This is because Umar had no personal interest in Fadak: [he did not] (1) take it for himself or for any of his relatives or friends, nor did he seek to deprive [the household] (2) of the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace. Rather, he gave them precedence over everyone else in the distribution of stipends and allotted them more than everyone else. Thus, “when he established the register for stipends and recorded the people’s names, they asked, ‘Shall we begin with you?’ He replied, ‘No. Begin with the relatives of the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—and place Umar where Allah has placed him.’ He therefore began with Banū Hāshim and included Banū al-Muttalib with them, because the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—said, ‘Banū Hāshim and Banū al-Muttalib are one and the same. They never parted from us, either in the pre-Islamic period or in Islam.’ (3) He gave precedence to al-Abbās, Ali, al-Hasan, and al-Husayn, assigning them more than he assigned their peers from the other tribes. He also favored Usāma ibn Zayd over his own son Abdullah in the distribution of stipends. His son became angry and said, ‘Do you favor Usāma over me?’ He replied, ‘He was dearer to the Messenger of Allah than you were, and his father was dearer to [the Messenger of Allah] than your father was.’” (4)

What we have mentioned about his giving precedence to Banū Hāshim and favoring them is well known to all scholars of history; no two of them disagree about it. Could someone who showed such consideration for the Messenger’s relatives and family wrong the person closest to him—the foremost of the women of Paradise—while she was grieving [his loss] (5), over a small amount of wealth, even though he gave her children many times