Abdullah ibn Ubayy

Abdullah ibn Ubayy, lord of the Khazraj — the man whom Yathrib was almost ready to crown as king, until the Hijra made the Prophet the master of his city instead of him. Sunni tradition remembers him as the chief of the hypocrites: the enemy from within.

The sources say the feuding tribes of Yathrib agreed to crown him before the Prophet arrived, and the crown evaporated. He then showed Islam, and his seat in the assembly remained — in the tradition's account he worked against the Prophet from within ^{1 2}.

He withdrew a third of the army on the eve of Uhud; the incident of the slander (hadith al-ifk) and the sura al-Munafiqun are read in connection with him ³. He died in early 631 CE. Tradition records that the Prophet prayed over him and clothed him in his shirt — an ending the sources report without softening the man ³.

The Aws and the Khazraj had united under his leadership after the war of Bu'ath, and they had strung beads to make him a crown. When the Prophet came, his people turned to the Prophet, and he felt that kingship had been taken from him. He showed Islam after Badr, but kept disbelief hidden within (Medina's society at the Hijra) ⁴.

Quraysh wrote to him threatening war or expulsion, and he and the pagans with him gathered to fight the Prophet. When the Prophet came to them, they dispersed. He refrained from fighting, because he judged that his companions would not hold firm (Quraysh's letter to Ibn Ubayy) ⁵.

He calls him the chief of the hypocrites in Medina, and says the Prophet did not order any of his Companions to kill him. ^{6 7} He recounts that Abdullah ibn Ubayy's son asked the Prophet's permission to kill his father, and was not given it. ⁸ He says the Prophet offered Abdullah ibn Ubayy's family a shroud for him (needs_source: the wording of this sentence is not clear in the automatic transcript). ⁹ He says the Prophet said he would ask forgiveness for him, however many times it was asked (needs_source: the number is not clear in the automatic transcript), and then a prohibition on praying over the hypocrites came down. ^{10 11}

The Sheikh narrates that when Abdullah ibn Ubayy died, people asked the Prophet to pray over him (needs_source: narration with no source given in the lecture). ¹²

He quotes a verse, not named by him, which he presents as a prohibition on praying over the dead among the hypocrites and standing at their graves. ^{13 14}