Seerah Series | Part 2: Specialties of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) | Shaykh Yasir Qadhi

And since ‘Amr ibn al Aas could not stare at him as much as he desired, and this is a beautiful point by the way as well, most of the descriptions of the Prophet , they come from the younger sahabah, not from the older sahabah. And of the greatest or the most explicit descriptions is from Anas ibn Malik who was a little kid. So Anas does not have the same type of, if you like, emotions that the elder ‘Amr ibn Al Aas has. And Anas ibn Malik, he was introduced to the Prophet when he was seven years old. His mother came to him and she gifted her son as a servant and basically Anas would wake up and run to the Prophet ’s house, stay there all day, and then go back to his mother’s house. So he would serve the Prophet , fetch him water, do this and that for him, so this is Anas ibn Malik.

And so Anas ibn Malik has given us one of the most explicit descriptions of the Prophet and this is found in the Shamaa-il of At Tirmidhi. Anas ibn Malik says that, The Prophet was neither very tall such that he stood above the crowd nor was he short such that he would be ignored. He was in the middle. He was of a medium stature. And the Prophet was neither extremely white and nor was he a ruddy brown. He was in the middle. The Prophet ’s hair was not in curls, nor was it straight. It was firm hair, like most men’s hair is.

And Anas ibn Malik said that I never felt any velvet or silk softer than the hand of the Prophet . His hand was very soft, softer than velvet and silk. And he said: Nor did I smell musk or a perfume more fragrant than the sweat of the Prophet . In other words, his natural odor that would emanate from him, Anas ibn Malik said I never smelled any fragrance sweeter than this smell.

And of course you know that Umm Salamah and others, when the Prophet would go to sleep, she would in fact collect his sweat in a jar. So it’s hot, there’s no A/C, there’s no fan, he’s sweating. So she would collect this sweat in a jar, in a small bottle, why? They would use it as perfume. They would use it as perfume. And they would also use it as medicine. They put it in some water and they drink it. This is the sahabah, they’re living with him, they see it themselves, they smell, they see the reality of the miracle of the Prophet . Al Bara ibn ‘Azib described the Prophet and he said, the Prophet was of medium stature. He wasn’t extremely tall, 6 foot 6, nor was he short, he was in the middle of an average stature. And he had broad shoulders. His hair was thick, and by the way this thickness of hair and lusciousness of hair has been narrated by at least five different sahabah. His beard is very bushy and his hair is very full. And the Prophet would usually grow it until it went down to his earlobes and then he would shave it all off. Let’s say he went for umrah or something, or Hajj, he would shave it all off. But it would typically be low to the earlobes. He would have a full hair. And Al Bara’ ibn Azib said that once I saw him wearing a red hullah. Hullah is a cloak, a thing you put over, we would call it a jacket, let’s say, they didn’t have the arms, but over that, and he said, I never saw anything more beautiful than him on that night that I saw him wearing that red hullah, I never saw anything more beautiful than that.

And Ali ibn Abi Talib, the cousin of the Prophet , he also described in a lot of detail, the Prophet . And he said, and of course Ali was his cousin, Ali was someone who grew up with him and knew him even before the risaalah began. And Ali was his son-in-law. So Ali is a close family member who definitely has seen the Prophet more than many of the other sahabah.

Ali ibn Abi Talib says that the Prophet did not have a very fleshy face nor was it completely round. Imagine now, we’re not allowed to draw pictures obviously the sahabah didn’t draw, so they’re trying to use words to get the imagery across. So they’re saying he wasn’t like this and he wasn’t like that, he was in the middle. His face wasn’t fleshy nor was it round. It was slightly ovalish. He had a whitish skin tinge. And as I explained before, what they meant by this…he said white with a reddish tinge, and what they mean by this is as I said a lightish brown. It’s not the pure white, it is a lightish brown. His eyes were large with jet black pupils; so he had black eyes…his eyes were large with jet black pupils and his lashes were long. His joints were large as was his upper back. So you could clearly see the fingers on his joints, his upper back is broad. The Prophet was broad shouldered. And he did not have hair all over his body. He wasn’t hairy on his body…he had hair on his head and the beard was full but he did not have hair on his body but he did have a fine line of hair extending from the chest to the navel. So he had the normal masculine hair that is there.

When he walked, he would walk briskly, fast. It is sunnah to walk fast. When he walked, he would walk briskly, as if he’s descending down a slope. In other words, he’s so fast it’s as if he’s walking down a slope. Some scholars have also said that it is as if Allāh made the earth humble to him, that wherever he’s walking, it’s as if the earth is giving him the place to walk. And others said this is metaphorical, what it means is that the Prophet would walk briskly and he’s walking so fast that most of us, we can only walk like that when we’re going down an inclined plane, and that is how he would generally walk. When he turned, he would turn to face with his whole body. So he’s walking, somebody calls him, he turns to face him with his whole body. And subḥānAllāh, modern presenters and modern speakers, they tell you the exact same advice. That when you speak to somebody, never speak with your head turned. Face him. Speak with him one on one. And this we find written 14 centuries ago…and as a footnote here, just a side point, I read a lot of books about public speaking, a lot of books about presenting and what not. WAllāhi every single point of benefit that we find, we find that the Prophet , he has exactly done this and I’ve wanted to give a lecture, maybe someday I will, about the speaking techniques and style of the Prophet and how perfect it was. And here we find one thing, just off the top of my head, remembering this, that this is one of the advices that the speakers committees always give. Turn and face the entire body, face the audience like that. Never just turn the head. Here we find Ali ibn Abi Talib saying, whenever he would turn, he would turn with his whole body to face the person he is talking to.

Between his two shoulders was the seal of the prophethood. Now we’re going to talk about this inshā’Allāh in a few weeks. The Prophet had a physically khaatam, a physical seal. A physical something that Allāh gave him on his body, on his jasad, and this was to be a sign by which he would be recognized by other people. So the Prophet had a physical sign and this sign is the seal of the prophets, and Ali ibn Abi Talib says, he had this seal and he was the seal of the prophets. He is the khataam and he had the khatam. What is this khatam? We’re going to talk about it later but it is basically an outgrowth of hair in an area where hair does not grow and it is of a different color. And it was between his shoulder blades, shaped like a pigeon’s egg…an oval, small oval, like a pigeon’s egg. And it was in a place that nobody’s hair grows over and that’s all it was, it wasn’t any growth of skin, it wasn’t anything abnormal, a small, if you like, growth of hair of a different color than the usual color of the hair and it was in between his shoulder blades, at the bottom of the shoulder blades, over there. Ali ibn Abi Talib says that between his shoulder blades was the seal of the prophethood. We’re going to hear about this later on when a number of people accepted Islam, most famously Salman al Farsi. Salman al Farsi accepted Islam because his Christian teacher had told him that the sign of the Prophet is that he’s going to have the seal between his two shoulders. And so when Salman al Farsi came, and this is a story we’re jumping the gun here, Salman al Farsi came to the Prophet testing him, does he have the signs or not. One day he came he had the first sign, check, he went home. Second day he came he had the second sign, check, he went home, and these two signs were physical apparent signs, nothing on the body. The third sign is on the shoulder…how am I going to see the shoulder? So the third day Salman al Farsi comes, he’s wondering how am I going to see, the Prophet is wearing a shirt, how am I going to see his shoulder? So he walks behind trying to see maybe, maybe you might see something. And when the Prophet saw him walking behind, subḥānAllāh, the Prophet lowered his shirt and showed him, just…without a word being passed. The Prophet just lowered, you want to see, khalas I’ll show it to you. Here it is. Because he realized what Salman is doing and as soon as he saw that, Salman accepted Islam and he told his long story while we will give an entire, inshā’Allāh, lesson about.

We continue with Ali’s statement, that whoever unexpectedly saw him would stand in awe of him. In other words, just, if you weren’t expecting to see him, you saw him, you would just stop for a millisecond, so much reverence from his body emanating, they would stand in awe of him. And whoever accompanied him and got to know him would love him. Once you got to know him, you would get to love him. And those who described him would always say; now Ali is saying, this is what everybody else says and this is exactly what everybody else says. What did he say? “I have never seen anyone before him or after him who was like him”. This is exactly what Ali is saying the other people say and this is…we are already saying…Bara’ said this and Rubayyi’ said this and so and so…all of the sahabah are saying the same thing: I’ve never seen anyone before him or after him like him.