In the name of Allah, the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful.
Mawaddah Association
presents:
The Ten Promised Paradise —
Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah,
may Allah be pleased with him.
Loving the Companions and the Prophet’s kin is an established Sunnah,
with which I hope to meet my Lord as long as He grants me life.
Loving the Companions and the Prophet’s kin...
People gathered as usual in the marketplace of Busra,
buying and selling,
while caravans arrived to them from every direction.
While they were thus engaged,
a monk suddenly emerged from his hermitage
and called out:
"Ask the people of this market season:
is there anyone among them from the people of the Sacred Precinct (the Haram)?"
Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah said:
"I was near him,
so I said: 'Yes,
I am from the people of the Haram.'"
The monk said to him:
"Has Ahmad appeared among you?"
Talhah asked: "And who is Ahmad?"
He replied:
"The son of 'Abdullah, son of 'Abd al-Muttalib.
This is the month in which he is to appear,
and he is the final Prophet.
His emergence shall be from the Haram,
and his migration will be to a land of date palms, volcanic tracts, and salt flats.
So beware of letting anyone precede you to him."
Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah said:
"What he said struck deep into my heart,
so I departed swiftly until I reached Mecca.
I asked:
'Has anything new occurred?'
They said: 'Yes,
Muhammad Ibn 'Abdillah, the Trustworthy,
has claimed prophethood,
and Ibn Abi Quhafah has followed him.'"
He said:
"So I set out until I entered upon Abu Bakr,
and I asked:
'Have you truly followed this man?'
He said: 'Yes.'"
Talhah then informed him of what the monk had said.
Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) took Talhah
and brought him to the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him.
Talhah embraced Islam,
and he informed the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him)
of what the monk had said,
and the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) was deeply delighted
with that.
When Quraysh learned of the Islam of Abu Bakr and Talhah,
they set upon them Nawfal Ibn Khuwaylid Ibn al-'Adawiyyah,
who was called the "Lion of Quraysh."
He seized them both, bound them together with a single rope,
and handed them over to the foolish ruffians of Quraysh.
For this reason, Abu Bakr and Talhah were called "the Two Bound Comrades" (al-Qarinayn).
Talhah suffered immense harm from the polytheists because of his Islam,
and his own mother took part with them in torturing him
so that he might renounce his religion,
yet he stood like a mountain in his firmness and steadfastness.
Reports have indeed come down
that while people were circumambulating between al-Safa and al-Marwah,
they saw a large crowd following a young man
whose hands were bound to his neck,
while the people were insulting and beating him.
They asked, "What is his story?"
They replied, "This is Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah; he has renounced his ancestral religion."
Then they saw a woman behind him shouting angrily and cursing him,
so they asked, "And who is this?"
They said, "This is his mother,
al-Sa'bah bint al-Hadrami."
Such was the conversion of the hero of our story:
Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah Ibn 'Uthman al-Qurashi al-Taymi,
Abu Muhammad.
And such was his steadfastness,
until he became one of the foremost pioneers in Islam,
one of the Ten Promised Paradise
upon the tongue of the Prophet, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him,
and one of those with whom the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) passed away
while being completely pleased with them,
and one of the six members of the consultative council (Shura)
whom 'Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) chose to select the Caliph after him.
Talhah was born
twenty-eight years before the Hijrah.
His mother was al-Sa'bah bint al-Hadrami,
the sister of the noble Companion
al-'Ala' Ibn al-Hadrami, may Allah be pleased with him.
She later accepted Islam and migrated, may Allah be pleased with her.
Talhah married four women,
each of whom had a sister who was a wife of the Prophet, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him:
He married Umm Kulthum bint Abi Bakr al-Siddiq,
the sister of the truthful lady 'A'ishah bint Abi Bakr;
he married Hamnah bint Jahsh,
the sister of Zaynab bint Jahsh;
he married Fari'ah bint Abi Sufyan,
the sister of Umm Habibah bint Abi Sufyan;
and he married Ruqayyah bint Abi Umayyah,
the sister of Umm Salamah,
Hind bint Abi Umayyah —
may Allah be pleased with them all.
He had eleven sons and four daughters,
and he used to name his sons after the Prophets.
His sons were: Muhammad,
who was his eldest son
and was nicknamed "al-Sajjad" (the Constant Prostrator) due to his abundant worship,
and he was a Companion
who lived during the time of the Prophet, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him;
and among his sons were also:
'Imran, Musa, Ya'qub,
Isma'il, Ishaq,
Zakariyya, Yusuf,
Yahya, 'Isa, and Salih.
His daughters were:
'A'ishah, Umm Ishaq,
Fatimah, and Maryam.
Talhah (may Allah be pleased with him) was
a man of brown complexion,
with thick hair,
of medium build leaning towards shorter stature,
handsome of face,
broad-chested,
wide between the shoulders,
with large feet;
when he walked, he walked briskly,
and when he turned, he turned with his whole body.
The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said of him:
"Whoever wishes to look upon a living martyr walking upon the earth,
let him look at Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah."
When the word of Allah was revealed: ﴾Among the believers are men true to what they pledged to Allah...﴿,
the Companions wanted to know who had fulfilled his vow.
They did not dare to ask the Prophet (peace be upon him) directly,
out of deep reverence and awe of him.
So they said to a bedouin:
"Ask him about the one who has fulfilled his vow."
The bedouin asked him,
but the Prophet (peace be upon him) turned away from him.
He asked him a second time,
and he turned away from him again.
Then he asked him a third time,
and he turned away from him once more.
When the Prophet (peace be upon him) stepped out of the mosque,
he saw Talhah Ibn 'Ubaydillah, may Allah be pleased with him,
and said:
"Where is the one who asked about the one who fulfilled his vow?"
The bedouin said:
"Here I am, O Messenger of Allah."
He said:
"This is one of those who fulfilled his vow,"
pointing to Talhah, may Allah be pleased with him.
Allah bestowed abundant wealth upon Talhah,
so that he became one of the wealthiest and most affluent men.
He was called "Talhah of Goodness" (Talhat al-Khayr),
"Talhah of Generosity" (Talhat al-Jud),
and "Talhah of the Overflowing Bounty" (Talhat al-Fayyad),
because of his immense spending and extraordinary magnanimity.
He had an outstretched hand in doing good and giving freely to the needy,
and extraordinary accounts were related concerning his benevolence.
Among them:
On one occasion, wealth arrived to him from Hadramawt
amounting to seven hundred thousand dirhams,
and he spent his night tossing and turning restlessly.
His wife, Umm Kulthum bint Abi Bakr al-Siddiq, said to him:
"What is the matter with you, may Allah have mercy on you?"
He said:
"I have been thinking all night,
saying to myself:
'What can a man think of his Lord when he spends the night with such wealth in his house?'"
She said:
"Why not share it with your close friends?
When morning comes,
call for large bowls and platters,
and distribute it among them."
He said to her:
"May Allah have mercy on you!
You are truly divinely guided, the daughter of a divinely guided man."
When morning came,
he distributed it entirely among the Emigrants (Muhajirun) and the Ansar.
A man once came to him and appealed to him on account of the kinship between them.
Talhah (may Allah be pleased with him) said to him:
"This is an orchard of mine in such-and-such a place —
that is, my garden —
and I have been offered three hundred thousand dirhams for it.
If you wish, take the money,
and if you wish, take the orchard."
So the man took the money, the full value of the orchard.
He (may Allah be pleased with him)
never left any destitute member of Banu Taym without providing for his needs,
nor any debtor without paying off his debt,
nor any bachelor without arranging his marriage.
'Ubaydullah Ibn Ma'mar
and 'Abdullah Ibn 'Amir Ibn Kurayz owed
a debt amounting to eighty thousand dirhams,
so Talhah (may Allah be pleased with him) paid it off on their behalf,
and he also paid off thirty thousand dirhams for another of his cousins.
He used to send ten thousand dirhams every year to the Mother of the Believers, 'A'ishah, may Allah be pleased with her.
It used to be said:
"The most generous of the Arabs in Islam
is Talhah ibn 'Ubaydullah (may Allah be pleased with him)."
Yet despite all this giving and spending,
he would humbly say:
"We feel the same attachment to our wealth as the miserly do,
but we force ourselves to be patient and part with it."
When the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)
and his companion Abu Bakr (may Allah be pleased with him) migrated to Medina,
Talhah ibn 'Ubaydullah was away in the Levant on business.
On his way back to Mecca,
he met the Prophet (peace be upon him) and Abu Bakr
while they were on their journey of migration,
and he clothed them both in garments from the Levant.
He then returned to Mecca,
settled people's financial trusts and dues,
and then took the family of Abu Bakr
and set out with them, migrating to Medina.
One day, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) passed by a water well called Baysan,
so he asked about it.
He was told, "Its name is Baysan,
and its water is salty and bitter."
The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said:
"Rather, it is Nu'man,
and it is sweet and wholesome."
So the Messenger of Allah changed its name,
and Allah changed the nature of the water.
Thereupon, Talhah ibn 'Ubaydullah bought it and gave it away in charity.
He then came to the Prophet (peace be upon him) and informed him of it,
so the Messenger of Allah said:
"You, O Talhah, are truly an overflowing fountain of generosity (Fayyad)!"
For this reason, he was nicknamed "Talhah the Fayyad" (the Boundlessly Generous),
may Allah be pleased with him and make him well-pleased.