A Secret Investigation in Medina | Signs of the Hour Ep. 3 | Dr. Omar Suleiman

A Secret Investigation in Medina

I wanted to start tonight's halaqa by saying that the dajjal is already out. Do you believe me or not? Yes. The title of the halaqa is that the dajjal is already alive and the dajjal is already out.

SubhanAllah, we spoke about last time the minor signs that happen in the life of the Prophet ﷺ. But what about a major sign that happened in the life of the Prophet ﷺ? What if dajjal was there but he hadn't yet begun his tenure as dajjal? Because there's a moment where dajjal becomes a dajjal. And so it's very important here to say that one of the major signs of the Day of Judgment is خروج المسيح الدجال. The coming out of al-Masih al-Dajjal, where he appears as the Antichrist and he begins his reign as the Antichrist, as a dajjal. However, did the Prophet ﷺ and his companions see him?

The Mystery of Ibn Sayyad

And this is actually one of the most interesting chapters in the entire study of علامات الساعة, of the signs of the Day of Judgment, is that the Prophet ﷺ and the companions thought that dajjal was amongst them. And it's called the Mystery of Ibn Sayyad. If you open up Sahih Muslim, it's the neatest compilation of these ahadith. It's باب ذكر ابن صياد, the chapter of Ibn Sayyad. Imam Muslim ﷺ categorizes all of the narrations about Ibn Sayyad, the man who they thought was dajjal. And Imam al-Nawawi ﷺ of course has the most famous sharh, the most explanation of Sahih Muslim. So you could read through those explanations of each hadith.

But inshallah ta'ala we're going to look at them together, but again through a practical lens. Because I don't just want to cite the ahadith about dajjal being amongst the Prophet ﷺ and the companions. I want to cite some of the lessons from how they dealt with the situation. And the very first thing to take from this is imagine if you are living at the time of the Prophet ﷺ, and you think that not only are you living with the Prophet ﷺ, but you're also living with dajjal already coming out. Meaning how urgent the day of judgment actually felt for them.

And we talked about this idea of الاستعداد, of preparation. And you look at the Prophet ﷺ, and even he ﷺ, to whom Jibreel ﷺ was sent. And even he ﷺ, Jibreel ﷺ, do not know when the day of judgment is. And the Prophet ﷺ is asked, is this al-Masih al-Dajjal? And the Prophet ﷺ does not know if this is actually al-Masih al-Dajjal or not.

The Strange Youth of Medina

So let's talk about this man. And again, put yourself in the climate of Medina. And inshallah ta'ala we'll finally start to move on after this into the death of the Prophet ﷺ. And the signs that start to appear up until our time, bismillah. But we're still living in the time of the Prophet ﷺ.

You get to al-Medina, and there is a young man that lives in the outskirts of Medina. And he's from one of the Jewish tribes that remain. Some of the writers said Banu Qaynuqa. I could not find anything to substantiate that from a primary source. So let's just say one of the Jewish tribes, possibly Banu Qaynuqa, that lives on the outskirts of al-Medina. And he's not a Muslim. So he does not embrace Islam when the Prophet ﷺ comes to Medina. His family does not embrace Islam. His name is Safi ibn Sayyad. Some of the narrations say Abdullah. And that could be something that comes up later, that the name Abdullah comes up later. But Safi ibn Sayyad is well established in the books of Ahadith. Also ibn Sa'id. So let's say Safi ibn Sayyad or Safi ibn Sayyad or Abdullah ibn Sayyad. But his most famous description is ibn Sayyad.

And this kid was very different. Now the Prophet ﷺ was used to soothsayers. They were used to fortune tellers. And one of the proofs of the Prophethood that we spoke about with Rasulullah ﷺ was the accuracy of what he was saying that would come to pass and it would come to pass. Some soothsayers are better than others. And what does that mean when someone is better than someone else at predicting the future?

How Soothsayers Operate

One of them could be that that soothsayer is just ambiguous and broad enough to say something that would make you say, ah, he got it right, she got it right. So they say something that can catch three or four different scenarios. And so if you fall in any one of those three or four scenarios, you say, they know what they're talking about. The fortune teller knows what they're talking about. So if they tell you, sister, you're going to marry a Muhammad. And then you end up marrying a Muhammad and you say, see, he knew what he was talking about. So they cast a very broad, the point is, is that this is one of the ways that they would decipher who is, you know, a better soothsayer at their craft, a better fortune teller at their craft. They cast a broad enough net to tell you that this is what's happening. Or they actually get some things wrong, but what they get right is very specific. So they tell you two or three things. Two of them are wrong, but the one that they got was just too specific to where it couldn't not be spooky.

So in Mecca, they were used to these types of people. And of course, a كاهن has a very specific type of look. And that's one of the ways they were like, the Prophet ﷺ doesn't fit the description in any way of these people, of a soothsayer.

Now, what do these people do? And what makes them so compelling? So especially when we're talking about the person that we're talking about today, or we're talking about those that the Prophet ﷺ mentioned, in some way, shape, or form, they deal with the jinn. They deal with the jinn. And in dealing with the jinn, they make certain compromises of themselves, and subhanAllah, almost all of them lose themselves. It really is something that you don't want to come near. And I've seen many good people that start to get obsessed with that world, and eventually they fall into that world, and there's no coming back from it. Or it feels like there's no coming back from it. And of course, Allah can heal anyone. But someone that willingly tries to get into that world, and understand that world, and try to deal with the uncertainties, and the futures, and the unseen.

That we have adorned the skies, the heavens with the stars, and we have made them like missiles towards the shayateen. We strike the shayateen with them. And what that is referring to is that the shayateen steal. They try to hear some of the أخبار, some of the hearings of what's happening in the heavens. And they take one story, but then they decorate that one story with so many different things. So they might get something very specific. But then, in order to complete the story, to fill in the gaps, they just use their own, I guess you call it shaytanic creative liberty, to fill in the gaps. And to give you a story.

The Prophet's Teaching on Soothsayers

Now this is a fitna. And Aisha radiAllahu ta'ala anha, she said that some people asked the Prophet ﷺ about الكهان, about these soothsayers. And the Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari)

They're nothing. Like he dismissed them ﷺ. They were very honest. They said:

Sometimes they say things and they get it right. Sometimes they say things and it comes true. It's exactly as they said it. And the Prophet ﷺ said:

He said ﷺ that that is one word of truth that they take and then they decorate it with a hundred lies. And they murmur it into their partner, their friend, the foreteller. And it's like the sound, if you can imagine, like the cackling of a hen. It's not a pleasant sound, but it's a weird process that's happening at the end of the day. They're getting one thing right and then they're decorating it with a bunch of lies. Now if someone's really good at their craft, they get 5% right. They get 10% right. The point is that sometimes you have others that are better at this.

The First Encounter

So there was this kid in Medina, on the outskirts of Medina from these tribes, who was a very strange kid. And he was very, very, very good at talking about visions and things that would happen. And everyone was kind of spooked out by him.

So Abdullah ibn Umar radiAllahu anhu says that Umar ibn al-Khattab radiAllahu anhu went along with the Prophet ﷺ in the company of some persons in an area towards where Ibn al-Sayyad was.

He found him playing with some of the kids around the fortress of Banu Mughala. Some narrations said Banu Muawiyah. It's one of the tribes of the Ansar, the sub-tribes of Khazraj in particular, on the outskirts of Medina. So this isn't around the masjid of the Prophet ﷺ. He's not a Muslim. And he's playing with the kids. And the Prophet ﷺ was uncomfortable with the other kids that were playing with him. So the Prophet ﷺ is with some of the companions, and he's watching this kid, Ibn al-Sayyad, with them.

So the Prophet ﷺ goes close to him. And the narration says:

He was close to being pubescent. So he's right at the brink of puberty. That just gives you an idea of what his age would be, pre-teen or an early teen.

The Prophet ﷺ walked up to him, and the Prophet ﷺ put his hand on his back. And he said to him:

May your hands be covered in dust. Do you bear witness that I am the Messenger of Allah?

Ibn al-Sayyad looks at the Prophet ﷺ, and he says:

I bear witness that you are the Messenger of the illiterates. Then he says to the Prophet ﷺ:

Do you bear witness that I am the Messenger of Allah? So he says that to the Prophet ﷺ. So the Prophet ﷺ says:

I believe in Allah and His Messengers.

I believe in Allah and the angels and the books.

A Practical Lesson in Faith

So the Prophet ﷺ affirmed the statement of Iman. Lesson number one, by the way, when someone يُشَكِّكُكَ someone causes you doubt in your faith, the Prophet ﷺ said, آمَنْتُ بِاللَّهِ. So we actually have a practical manifestation here that you say, I believe in Allah. When you see something that is in its nature, deceptive, that lends itself towards disbelief or doubt, you have a reaction.

Even the companions came to the Prophet ﷺ and they mentioned that sometimes we have these things inside of us that like whispers. وَسْوَاس. And they're so bad that like we want to hurt ourselves. Like it's as if we want to throw ourselves off of a cliff because we hate the way this is feeling, right? That a doubt comes in our minds. And the Prophet ﷺ says, Is it like that? And they said, Yes. And the Prophet ﷺ said, That's صَرِيحُ الْإِيمَانِ They don't say it. They don't speak those words. That is actually clear faith.

And the Prophet ﷺ said that when Shaytan takes you down a track where who created this? Allah. Then who created Allah and starts messing with your faith? Say, آمَنْتُ بِاللَّهِ at that moment. Dismiss him by, I believe in Allah.

So the Prophet ﷺ responded to a statement of kufr with a statement of iman. This is very practical by the way. When you see kufriyat in person or online, what should come to your mouth according to what the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said? آمَنْتُ بِاللَّهِ. Let it constantly be there as an affirmation of faith.

So the Prophet ﷺ responded and he said:

I believe in Allah and His Messengers.

In Allah and the angels and in the books as well. So the Prophet ﷺ said to him:

What are you seeing right now? What are you seeing right now? Because again, you kind of look at him and he has a look to him. Like he's seeing visions and things of that sort. So he said:

He said, I see a throne above water.

The Investigation of Ibn Sayyad

The Prophet ﷺ says:

You are looking at the throne of Iblis on the water. And he said to him:

And what else do you see? So he said:

A truthful one comes to me and a lying one comes to me. I mean, you can tell he's a very weird person by the way he's answering these questions, right? Strange. He says, a truthful one comes to me and a liar comes to me as well. And the Prophet ﷺ did not explain to him what that was. He simply said:

Things are all mixed up for you. Things are all mixed up for you.

The Test of Hidden Knowledge

Then the Prophet ﷺ said to him, and this is very interesting:

I'm hiding something from you. And Ibn Sayyad said:

It is الدُّخ. The Prophet ﷺ said:

Be lost, may you be disgraced, you will not go beyond your limits. What is it that the Prophet ﷺ was thinking about? سُورَة الدُّخَان And Ibn Sayyad was able to guess الدُّخ but he couldn't complete the word. And the Prophet ﷺ was saying to him that you've been sealed off. You will not surpass what Allah does not allow you to surpass. Right? So اخْسَأْ May you be disgraced. You will not go beyond your rank.

Umar's Response

Umar ibn al-Khattab رضي الله تعالى عنه... If you know Umar ibn al-Khattab but you don't know the narration, what do you think Umar رضي الله عنه said, let me do? That's my solution. This kid is weird. He's challenging the Prophet ﷺ. I mean kufr beyond kufr here. Like يَا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ Let me just strike him. Let me finish this. I don't like the confusion.

سُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ That was Umar رضي الله عنه before he became Muslim when the Prophet ﷺ came with Islam. And Umar رضي الله عنه said I don't like the way he's making me feel. He said let me go kill the Prophet ﷺ. But here he's with the Prophet ﷺ and he says:

Let me just strike his neck, O Messenger of Allah! And it's interesting what the Prophet ﷺ said. He said:

If he is him, then you won't be able to kill him. Why? Because who will kill ad-Dajjal? Isa عليه السلام, Jesus peace be upon him. So if it's actually ad-Dajjal, you won't be able to kill him. And if it's not him, then you would have killed the kid. What's the use of killing him? So either he doesn't deserve to be killed or he can't be killed. So no, there's no point. Hold your sword. Don't do anything with him.

So the Prophet ﷺ moved on. Ibn Sayyad asked him, interestingly enough, he told him: Tell me what the soil of Jannah is like. He likes to have these types of conversations. He said tell me what the soil of Jannah is like. And the Prophet ﷺ said that it is:

White pure musk. So he answered his question ﷺ.

The Secret Observation

You're living in Medina. See some of you already look freaked out. You don't even live in that time. This is actually the point. Who is this person? He's strange. He's weird. Is it ad-Dajjal? Even the Prophet ﷺ does not know. Is he ad-Dajjal or not? And the Prophet ﷺ is taking his precautions with him. He's hanging out in the fortress areas of Medina.

Abdullah ibn Umar رضي الله عنهما further narrates that the Prophet ﷺ:

that the Prophet ﷺ went out with Ubayy ibn Ka'b رضي الله تعالى عنه to a palm grove where Ibn Sayyad was. And the Prophet ﷺ went under the tree. And while he went under the tree, Ibn Sayyad was wrapped up in some sort of blanket فِي قَطِيفَةٍ لَهُ فِيهَا that he was in this particular type of blanket and he was murmuring something. He was murmuring something.

So you can imagine he's in this particular situation. There's a murmuring sound that's coming from that blanket. زَمْزَمَة Like you can imagine a buzzing of sorts. So he's clearly doing something that's very strange and very weird. And while the Prophet ﷺ is watching him from behind the tree, the mother of Ibn Sayyad comes out and she says to Ibn Sayyad:

Muhammad is there ﷺ. And so Ibn Sayyad فَثَارَ ابْنُ صَيَّادٍ he jumps up and the Prophet ﷺ said:

If she would have left him alone then it would have given me enough time for me to actually examine his affair further. But clearly his mother alerted him to the Prophet ﷺ being there and by the way that his mother spoke his mother is also not a Muslim. Notice the Prophet ﷺ does not do anything to her. He does not do anything to him.

The Prophet's Warning About ad-Dajjal

Then Abdullah Ibn Umar says:

The Prophet ﷺ stood up on the minbar and he praised Allah as Allah deserves to be praised.

And then he spoke about ad-Dajjal. And the Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 3057)

That verily I am warning you about him. There is not a prophet that came except that he warned about ad-Dajjal. Nuh عليه السلام warned his people about him. And so he's saying to you that even the first messenger of Allah, Nuh عليه السلام warned about ad-Dajjal.

He said but I'm going to tell you what no Nabi told his people before: that ad-Dajjal is أَعْوَرُ. That he is one-eyed. He has a disability in one eye. A defect in one eye. And the Prophet ﷺ said that Allah is not as such:

And it goes on that the Prophet ﷺ was speaking about the people or speaking to the people about ad-Dajjal. And he said ﷺ:

That verily written between his eyes is the word kafir. That a person who will be able to read it will be a believer, a mu'min who hates what he does. Very important distinction here:

That verily who hates his deeds is a believer, is a mu'min. And the Prophet ﷺ mentioned also:

Know all of you that none of you will see Allah until you die. So this man will claim to be God himself at some point. He'll claim to be Allah himself at some point.

Further Encounters with Ibn Sayyad

There is another part of this that continues of some of the sahaba now interacting with Ibn Sayyad and still wondering if he was ad-Dajjal. Abdullah ibn Umar رضي الله تعالى عنهما he says:

I met Ibn Sayyad twice. I met him twice. And I saw some people around him. So I said to some of them:

Do you say amongst yourselves that he is he? Right? He is ad-Dajjal? And a person said: "By Allah, no." So a person with him said: "By Allah, no."

So Abdullah ibn Umar رضي الله تعالى عنهما he said that you have lied. And he said: "By Allah, some of you inform me that he would not die until he would have the largest number of offspring and huge wealth. And it is about he about whom it is thought so."

So basically, you know that there is something off about him. And you are not being honest about how you really feel about him. This group that is kind of developing around Ibn Sayyad. But they are also attracted to his personality. They are attracted to things that he is doing.

And that Ibn Sayyad spoke. And Abdullah ibn Umar رضي الله تعالى عنهما says: "I met him for a second time and I said something to him that he did not like. I made him angry." And he said: "And his eye was swollen."

So this is where it gets even more interesting. His eye was swollen. So he says to him: "What happened to your eye?" Abdullah ibn Umar asks Ibn Sayyad: "What happened to your eye?" He says: "I don't know." He said: "It is in your head. You don't know what happened to your eye?"

The Strange Encounter with Ibn Sayyad

So basically at this point when he says to him:

"You don't know and it is in your head." That at that point Ibn Sayyad said to him:

"If Allah wants, He could create it or He can put that right in your staff."

And he said at that point he started to make a noise that was braying louder than any donkey I had ever heard. And it took him by surprise. In one narration, Abdullah ibn Umar رضي الله عنهما said his body literally inflated until he became so big that it was like he was taking up the road. And Abdullah ibn Umar said, "You know I got so scared that I quickly went away from him."

Some of the companions that saw that incident said that you broke your staff, you know, hitting him. And he said, "I didn't even remember if I hit with the staff or tried to get away from him or something like that." And he said, "I went to Hafsa رضي الله عنها and I told Hafsa رضي الله عنها what happened."

And Hafsa رضي الله عنها said to him:

"Woe to you, may Allah have mercy on you. Why did you incite Ibn Sayyad? Don't you know that the Messenger of Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم said that Dajjal would appear out of a moment of rage?"

Very interesting, which gives you a practical manifestation to this as well. That Dajjal is dormant for a moment and then he comes out at some point. So there is a dormant version of Dajjal and then there is a moment of Dajjal where he actually comes out. Right? So Hafsa رضي الله عنها says, "May Allah have mercy on you" to her brother. "Why did you incite him? Why did you say a word to him to upset him knowing that the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said that it would be a moment of rage from which Dajjal would appear in this world?"

The Hadith of Tamim al-Dari

Now we pause Ibn Sayyad and we move on to another hadith, which is the hadith of Tamim من أوسى الداري رضي الله تعالى عنه, the Palestinian companion. The one we spoke about not too long ago - in fact, sometime last year we talked about Tamim al-Dari رضي الله تعالى عنه. Tamim al-Dari, who was a Christian from Palestine, who arrived to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم in the ninth year with a delegation of ten men, including his brother Abu Hind al-Dari رضي الله تعالى عنه.

And the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, introducing him to the community with a very famous encounter. And that is the narration that Fatima bint Qais, also in Sahih Muslim, she says رضي الله عنها:

(Sahih Muslim)

"I heard a caller - I heard the caller of Allah's Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم calling that the prayer has begun. So I went out and I prayed with the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم. When the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم finished his prayer, he sat on the minbar while he was laughing."

And of course the laugh of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم was not audible - it was a big smile that he had. So he sat on the minbar and he smiled. And the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said:

"Do you know why I have gathered you?"

They said, "Allah and His Messenger know best."

He said, "I didn't gather you because of any type of fear or hope" - like it's not war, it's not battle, it's not because something is happening. He said that I have gathered you because Tamim al-Dari كان رجلا نصرانية - that Tamim al-Dari was a Christian man and he came فبايع وأسلم - he came and he took bay'ah and he became Muslim.

"And he spoke with words that match what I have told you about Dajjal."

The Strange Island Encounter

And so it goes on that Tamim al-Dari رضي الله عنه, while he was on his way to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, at some point their ship broke down and they became stranded. Tamim رضي الله عنه and his companions - so this whole group of people became stranded. And as they sailed in that ship with 30 men, suddenly they came across this very strange area on an island that they were on. And when they came across that island, or when they came across that site on that island, they met a beast that was so hairy that you couldn't tell its front from its back.

And they said, "Woe to you, who are you?" I'll skip the Arabic narration because I did it in Tamim's biography. I'll just paraphrase. And the beast said, "I am Al-Jassasa." They said, "What is Al-Jassasa?" And it said, "Oh people, go to the man in the monastery, for he is very eager to know about you."

So Tamim said that when it named a person to us, we left quickly, fearing that it might be a devil - like some sort of shaitan. Like we're like, "What was that? What was it that we just saw? Did we just see some sort of a shaitan?"

So Tamim said we quickly went to what appeared to be like a monastery, and there we found a huge man who we had never seen before. His hands were tied up to his neck and his legs were tied up with iron shackles. And we said to him, "Woe to you, who are you?" And he said, "You will soon know about me. Tell me who you are."

So we said to him that we are a people from Arabia. We sailed on a ship, but the waves have been tossing us around for a month, and we ended up on this particular area where we were met by this beast - this thing that looked like a beast that spoke and said it was Al-Jassasa, and it pointed us towards you. So we came to you quickly.

The Questions About the Signs

And then the man said, "Tell me about the date palm trees of Bisan," which is a town in northern Palestine which is near the Jordan River. It's part of the occupied territories. And we said, "What do you want to know about them?" He said, "I want to know whether those trees bear fruit or not." And we said yes. He said, "Soon they will not bear fruit anymore."

And he said, "Tell me about the lake of Tiberias" - Tiberia, the Sea of Galilee, which is in northern Palestine. We said, "What do you want to know about it?" He said, "Is there still water in it? Is there still water in that sea?" And this is very important for the content that we are covering. And we said, "There's plenty of water in it." And he said, "Soon it will become dry."

Look up what is happening to that lake today, and it has almost dried up. That lake has almost dried up. Right? So if you look at it, it is receding to a point of almost being dried up. So what's he asking about? He's asking about what signs of the Day of Judgment have passed from the minor signs. Because before Khuruj al-Dajjal - before Dajjal has his reign - the world goes through a severe drought and famine. Right? Food shortage, water shortage. And then Allah holds the rain from the skies. It goes through a severe shortage. So he's asking about this.

And subhanAllah, this lake is the lowest freshwater lake on earth. It's the second lowest lake in the world after al-Bahra al-Mayyit, which is of course a salt lake.

So he then says, "Tell me about al-Nabi al-Ummi" - very interesting, by the way. He used the same terminology that Ibn al-Sayyad used. "Tell me about the Prophet of the Illiterates and what he has done." So we said, "He has left Mecca and he has settled in Medina." And he said, "Have the Arabs fought against him?" And we said yes. And he said, "How did he deal with them?" He said, "He overcame all of them and they followed him."

And he asked, "Have they actually been defeated by him? Has he actually overcome them? And have they actually followed him?" And he said yes.

So they said, "Who are you?" "I am al-Dajjal. That verily the Prophet of the Illiterates has come out, and as you answered all of these questions and you said that he has been followed, that is better for them."

And he then said, "I will soon be permitted to leave this place. I will emerge and travel throughout the earth, and 40 nights I will pass through every single town except for Mecca and Taiba - except for Mecca and Medina. For these two have been forbidden to me. And every time I try to enter one of these two places, I will be met by angels bearing unsheathed swords who will prevent me from entering. There will be angels guarding those two cities from every single route that leads to them."

The Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, as he is recounting the story that Tamim al-Dari shared - and Tamim is sharing what happened to him in that narration - the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم strikes the minbar and he says, "And this is Taiba! This is Taiba! This is Taiba!" - meaning this is a place that he cannot enter.

And the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said, "Did I not tell you about this before?" And the people said yes.

Reconciling the Accounts

Alright, so is it that guy or is it Ibn al-Sayyad? So there are a few ways that we can try to reconcile this. One of them is that Ibn al-Sayyad was early in Medina, and this now confirmed to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم that Ibn al-Sayyad was not actually al-Masih al-Dajjal - the Dajjal - because Tamim comes in the last year just prior to the death of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and he shares this narration. And so this is clarifying of that.

And again, the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم has made clear even he does not know who is Dajjal and who is not in this regard. However, this establishes a few things: that Dajjal is alive and he is anxious for that day.

Now could he be a picture or a vision in that child body? Like everything about Dajjal is strange and weird. Could they be the same person, strange and weird? Again, even the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم did not know who Dajjal was - which one of them was actually Dajjal - or if Dajjal had actually come at all.

The Companions' Conviction

Now we go back to Ibn al-Sayyad. Jabir ibn Abdullah - Muhammad ibn Munkadir rahimahu Allah says: I saw Jabir ibn Abdullah رضي الله تعالى عنه وعن أبيه swearing that Ibn al-Sayyad was Dajjal. And I said to him, "Do you take an oath in the name of Allah?" He said, "I heard Umar رضي الله تعالى عنه swearing that he was Dajjal, and the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم did not censure Umar رضي الله تعالى عنه."

So now you have Jabir and Umar both sure that he was Dajjal, and the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم did not stop them. Now that could be again that when they swear based on a conviction that they have, they weren't technically doing anything wrong, so the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم did not stop them.

The Plot Twist: Ibn al-Sayyad Becomes Muslim

There's another plot twist then. What happens when the guy you think is Dajjal becomes Muslim? So Ibn al-Sayyad becomes Muslim - not during the time of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم, after the time of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم. So he's not a Sahabi by any rank, because you have to have met the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and believed in and accepted Islam while the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم was still alive. So he's not a Sahabi.

But after the death of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم - and Allah knows best, maybe this is why you have the confusion of Safi to Abdullah - maybe this is when he starts going by Abdullah Ibn al-Sayyad. But he now appears to be a Muslim. On top of that, he goes out for Hajj with the Sahaba.

And now this is very confusing. Who is this guy? Did we get him wrong? Have we been wronging him?