The Highest Companion

Some months after the Farewell, the Prophet ﷺ fell ill with a fever and a headache that grew heavier by the day. He continued to lead the prayers as long as he could. When at last he could not, he gave the instruction that the community has never forgotten its meaning: let Abu Bakr (ra) lead the people in prayer. Through his final days, even in agony, the prayer was on his lips and on his mind, his last counsel to his ummah repeated until his voice failed: the prayer, the prayer, and what your right hands possess.

By his wish, he was nursed in the room of Aisha (ra). In a moment of relief he came out, leaning between two men, his feet dragging, and saw the believers in rows behind Abu Bakr (ra), the whole community at prayer in his mosque, and his face lit with a smile of joy, almost, Anas (ra) said, like a page of the Qur'an, and he nearly fell into temptation to think they could continue without him. It was the last time most of them saw him, and they nearly broke their prayer for joy.

On his final morning he drew back the curtain and looked out at them at the dawn prayer, and smiled, and gestured for them to continue; they thought he was recovering. By midday he was back in Aisha's (ra) lap, in pain. She would later count it among Allah's favours to her that he passed in her house, on her day, his head against her chest, and that his last act on earth was an act of worship: he had been using a fresh tooth-stick she softened for him in his final hour.

As death approached he dipped his hand in water to cool his face and said: there is no god but Allah; indeed death has its agonies. And those near him heard him murmur, choosing between this world and the next that he was being offered: with those whom Allah has favoured, the prophets, the truthful, the martyrs and the righteous. And then, his gaze rising: O Allah, the Highest Companion. He repeated it, and his blessed soul departed to the One he had called the world to for twenty-three years. It was a Monday, the day he was born and the day revelation first came.

Madinah broke. Umar (ra), unable to bear it, stood with his sword and threatened anyone who said the Prophet ﷺ had died. Then Abu Bakr (ra) came, uncovered his face, kissed his forehead, wept, and went out to the people and steadied a faith that might have shattered with the words that defined the difference between the Messenger and the message: O people, whoever worshipped Muhammad, Muhammad is dead; but whoever worshipped Allah, Allah is living and never dies. And he recited: Muhammad is but a messenger; messengers have passed away before him; if he dies or is killed, will you turn back on your heels? It was as if, Umar (ra) said, the people had never heard the verse until Abu Bakr (ra) recited it that day. The man was gone; the message he carried would now belong to the world.