Nu'aym ibn Abdullah

ProfileNu'aym ibn Abdullah

Nu'aym ibn Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) was of the clan of Adi of Quraysh, a cousin of Umar, and known as an-Nahham. According to the early biographies, he was among the first dozen to accept Islam, and was loved in his clan for his kindness and his generosity, though not a rich man. According to the early biographies, he hid his Islam for a long time.

According to the early biographies, on the day Umar set out with his sword to find the Prophet ﷺ and put an end to the trouble, Nu'aym met him, and asked where he was going. Umar said that he was going to kill Muhammad. Nu'aym said that he should first go to his own family, for his sister Fatimah and her husband Sa'id ibn Zayd had accepted Islam. According to the early biographies, Umar turned aside to their house, and what he heard there changed him, and he went to the Prophet ﷺ to accept Islam instead.

According to the early biographies, when the Prophet ﷺ migrated, the clan of Adi asked Nu'aym to stay in Makkah, because so many widows and orphans of the clan depended on him, and promised not to harm him for his religion. According to the early biographies, he stayed, and later came to the Prophet ﷺ with some forty people of his clan, who accepted Islam at his hands. According to the early biographies, the Prophet ﷺ rose to him and kissed his head, and said that his people were better to him than the Prophet's ﷺ own people, who had driven him out. Nu'aym answered that he had been kept back from migrating by his people, while the Prophet ﷺ had been given the reward of the migration.

Jabir told that a man set his slave free after his own death, and had no other property, and the Prophet ﷺ cancelled the arrangement and sold the slave, and Nu'aym ibn Abdullah bought him for eight hundred dirhams. The Prophet ﷺ gave the money to the owner and told him to spend it on himself first, then his family, then his relatives (Sahih al-Bukhari; Sahih Muslim).

According to the early biographies, he served as a soldier under Abu Bakr and Umar, and was killed at Yarmuk. According to the early biographies, he was called an-Nahham because the Prophet ﷺ said that he had entered Paradise on the night of the ascension and heard the clearing of Nu'aym's throat in it.

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