to what awaited them of the terrors of the Day of Resurrection; for, as people say, “This thing beside that thing is but sleep.” Even though the first state contains hardships and horrors, when it is compared with something more severe, more grievous, and more overwhelming, it is as though it were mere slumber. The Qur’an itself points to this, where it says, “Then, when the Greatest Catastrophe comes” (79:34) [al-Naziʿat]. At that point he would weep until his beard was soaked. (1)
Al-Walid ibn Muslim said: ʿAbd Allah ibn al-ʿAlaʾ related to me; Basr ibn ʿUbayd Allah al-Hadrami related to me: I heard Abu Idris al-Khawlani say:
“During the Age of Ignorance the people gathered around a wandering ascetic somewhere between Iraq and Syria. He rose among them and declared, ‘O people, you will surely die and then be resurrected for requital and reckoning.’ A man stood up and said, ‘By Allah, I have seen someone whom Allah will never raise. I saw him fall from his mount at one of the Arab fairs, and the camels trampled him beneath their pads, the beasts of burden under their hooves, and the foot-travellers under their feet, until he decayed and not even a fingertip was left.’
“The wanderer replied, ‘You are a people of shallow minds, weak certainty, and scant knowledge. Suppose a hyena spent the night (2) over that corpse and devoured it, then defecated it (3); suppose the vulture (4) came next morning, ate that and excreted it; suppose a dung-eating beast then picked it up, and someone used it to stoke the fire under his family’s cooking-pot; then the winds scattered its ashes. On the Day of Resurrection Allah will command everything that has taken a part of him to return what it took, and it will return it. Then Allah will resurrect him for requital and reward.’ (5)”
Al-Walid ibn Muslim also narrated: ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Yazid ibn Jabir told me that a hard-hearted elder of the Age of Ignorance once said to Muhammad, “O Muhammad, I have heard that you make three claims that no man of sound mind should believe. You say that the Arabs will abandon what they and their fathers have long worshipped; that we shall come to possess the treasures of Khosrow and Caesar; and that we shall be raised to life after our bones have rotted.”
The Messenger of Allah replied, “Indeed—by Him in whose hand is my soul—the Arabs shall certainly abandon what they and their fathers worshipped, you shall surely seize the treasures of Khosrow and Caesar, and you shall surely die and then be resurrected. Then I will most certainly take you by the hand on the Day of Resurrection and remind you of these words of yours.”
The man said, “Then do not lose me among the dead, and do not forget me.”
He answered, “I will neither lose you among the dead nor forget you.”
That elder lived on until the Messenger of Allah passed away, and he witnessed the Muslims’ conquest of the treasures of Khosrow and Caesar. He accepted Islam, and his Islam was sound. ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) would often hear the old man sobbing and weeping in the Mosque of the Messenger of Allah, overwhelmed by the way he had once addressed the Messenger of Allah. ʿUmar would go to him, calm him, and say, “You have embraced Islam, and the Messenger of Allah promised to take you by the hand. The Messenger of Allah never takes anyone by the hand except that he prospers and is felicitous, God willing.” (6)