Sila ibn Ashyam Abu al-Sahba' al-Adawi

Silat ibn Ashyam Abu al-Sahba' al-Adawi, husband of Mu'adha al-Adawiyya. He was killed as a martyr with Yazid ibn Ziyad at Janza in the battle of Kabul ¹.

In a reflection answering those who presume upon their deeds before God, Ibn al-Jawzi sets Sila ibn Ashyam against the presumptuous worshipper: the lion fled from him, and in his night prayer he would say, "My Lord, save me from the Fire; would one like me ask for Paradise?" ² Abu Ishaq al-Heweny introduces him: his kunya was Abu al-Sahba', his wife was Mu'adha al-Adawiyya, well known in narration, he narrated only one hadith, from Ibn Abbas, living in seclusion and renunciation and narrating little, and he and his son were killed in battle with the Turks in Sijistan in the year 62 of the Hijra. ^{3 4} That date is the one al-Heweny gives.

He narrates, by way of Hammad ibn Salama from Thabit al-Bunani, that Sila was on campaign with his son and told him to go forward so that he might count him with God; the son advanced and was killed, then Sila was killed; and that Mu'adha told the women who gathered at her house: welcome, if you have come to congratulate me; otherwise go back. ^{5 6} He quotes al-Dhahabi that the story of the dates is an established miracle with more than one chain: in a time of flood Sila found no food, a non-Arab offered him bread with pig fat, which he refused, and then a basket of fresh dates wrapped in a white cloth fell behind him at a season when there were no fresh dates; he ate and carried the stones away. ⁷

The story of the lion is told by Abd Allah ibn al-Mubarak, and through him by Abu Nu'aym in Hilyat al-Awliya', from Hammad ibn Ja'far ibn Zayd from his father: Ja'far ibn Zayd went on campaign to Kabul with Sila in the army; Sila went into a thicket to pray, a lion came, Ja'far climbed a tree, and when Sila had finished he told the lion to seek its provision elsewhere, and it turned away; then Sila prayed that God save him from the Fire. ^{8 9 10} Al-Heweny notes the critics' disagreement over Hammad ibn Ja'far and says such stories are treated leniently because they are not hadith attributed to the Prophet ﷺ that bind all people; ^{11 12} and he sees Sila's "would one like me ask for Paradise?" as a passing state, not a rule, since the Prophet often asked God for Paradise. ¹³