From Muhammad SAWW to Adam AS – An Overview

This article is written by Sarah Qureshi, in this article she is describing the detailed overview from Muhammad SAWW to Adam AS.

Arabs can be divided into 2 broad categories.

1. The extinct Arabs ( عرب البائده )

Which are one of the earliest civilizations known in the land of Arabia. Qur’an has mentioned some of them i-e عاد and ثمود. These civilizations flourished 5000 to 6000 years ago.

The second group of Arabs is called (عرب الباقية), also known as “the remaining Arabs.” They are further divided into 2 categories.

1. العرب العاربه (the pure Arabs)
2. العرب المستعربه

عرب العاربه

These are the pure Arabs. Qahtaan is said to be the founder of عرب العاربه who are primarily found in the southern part of Arabia i-e ancient Yemeni civilization.

العرب المستعربه

These people became Arabs by learning Arabic language. Adnan is said to be the founder of عرب المستعربه. They adopted Arabic language when they started living in the Arabian Peninsula. Adnan was a descendant of Ismail (a.s) and an ancestor of Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w), which makes Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w) an Adnani Arab.

There is a unanimous consensus that our Prophet (s.a.w) is the 20th grandchild of Adnan. According to Ibn Al Kalbi (who is one of the greatest ulama’ of ansaab and one of the founders of writing the history of genealogy), Ma’ad, Adnan’s son, lived contemporaneously with Jesus Christ (a.s), which means Adnan was one generation before Jesus Christ. With this background, the lineage of our prophet can be divided into 3 categories.

1. From Prophet s.a.w to Adnan
2. From Adnan to Ismail ( There is a difference in opinion over the number of generations between Adnan and Ismail a.s, some say there are 7-10 generations and others say there are 40-41 generations)
3. From Ismail to Adam a.s.

So let us now start with our prophet’s immediate ancestors (s.a.w) whom we know more about, beginning from Qusai’. Qusai’ lived around 400 C.E, 170 years before the birth of our prophet (s.a.w).

He wrestled back the power of the political city of Mecca into the descendant of the Quraysh from Khaza’ah, who were also the descendants of Ismail, but they were not Qurayshi. Fahr is said to be the founder of the Quraysh tribe.

Quraysh started their rise to power in the times of Qusai. Qusai was the one who built Dar un Nadwah. He also took custody of the Kabaa and created multiple responsibilities, i.e., water, food responsibility, hospitality responsibility, etc.

He initially fulfilled all responsibilities by himself, and later on, after his death, the responsibilities were distributed among his sons. He had a son named Abdul Manaaf (Manaaf means something that is raised). His real name was Mugheerah.

He was known for his handsomeness and his leadership skills. He was very beloved to his people, even during the times of Qusai. He had a son called Hashim, which means someone who grinds (he would grind barley for the pilgrims of Hajj), Hashim was his title, and his name was Amr.

He was a very generous man, and it is stated that he would never eat his food alone. The most important thing he did was to raise the economic level of the Quraysh. He had multiple wives, and one of his wives was from Yathrib’s city, and her son was named Shaiba tul Hamd.

After Hashim’s death, his wife took her son and went back to Yathrib. Once his uncle named Muttalib was visiting Yathrib and saw Shaiba tul hamd. He immediately said, “It is my blood.” Back in those days, people had this gift of recognizing. He then found out that his mother was a woman whom his brother married. He realized that Shaibah was his nephew and concocted a plan and abducted the child because his relatives would not let him go to Mecca with his uncle.

In Mecca, when people saw a young man with Mut’talib, they assumed that he was his slave and started calling him Abdul Muttalib. Later on, Abdul Mut’talib inherited his father’s share of grandfather’s wealth and managed to carve out for himself an entire legacy. Three main things happened in the life of Abdul Muttalib.

1. The rediscovery of Zamzam well
2. His vow to sacrifice Abdullah
3. The incident of Abraha To conclude,

This story of the prophet’s lineage proves clearly that something momentary was about to happen. Every single person in his lineage established something of momentous value. Therefore, Allah chose the Prophet’s lineage so that nobody in the world has a more noble and prestigious lineage than him.

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