The story went back to after Baitul Maqdis was won by the Muslims. ‘Amr ibn al-‘As who led his troops was moving towards Egypt with the intention of capturing Egypt when he sent his subordinate to ask for permission from the Caliph, Umar r.a. In addition, ‘Amr ibn al-‘As himself was among of those who were intelligent at his time, so when Umar r.a. sent his messenger for the answer, he refused to accept to see him (and kept refusing the messenger) until they crossed over the border of Egypt. And the messenger was called for the answer by Umar r.a;
“If you have entered the border of Egypt, continue but if you’re still far, return to Madinah.”
The plan to capture Egypt was now on but he was still insufficient of soldiers, so he sent his messenger to ask for assistance from the caliph. When Umar asked how many of them paying the Jizyah (which means how many of the enemies are fighting, because only those who can fight have to pay jizyah if they are captured, nevertheless, it’s also to determine the size of the armies), he told Umar that they were 1 million of them.
Umar r.a. then gathered the Muslims in Madinah (most of them had gone spreading Islam towards east and had reached India at the time) and sent them to ‘Amr ibn al-‘As. He told ‘Amr that there were 8 000 of them being sent, but when ‘Amr counted them, there were only 4 000 of them. So, ‘Amr asked Umar where were the other 4 000? Umar answered;
“among these people, there are four people of whom their strengths are equal to 1 000 men, they are Muhammad ibn Maslamah, Zubair ibn Awwam, Ubadah ibn Samit, and al-Miqdad ibn Aswad.”
That’s why they were only 8 000 men in sum, but 12 000 in strength! As they were entering Egypt, the people of Egypt were very happy as they were giving them the freedom from the Romans and many embraced Islam. The Muslims had captured Egypt in only three months when they gained total control of Alexandria!
Refreshed and extracted from Dr. Tariq Swaidan’s lecture on The future of Our Religion
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