Tamim e Dari during Umar’s Caliphate

Abu Riyya writes: ‘Umar bin Khattab highly respected Tamim and recalled his name by referring to him as ‘Khair o Ahlel Madina’ (The best person in Medina’[1]. This was at a time when personalities like Ali (a.s.) and other honorable companions were present.

          Later, when people were divided into different categories on the command of the second caliph, Tamim was allocated in the category of the warriors of Badr who were the most respected companions of the Prophet (p.b.u.h.) and had the highest income.

          Likewise, when he commanded that the Nawafil prayers and the recommended prayers of the month of Ramadan will be offered in congregational manner (in the 14^th Hijrah), he appointed some as the Imam for the congregation and one of them was Tamim, who was a Christian monk and a cleric who newly accepted Islam.

          He used to arrive for the congregational prayer with a robe which was worth a thousand dirhams and with extreme glory and adornment, to lead the Muslims for prayer.[2] Tamim lived in Medina till the end of Othman’s Caliphate, but after Othman was killed, he went to Syria where he died in the year 40 Hijrah.[3]  

          Abu Riyya writes: ‘One of the most remarkable points is that all these Jewish and Christian clerics who accepted Islam newly and all the other Muslims who were seeking worldly pleasures, went towards Syria after the assassination of Othman and the designation of Ali (a.s.).

          It is clear that this act was not for Allah but it was performed with the intention of aiding the extension of conspiracies and blazing the enmity between the Muslims in order to strengthen the base of Umayyad rule by this means, which also made it easy for them to fill their pockets with the gifts and grants of the Umayyad rulers’[4].[5]

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