Abu Jahl Knew the Truth—Why He Still Rejected It

Muslim. And then.

[Silence]

So we have a story here narrated or collected by half of im Muslim. And this story is before the prophet sallallah.aii wasallam made hij when the mushri of started to not only become very hostile but they became murderous. They became murderous. we have one of the biggest enemies of the prophet sallall.aii Wasam and the Muslim and the companions who is known mo to most people as Abu Jah. Abu Jah jah in the Arabic language is ignorance and Abu is usually a term of respect. Abu fan his was never Abu Jah to start with. His name is Amarbin Hishem. He comes from a lineage of basically tribal royalty and he was referred to as Abul Hakim. That was his original kuna that people referred to him as Abul Hakim. I would heckim would translate to one of incredible wisdom and one of incredible justice and fairness. You say alakim is someone who is not only knowledgeable but someone who is very wise and very just and fair. So he was always referred to as Abul Hakim and his name is Amb Hisham and he is originally from the tribe of Kinana which meets with the lineage of the prophet sallall.aii wasallam. He comes from very high esteem and lineage and he was as close to a king in Mecca as anyone could be in that kind of tribal environment. Amarbin Hisham was the first one to kill a Muslim for the sake of his idols and in combat against the prophet sallall.aii alaihi wasallam. He killed the first Muslim was a martyr. It was he murdered her not only in cold blood, but he murdered her in an incredibly defiling way and that he took a spear. It was actually more of a lance. It's a short spear, harpa. And he continued to stab her in her privates until she passed away and was martyed. And from that moment the prophet sallall.aii wasallam referred to him as Abu Jah. this man Abu Jahel is not someone that the prophet sallall.aii wasallam wanted as an enemy. He wanted him to become Muslim and he tried very hard to bring him to Islam and he made dua to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala choose the best for the Muslims and Islam between Hisham or Omar and Omar was who Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala chose to answer that dua. And Abu Jah was later known as the prophet Sam said after the battle of he said every nation and every prophet has a pharaoh. A pharaoh, one who acts as Pharaoh did to Musam. And the pharaoh of this ummah is Abu Jahb hishem. He said this when he was killed in the battle of Badr by Abdullahbas. Abu Jah antagonized the prophet sallallah.aii wasallam very much. And it wasn't because he didn't believe he was a prophet. No. A lot of times if we have good intentions and as Muslims, it's hard for us to imagine a person who would know that someone is a prophet or a messenger and still harm them. And so a lot of times we have a hard time understanding how Abu Jahel came to the conclusions that he did. And a lot of us may be under the misconception that Abu Jahel was confused. Abu Jahel didn't understand. Abu Jahel didn't really believe. No, he did. He believed that he was a prophet and he said as much in many narrations. Iban is Muhammad Iban is he wrote a book and it is the largest book known up until now ever written and most detailed on the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam it's known as Iben is unfortunately that book has been lost however it was summarized by a man named Iben Hishem a great scholar and his book is all we have left of that book. One of the things that Iben Hisham did was he took out all of the chains of narration that is had so all he says is and so there are many narrations that are questionable or unauthentic because of that. However, a huge majority of his book and a lot of what has reached us by way of the prophet's biography and has come by way often is and so Iban Hisham narrates that his narrated in his that Iban Shurik and Abu Sufyan both of which who were not Muslim at the time They later accepted Islam and Abu Jahem. The prophet sallallah.aii wasallam when he would go to pray at night or what we know as the he would go to thea. He would stand in front of thea and he would place thea between himself and so he would face al because that was the at the time but he would have thea in front of him. So he would be praying to both simultaneously. And this is because he always knew that thea was the rightful of all of the prophets and messengers. And that praying towards was an innovation that was introduced by the people of the book later. However, at the beginning of Islam, that was his for reasons that we may discuss in another time. And so, the mushik would come down and hide around the idols and listen to the Quran while he was praying at night. They'd listen all night. Abu Jah is one of them. Abu Sufyan is one of them. andb is one of them. And Abu Jahel was particularly known for hiding behind the sar of the Kaa. So he would actually stand between the Kaa and the covering on the Kaa so that he could listen and they would listen to the Quran how long? All night until fudger. How many of us as Muslims listen to the Quran all night? These are mushri. They were so taken and so enthralled by the Quran that they would listen all night long. On one of such occasions, the sun started to come up and the prophet sallallah.aii Wasallam finished his salah and went home. And so these three men Abu Jahb, Abu Sufy, these are all tribe leaders. As they were leaving, they all saw each other on the path going home. Each one of them asked, "What are you doing here?" Wait, what are you doing here? And so They all swore by Allah to each other and took an oath that they will never do this again. Why? Listen to the reasoning. They said because if the youth of Quraysh know that we are listening to the Quran, it will be a fitna for them. They're afraid for the youth, mashallah. And so they went home. The next night, each of them thought that the other wasn't going to show up cuz they all took an oath. And they repeated the same thing again when the sun started to rise. They all caught each other again. What are you doing here? You swore. you took an oath. The youth are going to be mun if we continue to do this. We have to, you know, be careful with our youth, etc. And so they again took this oath and a third time this happened. And as Iben mentions in his ib decided the next morning to address the elephant in the room. He went to Abu Sufyan and said, "Listen, we're let's just talk about it. We're all listening to this book. What do you really think about it off the record?" He said, "I this is Abu Sufiad." He said, "I listen to it and there are things that are so captivating and so true, but then there are other things that I don't understand about it. I don't know." And sobb then went to Abu Jah and asked him the same thing. And Abu Jah said, "Why are you asking me this? Do you think that I don't know he's a prophet from Allah? I know he's a messenger of Allah. But the problem is is that us and his tribe and the tribe of the prophet sallall.aii said, "We were two raceh horses in they gave to charity and we gave." They gave charity and we gave. They went to war and we went to war. They freed slaves and we freed slaves.

[Silence]

He said they continued to compete with us in all forms of goodness until us and Benu Hashim were on our knees at the finish line two raceh horses neck and neck and then suddenly they tell us we have a prophet who Allah himself appointed and revelation comes to him from the heavens. How are we going to produce a prophet now to compete with that? Wall we will never believe in him and we will never follow him. That is the beginnings and the origins of Abu Jah. The remaining verses of surah are all about Abu Jah as the scholars of have agreed. Inshallah we will continue.

[Arabic recitation]