Musnad of Abdullah bin Mas'ud

It is narrated from al-Aswad bin Yazid (may Allah have mercy on him) that he related: My uncle and I came to Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) at the time of the intense midday heat, and he established the prayer. We began to move back behind him (for the prayer), so he took the hand of one of us with his right hand and the other with his left hand, and made us stand on his right and his left (level with him). Then when he had completed the prayer, he said: "This is how the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) used to do when (the worshippers) were three."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Allah Almighty has not laid down any prohibition (restriction) except that He knew that someone or other among you would commit it. Beware! I am holding you by your waist-wraps to save you from the Fire, so that you do not fall into it the way moths, flies or beetles (rush and) fall."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "He will not enter Paradise who has in his heart even a mustard seed's weight of arrogance."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Indeed, the last person to enter Paradise will be a man who walks on the Bridge (al-Sirat): sometimes he falls, sometimes he walks, and sometimes the Fire scorches him. Then when he has crossed it, he will turn to look at it and say: 'Blessed is the One who has saved me from you! Allah has given me what He has not given to anyone among the first and the last.' Then a tree will be shown to him, and on seeing it he will say: 'O my Lord, bring me near to this tree so that I may stay in its shade and drink of its water.' Allah Almighty will say: 'O My servant, perhaps if I bring you near to it, you will ask Me for something else?' He will say: 'No, O my Lord.' And he will make a covenant with Allah that he will not ask for anything besides it, while the Lord, the Blessed and Exalted, knows that he will soon ask, because he is seeing something for which he has no patience. So Allah will bring him near to it. Then another tree, more beautiful than the first, will be shown to him, and he will say: 'O my Lord, bring me near to this tree so that I may stay in its shade and drink of its water.' Allah Almighty will say: 'O My servant, did you not make a covenant with Me that you would not ask for anything besides it?' He will say: 'O my Lord, just this one (grant it); I will not ask for anything besides it.' So Allah will bring him near to it. Then another tree will be raised up near the gate of Paradise, more beautiful than all of them, and he will say: 'O my Lord, bring me near to this tree so that I may stay in its shade and drink of its water.' Allah Almighty will say: 'O My servant, did you not make a covenant with Me that you would not ask for anything besides it?' He will say: 'O my Lord, just this one (grant it); I will not ask for anything besides it.' He will make a covenant with Allah, while the Lord Almighty knows that he will ask for more besides it, because he is seeing blessings for which he has no patience. So Allah will bring him near to it, and he will hear the voices of the people of Paradise and say: 'O my Lord, Paradise, Paradise!' Allah Almighty will say: 'O My servant, did you not make a covenant with Me that you would not ask for anything besides it?' He will say: 'O my Lord, admit me into Paradise.' Then Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, will say: 'O My servant, what will put an end to your asking? Will it please you that I give you the whole world and another like it along with it?' He will say: 'Are You mocking me, when You are the Lord of Might?'" After this, Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) laughed (while narrating this) until his molars showed. Then he asked: "Will you not ask me why I laughed?" The people asked: "Why did you laugh?" He said: "Because the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) laughed (in the same way)."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "I was not kept back on three occasions (from attending upon the Prophet) - or he said, I was not prevented -: from the gathering of private and confidential talk, and from such-and-such, and from such-and-such." (The narrator) Abdullah says: My uncle forgot one thing and I forgot another, but this incident remained in memory. (Sayyiduna Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) said:) I came to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), and Sayyiduna Malik al-Rahawi (may Allah be pleased with him) was sitting with him. I caught the last part of their conversation; he was saying: "O Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), I am a man to whom Allah Almighty has given the beauty that you see, so I do not like anyone to surpass me even to the extent of two sandal straps or more. Is this attitude counted as transgression and arrogance?" He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "No; rather, real transgression is that a person belittles the truth and regards people as lowly and contemptible."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) lay down to rest on a mat whose marks became visible on his blessed side. So we said: "O Messenger of Allah, if only you had informed us, we would have spread under you a bedding much softer than this." At this he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "What have I to do with the world? The likeness of me and this world is only that of a rider who set out on a journey on a summer day, then rested for a while in the shade of a tree, then left it and went on towards his destination."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Those people kept us from the middle prayer (al-salat al-wusta, the Asr prayer) until the sun set. May Allah Almighty fill their bellies and their graves with fire." This hadith is repeated: the Imam, the author, also narrated it through another chain with the same words.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him): "On the night the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was taken on the night journey (the night of the Mi'raj), he met Sayyiduna Ibrahim, Sayyiduna Musa and Sayyiduna Isa (peace be upon them), and they all discussed among themselves the time when the Hour will be established. They first asked Sayyiduna Ibrahim (peace be upon him), and he had no knowledge of it; then they asked Sayyiduna Musa (peace be upon him), and he too had no knowledge of it. Then the matter was turned to Sayyiduna Isa (peace be upon him), and he said: 'Allah has informed me about some of the matters that come before the Hour takes place, but no one except Allah knows the actual time of its coming.' Then he mentioned the emergence of the Dajjal, (saying): 'I will descend and kill him. Then the people will return to their lands, and they will be confronted by Ya'juj and Ma'juj (Gog and Magog), who will rush down from every height. Whatever water they pass by, they will drink it up, and whatever thing they pass by, they will ruin it. The people will cry out to me for help, so I will supplicate to Allah, and Allah will destroy them, and because of that the earth will become putrid with their stench. Then I will supplicate to Allah, and He will send down rain from the sky, which will carry their bodies away and cast them into the sea. Then the mountains will be crushed to dust, and the earth will be stretched out like leather. So Allah, the Blessed and Exalted, has made a covenant with me that when these signs appear, the Hour will be to the people like a pregnant woman whose term is complete, whose family does not know when she will suddenly startle them with her delivery, by night or by day.'" Al-Awwam (may Allah have mercy on him) said: I found confirmation of this in the Book of Allah; then he recited this verse: "Until, when Ya'juj and Ma'juj are let loose" [Al-Anbiya: 96].

Huzayl bin Shurahbil (may Allah have mercy on him) relates: "A man came to Sayyiduna Abu Musa (may Allah be pleased with him) and Salman bin Rabi'ah (may Allah have mercy on him) and asked them about (the inheritance of) a daughter, a son's daughter and a full sister; then the narrator mentioned the (rest of the) hadith."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "May Allah keep radiant and flourishing the person who heard a hadith from us and then conveyed it (to others) exactly as he heard it, for often the one to whom a hadith is conveyed retains and understands it better than the one who heard it directly."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whenever any servant is afflicted with grief, sorrow or anxiety and says: 'Allahumma inni abduka wabnu abdika, nasiyati bi-yadika, madin fiyya hukmuka, adlun fiyya qada'uka, as'aluka bi-kulli ismin sammayta bihi nafsaka, aw anzaltahu fi kitabika, aw allamtahu ahadan min khalqika, aw ista'tharta bihi fi ilmi al-ghaybi indaka, an taj'ala al-Qur'ana rabi'a qalbi, wa nura basari, wa jala'a huzni, wa dhahaba hammi' (O Allah, I am Your servant and the son of Your servant; my forelock is in Your Hand; Your command over me is ever carried out; Your decree concerning me is entirely just. I ask You by every one of Your names with which You have named Yourself, or which You revealed in Your Book, or taught to any of Your creation, or kept hidden in the knowledge of the unseen with You, that You make the Noble Qur'an the spring of my heart, the light of my sight, the cure of my grief and the means of the removal of my anxiety), then Allah Almighty removes his anxiety and grants him joy in place of his grief." The Companions said: "O Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), is it fitting for us to learn these words?" He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Yes, whoever hears them should certainly learn them."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "The millstone of Islam will keep turning for thirty-five, thirty-six or thirty-seven years; then, if they perish, they will be on the path of those who perished, and if they remain, their religion will remain for them for seventy years."

Masruq (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) (and most probably he narrated it from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him)) that he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "I had forbidden you from visiting graves; now visit them. And I had forbidden you from keeping the meat of sacrificial animals beyond three days; now you may keep it (for your needs). And I had forbidden you from using these particular vessels; now prepare drinks (nabidh) in them, but avoid every intoxicant completely."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), Zirr bin Hubaysh (may Allah have mercy on him) relating, that it was said: "O Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), how will you recognize on the Day of Resurrection those of your Ummah whom you did not see (in this world)?" He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "They will have radiant foreheads and shining hands and feet, with white marks from the traces of ablution (wudu) that will distinguish them from others."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that on the Night of the Jinn the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) asked: "Do you have water for ablution?" He said: No, except some date nabidh in a vessel. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Bring it; it is wholesome dates and purifying water."

It is narrated from Alqamah (may Allah have mercy on him) that Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "Shall I not lead you in prayer according to the prayer of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)?" Then he led them in prayer and raised his hands only once.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him): "When the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was taken on the Mi'raj, he (peace and blessings be upon him) reached Sidrat al-Muntaha (the Lote Tree of the Utmost Boundary), which is in the sixth heaven. Whatever rises up from the earth stops there and is received from there, and whatever command descends from above also stops there and is received from there." Concerning this very place Allah Almighty says: "When there covered the Lote Tree that which covered it", and in explanation of it he said: "It refers to moths of gold." He further said: "There the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was given three great things: the five daily prayers, the concluding verses of Surah al-Baqarah, and forgiveness of the muqhimat (ruinous major sins) for whoever of his (peace and blessings be upon him) Ummah does not associate anyone with Allah."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: I came to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) while he (peace and blessings be upon him) was seated in a leather tent with about forty people present, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "(The gates of conquest) will be opened for you, you will be helped and supported, and you will attain (spoils and success). So whoever of you lives to see that time should fear Allah Almighty, enjoin what is good, forbid what is evil and maintain the ties of kinship." And (he said): "Whoever deliberately lies about me, let him take his seat in Hell. And the example of one who helps his people unjustly is like that of a camel that has fallen into a well and is being pulled out by its tail."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him): "The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) used to fast three days at the beginning of every new moon (that is, in the first days of every lunar month), and it rarely happened that he (peace and blessings be upon him) did not fast on Friday."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that one night the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) delayed the Isha prayer; then, when he (peace and blessings be upon him) came to the mosque, the people were sitting waiting for the prayer. At that he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Among the followers of all religions there is no one besides you who is engaged in the remembrance of Allah Almighty at this hour." Sayyiduna Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) relates that it was in this context that these blessed verses were revealed: from "They are not all alike: among the People of the Book is a community that stands (firm upon the truth)" [Al Imran: 113] to "And Allah knows well those who are mindful of Him" [Al Imran: 115].

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whoever deliberately lies about me, let him take his seat in the Fire of Hell."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "If I were to choose anyone from my Ummah as my khalil (most intimate friend), I would certainly have taken Sayyiduna Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) as my khalil."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him): "During travel the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) would sometimes fast and sometimes not fast, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) would pray two rak'ahs (as the shortened prayer), which he never abandoned. (The narrator) says: he (peace and blessings be upon him) would not add to them, meaning to the rak'ahs of the obligatory prayer."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "I was picking a miswak from an arak tree for the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), and the wind was tilting me this way and that (because of my thinness), and my shins were thin, at which the people laughed. The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) asked: 'What are you laughing at?' The people said: At the thinness of his shins. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: 'By the One in whose Hand my soul is! These two shins are heavier in the Scale (of deeds) than the mountain of Uhud.'"

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "I was a young boy and used to graze the goats of Uqbah bin Abi Mu'ayt, when the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) and Sayyiduna Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) came by (while leaving Makkah), having escaped from the polytheists. They asked: 'O boy, do you have any milk that you can give us to drink?' I said: Yes, I do, but I am a trustee, and I cannot give the two of you milk to drink (without the owner's permission). The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: 'Do you have a young she-goat that no male has yet mated with (that is, one that has not yet conceived and gives no milk)?' I said: Yes. So I brought it to him (peace and blessings be upon him), and the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) took hold of it, passed his hand over its udder and supplicated, and the milk began to flow abundantly. Sayyiduna Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) brought a deep, bowl-like hollow stone, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) milked into it, then drank himself; Sayyiduna Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) also drank, and I drank too. Then he (peace and blessings be upon him) said to the udder: 'Shrink,' and it became as it was (dry, as before). After that I came to him (peace and blessings be upon him) and said: O Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), teach me something of this speech, that is, of this Qur'an. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: 'Indeed, you are a well-taught (well-mannered) boy.' So he (peace and blessings be upon him) taught me, and I took seventy surahs directly from his blessed mouth, in which no one can dispute or rival me."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him): "The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was praying in the shade of the Ka'bah, and Abu Jahl and some people of Quraysh, who had slaughtered a camel in an outlying part of Makkah, sent a man who brought its entrails and threw them between his (peace and blessings be upon him) shoulders. Then Sayyidah Fatimah (may Allah be pleased with her) came and removed them from his (peace and blessings be upon him) blessed body. When he (peace and blessings be upon him) had finished the prayer, he (peace and blessings be upon him) invoked against them (and he (peace and blessings be upon him) liked to supplicate three times); he (peace and blessings be upon him) said three times: 'Allahumma alayka bi-Quraysh' (O Allah, seize Quraysh), then, naming them, he said: 'Abu Jahl bin Hisham, Utbah bin Rabi'ah, Shaybah bin Rabi'ah, al-Walid bin Utbah, Umayyah bin Khalaf and Uqbah bin Abi Mu'ayt (deserve Your punishment).'" Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "By Allah! I saw all of them lying dead in the well of Badr, or (the narrator is unsure) in a well." Imam Abu Ishaq (may Allah have mercy on him) said: I have forgotten the name of the seventh person.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that Sayyidah Umm Habibah (may Allah be pleased with her) supplicated (before Allah): 'Allahumma barik li fi zawji Rasulillah, wa bi-abi Abi Sufyan, wa bi-akhi Mu'awiyah' (O Allah, bless me in my husband, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), in my father Abu Sufyan and in my brother Mu'awiyah). Then the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "You have asked Allah Almighty about terms that are already fixed, provisions that have already been allotted, and spans of life that are to be reached; none of these will come before its appointed time. Had you asked Allah to protect you from the punishment of the Fire or the punishment of the grave, that would have been better and more excellent for you." The narrator relates that then monkeys were mentioned (and I think pigs were also mentioned), whether they were those who had been transformed among the Children of Israel. He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whenever Allah Almighty destroyed (transformed) a people, He left them no offspring or descendants, whereas monkeys and pigs existed even before that (incident of the Children of Israel)."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the people asked the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) about monkeys and pigs: "Are they from the offspring of the (transformed) Jews?" The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Indeed, whenever Allah Almighty cursed a people and transformed them (changed their forms), their lineage did not continue; rather He destroys them (soon). These (monkeys and pigs) were a distinct creation that already existed; then, when Allah Almighty became angry with the Jews, He transformed them, and they became like those (already existing animals)."

Shayban (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated the like of the previous report from Dawud bin Abi al-Furat (may Allah have mercy on him) with the same chain.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Indeed, the worst of people are those whom the Hour will overtake while they are alive, and those who take graves as places of prostration."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whoever is struck by poverty or severe need and presents it to people (to have it relieved), his need will never be met; but if he presents it before Allah, Allah Almighty will surely soon grant him sufficiency, whether in the form of wealth that comes quickly or in the form of death that comes later (by which his poverty will come to an end)."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him): "All the nations were presented to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), until his own Ummah was presented, and their great number pleased him (peace and blessings be upon him) greatly. Then it was said (from Allah Almighty): Along with these there are seventy thousand fortunate people who will enter Paradise without any reckoning."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "When the last third of the night remains, Allah Almighty descends to the lowest heaven; then the gates of heaven are opened, then (the carpet of mercy and giving) is spread out; then Allah Almighty says: 'Is there anyone who asks?' And this call from Allah Almighty continues in this way until dawn breaks."

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that once he was delivering a sermon when suddenly he noticed a snake crawling on the wall. He (may Allah be pleased with him) broke off his sermon and struck it with a small stick until he killed it, then said: "I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) saying: 'Whoever kills a snake, it is as if he has killed a polytheist man.'"

Shayban (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated to us; he said: Dawud bin Abi al-Furat (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated to us something similar with his same (previous) chain.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him). Masruq (may Allah have mercy on him) relates: One night after the Maghrib prayer we were sitting in the gathering of Sayyiduna Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him), and he was teaching us the Noble Qur'an, when a man asked him: "O Abu Abd al-Rahman, did you ever ask the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) how many caliphs would rule this Ummah?" Sayyiduna Ibn Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) replied: "Since I came to Iraq, no one before you has asked me this." Then he said: "Yes! We asked the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) about it, and he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: 'Twelve, equal to the number of the chiefs (nuqaba) of the Children of Israel.'"

Shayban (may Allah have mercy on him) narrated that Hammad (may Allah have mercy on him) reported something similar with his same (previous) chain.

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Those of you who are people of intellect and understanding and of mature age should stand close to me (in prayer), then those who come after them (in rank), then those who come after them; and do not be out of line (in the rows), lest your hearts differ; and protect yourselves from the clamour and tumult of the markets."

Something similar to this (that is, like the previous report) is also narrated from Yazid bin Zuray' (may Allah have mercy on him).

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Beware! Do not turn back (again) to disbelief after me, striking the necks of one another."