkah as an ally of the clan of Makhzum, who married him to Sumayyah, an Abyssinian slave of theirs. Ammar was about the Prophet's ﷺ age, a strong man, and one of the very first to accept Islam. He said that when he saw the Prophet ﷺ in those days the only believers with him were five slaves, two women and Abu Bakr (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, he met Suhayb at the door of the house of al-Arqam, and each said that he had come to hear what the Prophet ﷺ was saying. They went in together and came out Muslims. He then told his parents about Islam, and they accepted it.

According to the early biographies, they were among the weak of Makkah whom Quraysh tortured in the midday heat. The Prophet ﷺ passed by and told the family of Yasir to be patient, because their meeting place was Paradise. Sumayyah was killed by Abu Jahl and was the first martyr of Islam, and Yasir died under the torture. Ammar himself was beaten, burned and held under water until he said words against the Prophet ﷺ. He came to the Prophet ﷺ in tears, and the Prophet ﷺ asked how he found his heart, and he said it was at peace with faith. The commentators say that the verse allowing words said under compulsion, while the heart is at peace with faith, was revealed about him. According to the early biographies, he migrated to Abyssinia and then to Madinah, and he is said to be the only one of the Emigrants whose parents were both Muslims.

When the Prophet's ﷺ mosque was being built in Madinah, the Companions carried one brick at a time and Ammar carried two. The Prophet ﷺ brushed the dust off him and said that Ammar would call the rebellious group to Paradise while they called him to the Fire (Sahih al-Bukhari). At the Trench, he told him that a rebellious group would kill him (Sahih Muslim). Once, on a journey when no water was found, Ammar rolled in the dust to purify himself and prayed. When he told the Prophet ﷺ, he said that striking the earth with his hands and wiping his face and hands would have been enough (Sahih al-Bukhari). A Companion reported that the Prophet ﷺ said Ammar's heart was full of faith (Sunan an-Nasa'i, graded hasan), and Abu ad-Darda named him as the man Allah had protected from Satan through the Prophet's ﷺ prayer (Sahih al-Bukhari).

According to the early historians, he fought in every battle with the Prophet ﷺ, and at Yamamah he lost part of his ear. Umar made him governor of Kufa and sent Ibn Mas'ud to teach there. When Umar removed him, he said that it had troubled him more when he was appointed than when he was dismissed. He took Ali's side in the fighting and was killed at Siffin in 37 AH, at over ninety years old. According to the early biographies, his son Muhammad, a narrator of hadith, was killed years later after refusing to make up a hadith for al-Mukhtar.

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