THE AMAZING ABDULLAH IBN MUBARAK AND THE MAN WHO DIDN’T GO TO HAJJ BUT IT WAS ACCEPTED FROM HIM

By Sheikh Zahir Mahmoud

Abdullah ibn Mubarak was an amazing personality. The only Imam who was never disparaged was Abdullah ibn Mubarak (ra).

He lived in a place called Merv, Central Asia, and he would travel every other year for Hajj.

So he goes for Hajj like many of the hajjis. So now he reaches Makkah, he performs his Hajj. And after performing his Hajj he is sleeping. He sees a dream, two Angels descend. One angel say to the other “how many people have performed Hajj this year?”, the other angel says “60,000”. The first angel said “how many people’s hajj has been accepted?”, The other says “Not even one! Except one man called Abdullah ibn Mufiq, a cobbler from Damascus. He didn’t even attend the Hajj, but Allah accepted his hajj”.

Abdullah ibn Mubarak wakes up in the morning deeply concerned about this. He’s shaking, his perspiring. He hurries to Damascus and he reaches Damascus. He asks people of Damascus, “do you know a man called Abdullah ibn Mufiq?” And they direct him to his house.

He knocks on the door. Abdullah opened the door and he asked his name. He says Abdullah ibn Mufiq. He asks “what’s your profession?”, he said “I’m a cobbler”. So he says to Abdullah I want to ask you a question, I saw a dream and I want to ask you about this dream. So he relates the dream to him. And Abdullah ibn Mufiq says “I’ll tell you. I am a cobbler. And I had a deep desire to perform hajj. But because my income is very little, for the last 20 years I have been saving up to perform Hajj. For the last 20 years I’ve been saving up to perform Hajj. And this year I had enough money to perform Hajj”.

And he said “my wife was pregnant, and she smelled meat from the neighbor’s house. And you know, pregnant women when they smell something they want it there and then. So she asked me to go and ask neighbors for the meat. So I went to the neighbor’s house and I knocked on the door. And the lady opened the door and I said ‘my wife is pregnant and you are cooking some meat, can I ask you for that meat?’ And the lady said ‘the meat is halal for us, but it’s haram for you’”.

And Abdullah ibn Mufiq said “how’s that halal for you and Haram for us?”, and the lady said “for many days my children have had nothing to eat, have been starving, and today I was walking on the street and I saw a dead donkey and I cut the meat from the donkey. The meat that I am cooking is that meat of the donkey. So it’s halal for us and it’s haram for you”.  And Abdullah ibn Mufiq says “I went home, I brought all the money that I had gathered for 20 years and I gave it to this lady. And I said ‘this is my hajj’”.

He didn’t even perform Hajj, but Allah gave him the reward for performing the Hajj.