Majma al-Zawaid — Hadith 4711

Sayyiduna Jabir bin Abdullah al-Salami (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates: The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) came to the quarter of Banu Amr bin Awf on a Wednesday. He saw a large building among the people's lands and properties which he had not seen before. He said to them: "O company of the Ansar!" The people said: "At your service, O Messenger of Allah! May our fathers and mothers be sacrificed for you." The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "It would be good if, when you come for your Eid, you stayed until you hear what I have to say." The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) meant doing so on Friday. The people said: "Very well, O Messenger of Allah! May our fathers and mothers be sacrificed for you." When Friday came, they joined the prayer behind him. When he had completed the prayer, he offered two voluntary rak'ahs right in his place. Before that, after praying the Friday prayer he used to go home and offer those two rak'ahs in his house, but that day he offered those two voluntary rak'ahs in the mosque. When he finished praying, he turned his face towards the people. The Ansar had come into the mosque; they had come to the mosque of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said to them: "O company of the Ansar!" The people said: "At your service, O Messenger of Allah! May our fathers and mothers be sacrificed for you." The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "In the Days of Ignorance you did not worship Allah Almighty, yet with your wealth you bore much of the burden of the afflicted, did good deeds and maintained ties of kinship, until Allah Almighty favoured you with Islam and with Sayyiduna Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him), and now you have started building high houses and forts. Whatever a human being eats, there is a reward for it; whatever a bird eats and whatever a beast of prey eats, there is a reward for it." The people went back, and every one of them knocked down the structure on his land. The narrator says: What this means is that they knocked down the walls they had built around their orchards so that people could go in and eat the fruit there.
Al-Tabarani recorded it in al-Mu'jam al-Awsat. Al-Bazzar recorded a similar report and added these words: "He used to visit the sick, attend funerals, and when he was invited he would accept." The narrator states: This report is transmitted from Sayyiduna Jabir (may Allah be pleased with him) only with this chain. (Allamah al-Haythami says:) I say: Its chain contains a group of narrators whom I do not know.