Story of Sufyan al-Thawri and his father

Bismillah.

Abu al-Layth al-Samarqandl (d. 373) narrates in his Tanbih al-Ghafilln by way of Sa'id ibn 'Umayr al-Ansari who fought in the battle of Badr that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessing be upon him), said: "Whoever invokes bless­ings upon me from my Community sincerely from his heart once Allah (The Exalted) sends ten blessings upon him and raises him ten degrees "

Abu al-Layth continues:

I heard my father narrate that it happened that, while Sufyan al-Thawri was circumambulating the Ka'ba, he saw a man who did not raise a foot nor lower a foot without making salat for the Prophet (peace and blessing be upon him).

Sufyan said he told him: "O man! You have left saying subhan Allah, and la ilaha illallah and have proceeded with the salat on the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him)! Do you have any explanation regarding this?"

The young man asked: "Who are you, may Allah pardon you?" "I am Sufyan al-Thawri*."

The young man said: "Had it not been that you are one of the Strangers among the people of your own time (i.e. one of Ahl al-Sunna), I would not have told you of my condition, nor revealed to you my secret.

"I went out with my father on pilgrimage to the Holy House of Allah, until I reached one of the resting-stations. My father became sick and I nursed him. One night, when I was at his bedside, he died and his face turned dark. So I said, 'We belong to Allah and to Him we return! ' Then I pulled the covers over his face, after which sleep over­came me and I slept.

"I saw a man next to me with a face such as I had never seen a more handsome one, nor clothes cleaner than his, nor a scent finer than his. He kept approaching until he came close to my father and removed the covers from his face, whereupon the face of my father became full of light.

"Then the man started to go back, so I held onto his clothes and said: 'O servant of Allah! Who are you, with whom Allah has graced us in this foreign land?' He said:

'Do you not you know me? I am Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah, who brought the Qur'an! Your father transgressed against himself, but he used to invoke salat on me frequently, and when he was affected with whatever affected him he called on me for help (isthaghatha bi), and I am prompt helper of one who makes much salat on me (wa-ana ghayyathun li-man akhthara al-salata 'alayy)'.

"Then I woke up and saw that the face of my father was bright."

Qabisa said that no one sat with Sufyan except they remembered death. Yusuf ibn Asbat narrates that he once handed Sufyan the ablution-pot in the evening and left him holding it pensively. At dawn, had not moved and said: "I am still thinking about the next life."

He would reach states of anxiety about the Day of Judgment in which urinated blood. He said: "I may see something against which I ought to speak out but I do not, then I urinate blood."

He also said: "I felt the fear of God to a point I wondered how I could still be alive, then I would say to myself: I have a fixed term of life, but I wish it were made lighter for me. My fear is such that I fear losing my mind." "I ask Allah to take away some of my fear of Him."

Ibn Mahdl said: "Night after night I would catch sight of Sufyan sitting up and calling out: "The Fire! The Fire! I cannot sleep nor feel pleasure anymore because i think of the Fire.'" Abu Nu'aym said that Sufyan would be useless for days whenever this state overtook him.

* Sufyan ibn sa'id ibn Masruq Abu 'Abd Allah al Thawri al-Mudari al-Kufi, may Allah have mercy on him (97-161), the Godfearing, wise, grief-stricken, Mujtahid Imam, was "Commander of the Believers in Hadith" - the highest level in hadith Mastership -, "Shaykh al-Islam, the Imam of hadith Masters, the leader of the practicing Ulema in his time, the author of the Jami'" (al-Dhahabi).

- Al-samarqandi, Tanbih al-Ghafilin, ed. Shaykh Ahmad Salam (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyya, c.1986) p.319-320.