Mu’adh the judge: the Book, the Sunna, the ijtihad

In Rabi’ al-Akhira or Jumada al-Ula of year 10, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) sent Khalid ibn al-Walid to the Banu al-Harith at Najran, with the order to call them to Islam three days before fighting them: they embraced Islam. Before the Farewell Pilgrimage, he sent Mu’adh and Abu Musa to Yemen: « Make things easy and do not make them hard; give glad tidings and do not repel », with the ten recommendations, the rates of the zakat and the order to judge by the Book, the Sunna, then the ijtihad. Ali was sent there in his turn: Hamdan accepted Islam all together, and his judgments were validated by the Prophet.

Abd ar-Razzaq said: Ma’mar informed us, from az-Zuhri, from Ubayy ibn Ka’b ibn Malik, who said: Mu’adh ibn Jabal was a young man, handsome and pleasant, among the best of his people’s youths, asked for nothing but he gave, until a debt fell upon him that locked up his wealth. He spoke to the Messenger of Allah to speak to his creditors, and he did, but they did not waive him anything; had it been left to anyone by anyone’s word, it would have been left to Mu’adh by the Messenger of Allah’s word. The Messenger of Allah called him, and he went on selling his wealth and dividing it among his creditors, and Mu’adh stood with no wealth. When the Messenger of Allah made the pilgrimage he sent Mu’adh to Yemen to restore him, and the first to trade in that wealth was Mu’adh.

He came to Abu Bakr as-Siddiq from Yemen, the Messenger of Allah having died. Umar came to Mu’adh and said: will you obey me and deliver this wealth to Abu Bakr, and if he gives it to you, accept it? Mu’adh said: why should I deliver it to him when the Messenger of Allah sent me to restore me? When he refused him, Umar went to Abu Bakr and said: send to this man and take from him and leave him some.

Abu Bakr said: I would not do so; the Messenger of Allah sent him to restore him, and I shall take nothing from him. When Mu’adh rose in the morning he went to Umar and said:

I see none but doing what you said; I saw myself last night in sleep: as Abd ar-Razzaq believes he said: dragged to the Fire and you holding my chest. He went to Abu Bakr with everything he had brought, until he brought him his whip, and swore to him he had concealed nothing of it. Abu Bakr said: it is yours; I take nothing of it. Ibn Thawr reported it, from Ma’mar, from az-Zuhri, from Abd ar-Rahman ibn Ka’b ibn Malik, who mentions it, except that he said: when the year of the conquest of Mecca came, the Messenger of Allah sent him governor over a part of Yemen, and he stayed until the Messenger of Allah was taken, then came in the caliphate of Abu Bakr and went out to Syria.

Al-Bayhaqi said: we already mentioned that the Messenger of Allah appointed him over Mecca with Attab ibn Usayd to teach its people, and that he witnessed the campaign of Tabuk, so the more apparent is that his sending to Yemen was after that; and Allah knows best. Then al-Bayhaqi mentioned for the story of Mu’adh’s dream a witness, through al-A’mach, from Abu Wa’il, from Abdallah, and that it was among what Abd ar-Razzaq brought of them: he brought them to Abu Bakr, and when he returned them all to him he went back with them, then stood to pray, and they all stood praying with him; when he turned he said: for whom did you pray? They said: for Allah. He said: then you are his freedmen, and he freed them.

The Imam Ahmad said: Muhammad ibn Ja’far narrated to us: Shu’ba narrated to us, from Abu Awn, from al-Harith ibn Amr ibn the brother of al-Mughira ibn Shu’ba, from people of the companions of Mu’adh of the people of Hims, from Mu’adh: that the Messenger of Allah, when he sent him to Yemen, said: what will you do if a judgment presents itself? He said: I shall judge by what is in the Book of Allah. He said: and if it is not in the Book of Allah? He said: then by the sunna of the Messenger of Allah.

He said: and if it is not in the sunna of the Messenger of Allah? He said: I shall exert judgment with my opinion, not failing. He said: the Messenger of Allah struck my chest and said: praise be to Allah who guided the messenger of the Messenger of Allah to what pleases the Messenger of Allah. Ahmad reported it from Waki’ and from Affan, from Shu’ba, by his chain and wording; and Abu Dawud and at-Tirmidhi reported it from the hadith of Shu’ba likewise, and at-Tirmidhi said: we know it not except by this route, and its chain is not connected in my view.

Ibn Majah reported it by another route from him, except that it is through Muhammad ibn Sa’id ibn Hassan: who is the crucified, one of the liars: from Ubada ibn Nusay, from Abd ar-Rahman ibn Ghanm, from Mu’adh, in like fashion. The Imam Ahmad reported, from Muhammad ibn Ja’far and Yahya ibn Sa’id, from Shu’ba, from Amr ibn Abi Hakim,

from Abdallah ibn Burayda, from Yahya ibn Ya’mar, from Abu l-Aswad ad-Du’li: Mu’adh was in Yemen and they rose to him concerning a Jew who died leaving a Muslim brother, and Mu’adh said: I heard the Messenger of Allah say: Islam grows and does not diminish; and he made him inherit. Abu Dawud reported it from Ibn Burayda likewise. This doctrine has been related from Mu’awiya ibn Abi Sufyan, and reported by Yahya ibn Ya’mar the judge and a group of the ancients, and Ishaq ibn Rahawayh inclined to it, while the majority contradicted them, among them the four imams and their companions, arguing by what is established in the two Sahihs from Usama ibn Zayd: the Messenger of Allah said: the disbeliever does not inherit the Muslim, nor the Muslim the disbeliever.

The point is that Mu’adh was judge for the Prophet in Yemen, arbiter in the wars, and collector to whom the alms were delivered, as the preceding hadith of Ibn Abbas indicates; and he was visible to the people, praying the five prayers with them, as al-Bukhari said: Sulayman ibn Harb narrated to us: Shu’ba narrated to us, from Habib ibn Abi Thabit, from Sa’id ibn Jubayr, from Amr ibn Maymun, that Mu’adh, when he arrived in Yemen, prayed the dawn prayer with them and recited ’and Allah took Ibrahim for an intimate friend’ [an-Nisa: 125], and a man of the people said: the eye of Ibrahim’s mother has been gladdened. Al-Bukhari alone reports it.