بِسْمِ اللّهِ الرَّحْمـَنِ الرَّحِيمِ
إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ عَلِيمُۢ بِذَاتِ ٱلصُّدُورِ
innal laaha ‘aleemum bizaatis sudoor
Part of Al-Imran (Family of Imran) 3:119: Behold, God has full knowledge of what is in [their] hearts!
Niaz Fatehpuri, a famous albeit somewhat misguided Urdu poet who had won many awards and accolades in South Asia, was a strong critic of religion. In an anecdote set in Lucknow, he is said to have argued with Maulana Manzoor Nomani against the existence of miracles in general, claiming specifically that the Prophet ﷺ had not performed any miracles.
Maulana politely asked whether, between the two of them, they could come up with a strategy to reform the city and rid it of misguided and corrupt conduct. Niaz replied, "Maulana, you are crazy; this is impossible!"
To which Maulana replied, "You are well-read and erudite, and you cannot even entertain the idea, and yet you saw how an unlettered Prophet with no worldly teacher, within a portion of his lifetime, managed to transform the worst of the jahiliyyah Arabs into arguably the best of the whole human race. Is that not miracle enough?"
In the telling, this stunned Niaz, and he became much more amicable towards religion after that.
The following retelling offers another example of this transformation:
As was his habit, one night the Caliph Umar al-Faruq رضي الله عنه went out in disguise to see the condition of the people. This time he was with his companion Aslam. As they were moving from one quarter to another, they reached a neighbourhood where some of the poorest people lived. Light was coming from one small dwelling and it seemed like there was a disagreement going on. They could make out that a mother was complaining to her daughter that the amount of money earned by her from the sale of milk that day was very little. She further said that when she was young, and used to sell milk, she always mixed water with milk, and that led to an increase in earnings. She was compelling her daughter to do the same.
The girl replied, "You adulterated milk when you were not a Muslim. Now that we are Muslims, we cannot continue in the same old corrupt ways."
The mother said, "What does Islam have to do with adulteration of milk?"
The daughter said, "Do you not know that the Caliph has instructed according to the commandments of Islam that food should not be adulterated?"
The mother said, "The Caliph has forgotten us. We are so poor, what else should we do but adulterate milk in order to make ends meet?"
The daughter said, "Such earnings would not be lawful, and as a Muslim I would not do anything whereby other Muslims are deceived."
The mother persisted, "But, child, there is neither the Caliph nor any of his officers here to see what we do. Daughter, you are still a child. Go to bed now and tomorrow I will myself mix the milk with water for you."
The girl refused to fall in with the plan of her mother. She said, "The Caliph may or may not be here, but how can we escape the notice of Allah and our own conscience?"
Thereupon the mother remained quiet. The lamp was extinguished and the mother and the daughter went to sleep.
The next day, the Caliph sent someone to purchase milk from the girl. The milk was unadulterated. The girl had kept her resolve and stayed firm. Umar رضي الله عنه turned to his companion and said, "The girl has kept her resolve in spite of the exhortation of her mother."
The next day the Caliph summoned the daughter and the mother to his court. The mother trembled as she stood before the mighty ruler. But the girl faced the Caliph boldly and there was an impressive dignity about her. Then before the gathering, Caliph Umar رضي الله عنه related how he had overheard the mother and the daughter, and how the daughter had kept her resolve despite the exhortations of the mother.
Someone suggested that the mother should be taken to task. The Caliph said that ordinarily he would have punished the mother, but he had forgiven her for the sake of her daughter. Turning to the girl the great Caliph said, "Islam needs daughters like you and as Caliph of Islam, I would like to propose that you become my daughter." The Caliph called his sons, and addressing them said, "Here is a gem of a girl who would make a great mother. I desire that one of you should take this girl as his wife. I know of no better bride than this girl of sterling character. "
Abdullah and Abdur Rahman, the elder sons of the Caliph, were already married. Asim, the third son, was still unmarried, and he offered to marry the girl. Thereupon, with the consent of the milkmaid and her mother, Asim was married to the girl, and the milkmaid became the daughter-in-law of the Caliph.
From this union was born a daughter, Layla bint Asim, who became in due course the mother of Umar bin Abdul Aziz.
Umar bin Abdul Aziz became Caliph and served from 717 to 720.
While other Caliphs of the Umayyad dynasty reveled in luxury, Umar bin Abdul Aziz as a Caliph set standards for austerity and simplicity in accordance with Islamic teachings. He preferred simplicity to the extravagance that had become a hallmark of the Umayyad lifestyle, depositing all assets and finery meant for the caliph into the public treasury. He abandoned the palace and instead preferred to live in modest dwellings. He wore rough linens instead of royal robes, and often went unrecognised. He even persuaded his own wife – who had been daughter, sister and wife to three separate caliphs – to donate her jewellery to the public treasury. It is said that if ever there was a noble Caliph after the first four “Rightly guided Caliphs,” such a man was Umar bin Abdul Aziz. And he inherited the noble qualities of the milkmaid who married the Caliph's son, and those of Caliph Umar Farooq who had the eye to discern the nobler qualities of sterling character in a poor girl.
There is a related incident that the relatives complained to Umar's aunt, meaning the sister of Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan, that he was repossessing their endowments and distributing them to the poor, threatening their way of life. She went to him and asked him to let the relatives enjoy the state wealth. But he did not relent as they were using the state exchequer to enrich themselves and he insisted on all of it being returned for the welfare of the community. It is notable here that she grumbled that, having married into such a family, they could hardly expect anything other than honesty and austerity.
One account attributes his death to opposition to the reforms he initiated, which greatly angered the Umayyad nobility. It is reported that they bribed a slave of his to administer a deadly poison. The Caliph, having felt the effect of the poison, sent for the slave and asked him why he had poisoned him. The slave replied that he was given one thousand dinars for the purpose. The Caliph deposited the amount in the public treasury and, freeing the slave, asked him to leave the place immediately, lest anyone should kill him.
He reportedly left behind only 17 dinars with a will that out of this amount the rent of the house in which he died and the price of the land in which he was buried would be paid.
Source note: The classical account names Aslam as Umar’s companion and relates the overheard refusal to dilute milk, Aslam’s next-day inquiry, and the marriage to Asim. The fuller dialogue, milk test, court hearing, and pardon here are narrative elaborations, not verbatim classical reports. The Niaz Fatehpuri exchange and the poisoning and estate reports still lack exact primary references. The earlier version alternatively named Ibn Abbas; that identification has been corrected. Classical Arabic passages and source references
