Hadith #340

Arabic Text

English Translation

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī narrated to us, ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ṭāʾifī narrated to us, from ʿUthmān ibn ʿAbdillāh ibn Aws al-Thaqafī, from his grandfather Aws ibn Ḥudhayfah who said: I was among the delegation that came to the Prophet ﷺ from Thaqīf, from Banū Mālik. He lodged us in a tent and would go back and forth between his houses and the mosque. After praying the late ʿIshāʾ, he would come to us and we would not leave until he spoke with us, complaining about Quraysh and the people of Makkah. He would say: 'It was not equal — we were humiliated and oppressed in Makkah. When we went out to Madinah, the tides of war went back and forth between us and them.' One night he stayed away and did not come until it grew late after ʿIshāʾ. We said: 'What kept you from us, O Messenger of Allāh?' He said: 'A portion of the Qurʾān came due for me, and I did not want to leave until I completed it.' In the morning, we asked the companions of the Messenger of Allāh ﷺ: 'How do you divide the Qurʾān into portions?' They said: 'We divide it into three sūrahs, five sūrahs, seven sūrahs, nine sūrahs, eleven sūrahs, thirteen sūrahs, and the ḥizb of al-Mufaṣṣal from Sūrat Qāf until the end.'