Burayda ibn al-Husayb al-Aslami

ProfileBurayda ibn al-Husayb al-Aslami

Burayda (may Allah be pleased with him) was the son of al-Husayb, of the Banu Aslam, a tribe who lived on the road between Makkah and Madinah, and their headman. According to the early biographies, he was a man of standing in his tribe, and not known to the people of Makkah or Madinah.

According to the early biographies, as the Prophet ﷺ and Abu Bakr were near the end of the Hijrah, Burayda came out with a group of his people, hoping for the reward Quraysh had offered for the Prophet ﷺ. The Prophet ﷺ asked him who he was. He said that he was Burayda, and the Prophet ﷺ turned to Abu Bakr and said that their affair had grown cool and sound, playing on the meaning of his name, which is like the word for cold. According to the early biographies, the Prophet ﷺ asked him whose tribe he was of, and then told him who he was, and called him to Islam. Burayda accepted Islam, and so did all of those with him. According to the early biographies, they prayed the evening prayer behind him, and when the Prophet ﷺ said that he was going on to Madinah, Burayda said that he should enter it with a banner, and he took off his turban and tied it to the end of a spear and carried it before him.

According to the early biographies, Burayda went back to his people for a while, and later came to Madinah, after Uhud, and was among the Prophet's ﷺ Companions. He told that he fought sixteen campaigns with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ (Sahih al-Bukhari). According to the early biographies, he carried the banner of the Banu Aslam at the Conquest of Makkah.

Burayda told that the Prophet ﷺ sent Ali to Khalid to bring the fifth of the spoils, and that he disliked Ali, who had taken a slave-girl from the fifth and bathed. He told Khalid to look at that, and when they came to the Prophet ﷺ he told him of it. The Prophet ﷺ asked, "O Burayda, do you hate Ali?" He said yes. The Prophet ﷺ said not to hate him, for he deserved more than that from the fifth (Sahih al-Bukhari).

His son Sulayman told that when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ appointed a leader over an army or a detachment, he would tell him in particular to fear Allah and to be good to the Muslims who were with him. Then he would give him the rules of fighting, not to steal from the spoils, not to break a pledge, not to mutilate the dead, and not to kill children (Sahih Muslim). Sulayman also told that the Prophet ﷺ used to teach them, when they went out to the graveyard, to say the greeting of peace to the people of the graves, the believers and Muslims, and that they would join them, if Allah wills, and to ask Allah for peace for themselves and for them (Sahih Muslim).

According to the early biographies, he later settled in Basra and then went to Khurasan, and died in Marw, in the reign of Yazid ibn Mu'awiyah. According to the early biographies, he is counted as a narrator of well over a hundred hadith, and his sons Sulayman and Abdullah narrated from him.

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