Chapter: What Has Been Reported Concerning the Campaign against the Byzantines
Al-Bukhārī said:
Ishāq ibn Yazīd al-Dimashqī narrated to us; Yaḥyā ibn Ḥamzah narrated to us; Thawr ibn Yazīd informed me, from Khālid ibn Maʿdān, that ʿUmayr ibn al-Aswad al-ʿAnsī told him:
He came to ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit while the latter was staying at a spot on the coast near Ḥimṣ (1), living in a small structure of his, and with him was Umm Ḥarām. ʿUmayr said:
Umm Ḥarām related to us that she had heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say:
“The first army from my community that embarks upon the sea has assured itself (Paradise).”
Umm Ḥarām said, “O Messenger of Allah, shall I be among them?”
He replied, “You will be among them.”
She continued: Then the Prophet ﷺ said,
“The first army from my community that attacks the city of Caesar will be forgiven.”
I asked, “Am I among them, O Messenger of Allah?”
He said, “No.” (2)
Al-Bukhārī alone recorded this ḥadīth; none of the other compilers of the Six Books included it.
Al-Bayhaqī also transmitted it in Dalāʾil al-Nubuwwah: from al-Ḥākim, from Abū ʿAmr ibn Abī Jaʿfar, from al-Ḥasan ibn Sufyān, from Hishām ibn ʿAmmār al-Khaṭīb, from Yaḥyā ibn Ḥamzah al-Qāḍī, with wording similar in meaning to the first narration. (3)
This ḥadīth contains three evidences of Prophethood.
- His foretelling of the first naval expedition, which indeed occurred in 27 AH, when Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān, acting as governor of Syria for ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān, led the raid on Cyprus. With that force was Umm Ḥarām bint Milḥān, accompanying her husband ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit—one of the twelve leaders on the night of al-ʿAqabah. She died on their return journey before reaching Syria, as al-Bukhārī’s version has already mentioned.
Ibn Zayd said she died in Cyprus in 27 AH.
- The second expedition was the assault on Constantinople by the very first army to march against it, whose commander was Yazīd ibn Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān, in 52 AH. Among its ranks was Abū Ayyūb Khālid ibn Zayd al-Anṣārī, who died there—may Allah be pleased with him. The aforementioned woman was not with them, for she had passed away during the first expedition.
Thus this ḥadīth contains three signs of Prophethood: the foretelling of the two campaigns, the statement that the woman would be with the first force and not the second, and the precise fulfillment of events exactly as he ﷺ foretold.
Foretelling the Campaign to India
Imām Aḥmad (4) said: Hushaym narrated to us, from Sayyār, from Jabr ibn ʿUbaydah, from Abū Hurayrah, who said: “The Messenger of Allah ﷺ promised us…”