A Person Travels from Madinah to Damascus For One Hadith

Kathir bin Qais narrates:

"I was sitting with Hadhrat Abu Darda (Radhiyallaho anho) in a musjid in Damascus, when a person came to him and said, 'O, Hadhrat Abu Darda (Radhiyallaho anho), I have come all the way from Madinah to learn one I ladith from you, as I understand you have heard it directly from the Prophet (Sallallaho alaihe wasallam)."

Hadhrat Abu Darda (Radhiyallaho anho):

      "Have you any other business in Damascus?"

The person:

      "No."

Hadhrat Abu Darda (Radhiyallaho anho):

      "Are you sure that you have no other work in Damascus?"

The person:

      "I have come to this place with the sole purpose of learning this Hadith."

Hadhrat Abu Darda (Radhiyallaho anho): "Listen. I have heard the Prophet (Sallallaho aliahe wasallam) saying, 'Allah eases the way to Paradise for one who traverses some distance to seek knowledge. The angels spread their wings under his feet, and all things in heavens and earth (even the fish in the water) pray for his forgiveness. The superiority of a person possessing knowledge over a person doing worship is as the superiority of the moon over the stars. The Ulama are the inheritors of the Prophet (Sallallaho alaihe wassallam). The legacy of Prophets (Alaihimus-salaam) is neither gold nor silver. Their legacy is knowledge. A person who acquires knowledge ac-quires a great wealth."

Hadhrat Abu-Darda (Radhiyallaho anho) is foremost among the Sahabah who possessed very sound knowledge in religion. He is called 'Hakim-ul-Ummah' (The Sage of Islam). He once said:

"Before Islam, I lived on trade. After accepting Islam, I tried to combine the service of with my business, but I could not do so. I therefore gave up business and devoted myself solely to the service of Allah. Now if I have a shop at the gate of a musjid and have no fear of losing a single Salaat thereby, and even if the shop gives me a daily profit of 40 dinars to spend the whole lot in the path of Allah, even then I am not willing to turn to business."

Somebody inquired the reason. He replied:—

"Because of the fear of reckoning."

He used to say:     "I love death, so that I may meet Allah. I love destitution, so that I be meek. I love sickness, so that I be pardoned my sins."

In this story, we find a person travelling all the way from Madinah to Damascus for the sake of one Hadith. This was not at all hard for those people. Hadhrat Sha'abi (Rahmatullahi alaih) is a famous Muhaddith of Koofa. He once narrated a Hadith to one of his 'students and said:

"You are listening to this Hadith while sitting in your home town. People had to travel all their way to Madi-nah for even less important things, because Madinah was the only of seat learning in those days."

Saeed ibnul Musayyab (Rahmatullahi alaih) is a famous Tabi'ee. He says:

"For each Hadith that I have learnt, I had to travel on foot for days and nights together."

Imam Bukhari (Rahmatullahi alaih) was born in Shawwal 194 All. He started learning Hadith in 205 A.H. i.e., when he was only eleven. He had memorised all the books written by Abdullah bin Mubarak (Rahmatullahi alaih) while he was in his early teens. After collecting Ahadith from all the learned men of his own locality, he set out in 216 A.H. in search of further knowledge. His father died and he could not leave his widowed mother alone. He therefore took her with him on his long and strenuous journey to Balkh, Baghdad, Mecca. Basra, Koofah, Asqalan, Hims and Damascus. He collected all the available Ahadith from these seats of learning. He was accepted as an expert in Hadith, while he had not a single hair on his chin. He writes:

I was eighteen when I compiled the Fatwah of the Sa-habah and Tabi'ees."

Hashad (Rahmatullahi alaihe) and one of his companions say:—

"Bukhari and we two used to go together to the same teacher. We noted down all the Ahadith that we learnt, hid he wrote nothing: After many days we said to him, 'Bukhari, you are wasting your tune.' Ile kept quiet. When we admonished him again and again, he said, 'You are now annoying me too much. Bring your notes.' We brought our notes, which covered about 15,000 Ahadith. He, to our litter amazement, recited all those Ahadith by heart."