Part of Glimpses from the Lives of the Tabi‘un (the Successors) (series completed)
· Lesson 31 of 37
Pictures from the lives of the followers | D. Abdul Rahman Raafat Al-Basha | Episode (31) | Abdul Rahman Al-Ghafiqi, may God have mercy on him | C (2)
0:000:00
Transcript
Machine translation — may contain errors
0:00
In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
0:03
The best of generations in their conduct and example,
0:08
Following the Messenger when he strove or spoke.
0:13
A collection of affection,
0:15
Proceed.
0:17
Scenes from the Life of the Tabi'un,
0:21
By Dr. Abd al-Rahman Ra'fat al-Basha,
0:26
May Allah have mercy upon him.
0:30
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi,
0:33
May Allah have mercy upon him.
0:44
The English poet Southey said,
0:47
Describing the Muslim armies that invaded Europe after the conquest of al-Andalus:
0:52
"Countless multitudes,
0:55
Of Arabs, Berbers, and foreign Romans,
0:58
Persians, Copts, and Tatars,
1:00
Have all gathered under one banner,
1:04
United by a fervent faith,
1:06
Firm in its chivalry,
1:08
And a zeal burning like sparks,
1:11
And an astonishing brotherhood that makes no distinction between men."
1:15
Their leaders were no less confident of victory than they were,
1:19
Having been intoxicated by the zeal of triumph,
1:22
And pride in that mighty power,
1:25
Before which nothing could stand.
1:28
They were certain that their armies could never be overcome by fatigue,
1:33
For they were always youthful and vibrant, as if they had been unleashed for the first time.
1:39
They believed that wherever they moved,
1:42
Victory and conquest walked in their wake,
1:45
And that they would always surge forward,
1:49
Until the conquered West became like the East,
1:52
Bowing its head in reverence to the name of Muhammad, peace be upon him.
1:56
And until the pilgrim rises from the furthest reaches of the frozen lands,
2:00
To tread with the feet of faith upon the burning sands,
2:04
Scattered across the desert of the Arabs,
2:07
And stand upon the solid rocks of Makkah.
2:11
You were not far from the truth, O poet,
2:16
Nor were you wandering in the valleys of imagination,
2:19
In much of what you said.
2:21
For the armies led by the mujahidin,
2:26
To bring your forefathers out of their profound ignorance,
2:30
Were just as you described.
2:32
Among them were Arabs, strengthened by Allah,
2:35
Who rushed to you from al-Sham,
2:37
From the Hijaz,
2:39
From Najd,
2:40
From Yemen,
2:41
From every place in the Arabian Peninsula,
2:44
Like the sent wind.
2:47
Among them were Berbers, ennobled by Islam,
2:51
Who poured upon you from above the Atlas Mountains,
2:54
Like a torrential flood.
2:57
Among them were Persians,
2:59
Whose minds had grown weary of the idolatry of the Chosroes,
3:02
And who returned to the religion of monotheism,
3:05
And the path of the All-Mighty, the Praiseworthy.
3:08
Among them were the foreign Romans, as you said,
3:11
But they had rebelled against injustice and darkness,
3:15
And aligned themselves with the Light of the heavens and the earth,
3:18
And were guided to the upright religion.
3:21
Among them were Copts,
3:23
Who lifted from their necks the yoke of slavery to the Caesars,
3:27
To live as their mothers bore them,
3:31
Free under the shade of Islam.
3:34
Yes,
3:35
The army led by Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi and his predecessors,
3:40
To save your ancestors from ignorance,
3:44
Included the white and the black,
3:46
The Arab and the non-Arab,
3:49
But they were all melted into the crucible of Islam,
3:53
And by the grace of Allah, they became brothers.
3:56
Their concern, as you mentioned, was
3:59
To bring the West into the religion of Allah,
4:02
Just as they had brought the East before it,
4:05
To make all of humanity bow its head to the Lord of mankind,
4:10
To let the light of Islam spread through your plains and valleys,
4:14
To let its sun shine in every one of your homes,
4:18
And to let its justice equalize your kings and your commoners.
4:23
They had resolved to offer their souls as the price for your guidance to Allah,
4:29
And for your salvation from the Fire.
4:32
And now,
4:34
Here is the final story of this army,
4:38
And the account of its peerless hero, Abd al-Rahman ibn Abd Allah al-Ghafiqi.
4:44
The Duke of Aquitaine received alarming news of the death of his brother-in-law, Uthman ibn Abi Nisa,
4:52
And the tidings reached him of the sad end,
4:55
That had befallen his beautiful daughter, Minin.
4:59
He realized that the drums of war had been beaten,
5:03
And he became certain that the Lion of Islam, Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi,
5:07
Was either upon him by evening or by morning.
5:11
So he prepared to defend every inch of his land with the defense of the desperate,
5:17
And readied himself to struggle for his own life and kingdom with the readiness of the defiant.
5:23
For he feared that he would be led, like the other, as a captive to the Caliphate in al-Sham,
5:30
Just as his daughter had been led,
5:32
Or that his head would be carried on a platter,
5:35
And paraded through the markets of Damascus,
5:38
Just as the head of Roderic,
5:40
The King of Spain, had been paraded before.
5:43
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi did not prove the Duke's fears wrong,
5:47
For he set out with his massive army from northern al-Andalus,
5:51
Like a cyclone.
5:53
And he descended upon southern France from over the Pyrenees,
5:57
Like a flood.
6:00
The equipment of his army was one hundred thousand mujahidin,
6:04
Within each of whom beat the heart of a lion,
6:08
And in whose veins flowed the resolve of a giant.
6:12
The Islamic army turned its face toward the city of Arles,
6:17
Situated on the banks of the Rhone River,
6:20
For he had a score to settle with it.
6:23
The fact was that this Arles had made peace with the Muslims,
6:28
On the condition that they pay the jizya.
6:31
But when al-Samh ibn Malik al-Khawlani was martyred,
6:34
In the Battle of Toulouse,
6:36
And the Muslims were weakened by his death,
6:39
The people of Arles renounced their obedience,
6:41
And broke their covenant,
6:43
And refused to pay the jizya.
6:47
When Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi reached the outskirts of the city,
6:51
He found that the Duke of Aquitaine,
6:55
Had mobilized his dense forces there,
6:58
And gathered them around its borders,
7:01
And stood to repel the Islamic advance upon it.
7:05
Then, it was not long before the two armies met face to face,
7:09
And a grinding battle took place between the two parties,
7:13
During which Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi launched battalions from his army,
7:18
Who loved death more than their enemies loved life,
7:22
So he shook the foundations of the enemy,
7:25
And tore through their ranks,
7:27
And entered the city this time by war,
7:31
And set the sword to the necks of its people,
7:34
And inflicted heavy losses upon them,
7:36
And took from them spoils that could not be counted.
7:40
As for Duke Eudes,
7:42
He fled with those who remained alive of his soldiers,
7:45
And began to prepare for another encounter with the Muslim armies,
7:50
For he knew that the Battle of Arles,
7:54
Was the beginning of the road, not its end.
8:00
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi crossed the Garonne River with his massive army,
8:05
And his victorious battalions began to roam the province of Aquitaine,
8:10
“And thou wouldst have deemed them waking though they were asleep, and We caused them to turn over to the right and the left, and their dog stretching out his paws on the threshold. If thou hadst observed them closely thou hadst assuredly turned away from them in flight, and hadst been filled with awe of them.” (18:18)
8:13
And the cities and villages began,
8:15
To fall under the hooves of his horses,
8:18
Like leaves falling from trees in the autumn,
8:22
When the fierce winds blow upon them.
8:25
The Muslims added to their previous spoils,
8:29
Subsequent spoils that no eye had seen before,
8:33
And no ear had heard of.
8:35
The Duke of Aquitaine tried,
8:38
To confront this great advance once again,
8:42
So he clashed with the Muslims in a fierce battle,
8:46
But the Muslims soon defeated him with a crushing defeat,
8:51
And inflicted upon him a devastating catastrophe,
8:55
And tore his army to pieces,
8:58
And left his soldiers between killed, captured, and routed.
9:03
Then the Muslims headed to the city of Bordeaux,
9:07
The largest French city at that time,
9:10
And the capital of the province of Aquitaine,
9:13
And they fought its prince in a battle no less horrific,
9:17
Than the previous battles,
9:19
In which the attackers and the defenders showed bravery,
9:22
A bravery that evokes wonder and admiration.
9:26
But the great and dangerous city,
9:29
Soon fell into the hands of the Muslims,
9:32
Just as its sisters had fallen before it,
9:35
And its prince was soon killed among the dead.
9:39
The Muslims acquired from the spoils of Bordeaux,
9:43
What made all the spoils they had acquired before seem insignificant.
9:47
The fall of Bordeaux into the hands of the Muslims,
9:51
Was the opening for the fall of many other dangerous cities,
9:55
The most important of which were Lyon, Besançon, and Sens,
9:59
And the latter was not far from Paris,
10:03
By more than a hundred miles.
10:07
Europe shook from its furthest reaches to its furthest reaches,
10:11
At the fall of half of southern France into the hands of Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi,
10:17
Within a few months.
10:19
The Franks opened their eyes to the imminent danger,
10:23
And a cry went out everywhere,
10:25
Calling the weak and the able to stand in the face of this horror coming from the East,
10:31
And urging them to confront it with their chests,
10:34
If swords were scarce,
10:36
And calling them to block the road before it with their bodies,
10:40
If equipment was lacking.
10:42
So Europe responded to the caller's call,
10:46
And people came to join under the banner of Charles Martel,
10:51
Bringing with them trees, stones, thorns, and weapons.
10:55
The Islamic army at that time,
11:00
Had reached the city of Tours,
11:02
The foremost of the cities of France in population,
11:06
And strength in structure and antiquity in history.
11:10
And the city was, moreover,
11:13
Boasting over most of the cities of Europe with its luxurious and massive church,
11:18
Filled with magnificent relics and precious treasures.
11:22
So the Muslims surrounded it like a collar around a neck,
11:26
And descended upon it like death when the appointed time comes,
11:31
And they considered their souls and lives cheap for the sake of conquering it.
11:35
So it soon fell into their hands,
11:38
Within the sight and hearing of Charles Martel.
11:42
And in the last ten days of the month of Sha'ban,
11:46
In the year one hundred and four after the Hijrah,
11:49
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi marched with his massive army upon the city of Poitiers,
11:55
And there he met with the massive armies of Europe,
11:59
under the leadership of Charles Martel.
12:01
One of the decisive battles between the two sides took place,
12:05
not only in the history of the Muslims and the Franks,
12:09
but in the history of all humanity.
12:13
This battle became known
12:16
as the Battle of Tours (Balat al-Shuhada').
12:19
The Islamic army was, at that time,
12:24
at the peak of its dazzling victories.
12:27
Yet, its burden was heavy with the spoils of war
12:31
that had poured upon them like a torrential rain,
12:34
and piled up in the hands of its soldiers like gathering clouds.
12:38
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi looked
12:41
upon this vast and immense wealth
12:44
with a gaze of anxiety and apprehension,
12:47
fearing for the Muslims because of it.
12:50
He was concerned that these treasures
12:53
might preoccupy their hearts during the encounter,
12:56
and distract their souls in moments of intensity,
13:00
causing one eye of the soldier
13:03
to be fixed on the approaching enemy,
13:05
while his other eye remained on the spoils in his hands.
13:09
He intended to order his soldiers
13:12
to dispose of these vast and immense riches,
13:16
but he feared their hearts would not be content
13:19
with such a grave decision,
13:22
and that their souls would not permit them to abandon
13:25
that precious treasure.
13:28
Thus, he found no better way than to gather
13:31
these spoils in special camps,
13:34
and place them behind the army
13:37
before the fighting began.
13:39
The two great armies stood for several days,
13:42
each facing the other,
13:45
in stillness, anticipation, and silence,
13:48
like two mountain ranges
13:51
standing one against the other.
13:54
Each army feared the might of its adversary
13:58
and prepared for the encounter with the utmost caution.
14:01
When time dragged on in this state,
14:04
and Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi sensed
14:07
the fires of zeal and courage
14:10
boiling in the chests of his men,
14:13
he chose to be the one to initiate the attack,
14:16
relying on the virtues of his soldiers,
14:19
and optimistic about his good fortune in victory.
14:22
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi charged
14:27
with his cavalry against the ranks of the Franks,
14:30
with the ferocity of predatory lions.
14:33
The Franks stood firm against them,
14:37
and the first day of the battle ended
14:40
without the scales tipping in favor of either side.
14:43
Nothing separated the combatants
14:46
but the descent of darkness
14:49
upon the battlefield.
14:52
Then the combat resumed the following day,
14:55
and the Muslims launched against the Franks
14:58
heroic assaults,
15:01
yet they did not achieve their objective.
15:04
The battle continued in this state
15:07
for seven long, arduous days.
15:10
When the eighth day arrived,
15:13
the Muslims launched a unified charge against their enemy,
15:16
opening a large gap in their ranks,
15:19
through which victory appeared to them
15:22
just as the light of dawn appears
15:25
through the darkness.
15:28
At that moment, a detachment of Frankish battalions raided
15:31
the camps of the spoils.
15:34
When the Muslims saw that their spoils
15:37
were about to fall into the hands of their enemies,
15:40
many of them turned back
15:43
to recover them.
15:46
Consequently, their ranks fractured,
15:49
their masses faltered,
15:52
and their momentum was lost.
15:55
The great commander rushed to act,
15:59
and while the hero of Islam,
16:02
Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi,
16:05
was traversing the battlefield on the back of his horse,
16:08
his grey steed, moving back and forth,
16:11
charging and retreating,
16:14
he was struck by a fatal arrow.
16:17
He fell from his horse
16:20
like an eagle descending from mountain peaks,
16:23
and died a martyr on the battlefield.
16:27
When the Muslims saw this,
16:30
panic spread among them and distress prevailed.
16:33
The enemy's pressure intensified upon them,
16:36
and nothing halted their ferocity but the arrival of darkness.
16:39
When morning came,
16:44
Charles Martel found
16:47
that the Muslims had withdrawn from Poitiers.
16:50
He did not dare to pursue them,
16:53
for had he pursued them, he would have annihilated them,
16:56
as if he feared their withdrawal was a ruse
16:59
of war, devised in the night.
17:02
So he chose to remain in his positions,
17:05
content with that great victory.
17:08
The day of Balat al-Shuhada' was
17:11
a decisive day in history,
17:14
in which the Muslims lost one of their most cherished hopes,
17:17
and during which they lost a hero
17:20
among the greatest of heroes.
17:23
It reenacted the tragedy of the day of Uhud,
17:26
for such is the Sunnah of Allah in His creation,
17:29
and you will never find any change in the Sunnah of Allah.
17:32
The news of the tragic day of Balat
17:36
al-Shuhada' shook the souls of the Muslims
17:39
everywhere with a violent tremor,
17:42
and their hearts were shaken by its horror
17:45
with a severe quaking.
17:48
Grief spread because of it to every city,
17:52
and its painful wound
17:55
still bleeds blood from their hearts to this day,
17:58
and it will continue to bleed as long as there remains
18:01
a Muslim on the face of the earth.
18:04
Do not think that this deep,
18:07
gaping wound has pained the hearts
18:10
of the Muslims alone;
18:13
rather, a group of the wise among the Franks
18:16
shared in that sentiment.
18:19
For what befell the Muslims in Poitiers
18:22
was a great calamity that afflicted humanity,
18:25
and a tremendous loss
18:28
that struck Europe at its core,
18:31
and a disaster that befell civilization.
18:35
If you wish to know the opinion of some of them
18:38
regarding the tragedy of Balat al-Shuhada',
18:41
then listen to Henri de Chambon,
18:44
the director of the French magazine *Revue Parlementaire*,
18:47
as he said:
18:50
"Had it not been for the victory of the barbaric army of Charles Martel
18:53
over the Arab Muslims in France,
18:56
our country would not have fallen into the darkness
18:59
of the Middle Ages,
19:02
nor would it have been afflicted by its horrors,
19:05
nor would it have suffered the civil massacres
19:08
to which religious and sectarian fanaticism drove it."
19:11
Yes,
19:14
and had it not been for the savagery against the Muslims in Poitiers,
19:17
Spain would have continued to enjoy the tolerance of Islam,
19:20
and would have been spared the stigma of the Inquisition,
19:23
and the progress of civilization would not have been delayed
19:26
by eight centuries.
19:29
Regardless of the differing feelings and opinions
19:32
regarding that victory of ours,
19:35
we owe the Muslims all the merits
19:38
of our civilization in science, art, and industry.
19:41
We are compelled to admit that they were
19:44
the ideal of human perfection
19:47
at a time when we were the ideal of barbarism.
19:50
It is a fabrication what we claim today,
19:53
that time has turned,
19:56
and that the Muslims have reached in this era
19:59
what we were upon
20:02
in the Middle Ages.
20:15
They were here,
20:18
watering the clouds of our lives,
20:21
so they died within us,
20:24
their memory rising high.
20:27
They departed and cast into the conscience
20:30
a question: is there anyone like them,
20:33
a star that rose and shone?
20:36
They filled life
20:39
with pride through their deeds,
20:42
and the world of humanity flourished because of them.