Extraordinary Standards of Service to his People

With regard to how Hazrat Umar (ra) would look after the elderly, physically impaired and poor men and women, there is a narration in which Hazrat Talha (ra) states that one night he saw Hazrat Umar (ra) leave his house in the darkness of the night. Hazrat Umar (ra) entered one house and then another.

The next morning, Hazrat Talha (ra) went to one of the two houses where he found a blind elderly woman sitting down. Hazrat Talha (ra) asked her, “The man that visited last night, what does he come here to do?” The elderly woman replied, “He has been helping me for quite some time. He completes my work for me and cleans up.” Upon hearing this, Hazrat Talha (ra) said to himself in regret, “O Talha! May your mother mourn for you! Woe be unto you! You went in search of an error on Umar’s part, but the matter is something completely different.”

(Ibn al-Juzi, Sirat Umar al-Khattab [Al-Azhar, Egypt: al-Matba‘ah al-Misriyyah], p. 58)

These were the extraordinary standards of service to one’s people that were established by Hazrat Umar (ra).

There are many narrations which demonstrate that Hazrat Umar (ra) looked after the poor, women and children, and how owing to his fear of Allah, he would support them and become anxious to help. If he would see that someone’s needs from among his people were not being fulfilled, he would become restless as a result of it.

I have mentioned some examples in the previous Friday Sermons in reference to certain matters. For example, on one occasion, Hazrat Umar (ra) asked a woman why her child was crying, to which she replied that since Umar (ra) did not fix a ration for suckling babies, she was trying to ween him and had stopped giving him milk, and so he was crying out of hunger. Upon hearing this, Hazrat Umar (ra) became restless and immediately arranged for her food provisions. He then announced that from then on, every new-born child would be assigned a ration.

(Ibn Kathir, Al-Bidayah wa al-Nihayah, Vol. 10 [Beirut, Lebanon: Dar Hijr, 1997] pp. 185-186)

Similarly, a woman who was travelling, did not have any food and had to camp for the night. Her children were crying out of hunger. In the night, when Hazrat Umar (ra) learned of this, he became worried; he immediately went to the store and took food provisions himself to her. He was not content until he cooked the food, fed the children and they began to laugh and play. Only then did he leave from there.

(Muhammad Ibn Jarir al-Tabari, Tarikh al-Tabari, Vol. 5, Thumma Dakhalat Sanah Thalath Ishrin/Dhikr Ba‘d Siyarih [Beirut, Lebanon: Dar al-Fikr, 1998], p. 62)