a company would stand its ground; so whoever, at that moment, can stay seated, or lower his gaze and remember Allah, I hope he will be spared the danger of showing off.
On the Day of Badr ʿUtbah ibn Rabīʿah said to his comrades, pointing to the Prophet’s Companions, “Do you not see them, kneeling on their knees? They look like guards, licking their lips the way serpents—or, he said, vipers—lick theirs.”
Al-Umawī writes in his Maghāzī: When the Prophet ﷺ urged the Muslims to fight, he granted every man whatever he might seize and said, “By Him in whose hand is my soul, no one who fights them today—then is slain—while patient, seeking his reward, advancing and not turning his back, but that Allah will admit him to Paradise.” He also mentioned the story of ʿUmayr ibn al-Ḥumām, as related earlier.
The Messenger of Allah ﷺ himself fought vigorously with his noble person, and so did Abū Bakr al-Ṣiddīq. Just as they had striven in the command post with supplication and humble entreaty, they later came down, urged the army on, and fought with their own bodies, combining both honored stations.
Imām Aḥmad relates: Wakiʿ told us, Isrāʾīl told us, from Abū Isḥāq, from Ḥārithah ibn Muḍarrib, from ʿAlī, who said: “On the Day of Badr we would seek shelter behind the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and he was the one of us closest to the enemy; that day he was the fiercest of people in combat.”
Al-Nasāʾī transmits, through Abū Isḥāq from Ḥārithah, from ʿAlī, who said: “Whenever the battle grew intense and the two forces met, we would shield ourselves behind the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.”
Imām Aḥmad also reports: Abū Nuʿaym told us, Masʿar told us, from Abū ʿAwn, from Abū Ṣāliḥ al-Ḥanafī, from ʿAlī, who said: “It was said to ʿAlī and to Abū Bakr, may Allah be pleased with them both, on the Day of Badr: ‘With one of you is Gabriel, and with the other Michael; and Isrāfīl, a mighty angel, is present at the battle but does not fight’—or he said, ‘is present in the ranks.’ ”
This agrees with what has been mentioned earlier: Abū Bakr stood on the right wing. When the angels descended on the Day of Badr, Gabriel was on one flank with five hundred angels, stationed on the right near Abū Bakr al-Ṣiddīq; Michael was on the other flank with five hundred angels, forming up on the left, where ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib was positioned.
In a ḥadīth recorded by Abū Yaʿlā through the chain of Muḥammad ibn Jubayr ibn Muṭʿim, ʿAlī said: “I was drawing water from the well on the Day of Badr when a violent wind blew, then another, and yet another; then Michael descended with a thousand angels.”