ʿAbdullāh ibn Masʿūd
عبد الله بن مسعود
- Dates
- 594–652 CE / 30 BH–32 AH
- Relation to the Prophet ﷺ
- Close companion from the earliest days of Makkah
The Prophet ﷺ said: "Whoever wants to recite the Qurʾan as fresh as it was revealed, let him recite as Ibn Masʿūd recites."
Life
Ibn Masʿūd was a shepherd for the chief of the Qurayshī tribe Quzaʿah when he met the Prophet ﷺ and accepted Islam — the sixth person to do so. He was small, thin, and barefoot, and the Prophet ﷺ loved him specifically. He served as the Prophet's ﷺ valet, present at almost every moment of the revelation.
He was one of the four from whom the Prophet ﷺ said to take the Qurʾan. He served as the teacher of Kufa after the conquests — founding the Kufan school of recitation that still bears his influence. His recension of the muṣḥaf differed in minor ways from ʿUthmān's committee's, and those differences are recorded in the tradition as a separate variant reading (qirāʾah).
Passages that mention ʿAbdullāh
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"The Hadith about a man who loves people yet has not joined them, he shall be with those he loves, is agreed upon from the Hadith of Ibn Masud."
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"This is reported by Abu Mansur al-dalami in Musnad al-firdaws on the authority of Ibn Masud with a weak chain"
Also from this generation
- Abū Hurayrah
أبو هريرة
Narrated 5,374 hadith — more than any other companion. A walking archive of the Prophet's ﷺ final years.
- ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbbās
عبد الله بن عباس
The Prophet ﷺ made duʿāʾ for him: "O Allah, give him understanding of the religion and teach him interpretation." The duʿāʾ was answered.
- ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿUmar
عبد الله بن عمر
The companion who most strictly imitated the Prophet's ﷺ smallest actions — down to where he stepped.