The Death of Abu Lahab: Shame, Disease, and the Fulfillment of 'Tabbat'

Abū Lahab ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, the Prophet's paternal uncle and the only member of the extended family named directly in Quranic condemnation (Sūrat al-Masad / Q 111), had not gone to Badr. He had hired a man to fight in his place. This was partly because, as the acting chieftain of Banū Hāshim, it was politically and morally too awkward for him to lead his own clan's members into battle against his brother's grandson. The Quraysh, who had pressured men like Umayyah ibn Khalaf to participate despite their reluctance, did not pressure Abū Lahab. So he remained in Makkah.

When the news came back with al-Ḥayṣamān and the other survivors, Abū Lahab refused to believe any of them. He resolved to wait for Abū Sufyān ibn Ḥarb, whom he considered a reliable witness. He would not accept the reality until he heard it face to face from someone he trusted.

Abū Sufyān eventually returned to Makkah. They met at the house of al-ʿAbbās, who was, at that very moment, a prisoner of war tied up in Madinah. In his house remained his wife Umm al-Faḍl and his household slave. Both were Muslims.

Abū Sufyān told Abū Lahab directly: 'By Allah, as soon as we met the Muslims, and none of this reflects on the Quraysh themselves, they simply overpowered us. We could not resist them. They took prisoners as they pleased and killed as they pleased. I have no criticism of our own men. Because by Allah I saw a group of men with white faces riding black and white horses hovering between the heavens and the earth. None of us could overpower them.' These were the angels, though Abū Sufyān described them from a human perspective as extraordinary warriors.

al-ʿAbbās's slave was in the room. He was not supposed to be listening, he was a slave doing his work. But he was a Muslim, and when he heard this description of the angels at Badr, he could not contain himself. He leaped up and cried: 'Ey Wallāhi! Those were the angels! Those were the angels helping the Muslims!' He was unable to hide his joy that the Muslims had won.

Abū Lahab was already in a state of grief and barely suppressed fury. When he saw his brother's slave, his brother who was now a prisoner, rejoicing at the Quraysh's humiliation, something broke inside him. He jumped up, threw the slave to the ground, and began beating him savagely. The slave was in no position to defend himself.

Umm al-Faḍl, al-ʿAbbās's wife, one of the earliest Muslim women, some say the second woman to accept Islām after Khadījah, came out. She physically tried to intervene and pull Abū Lahab away from the slave. He turned on her and struck her as well.

Wounded and furious, Umm al-Faḍl confronted him: 'When the Sayyid (the master of this house) is away, this is what you do? You beat his wife? You nearly kill his slave? What kind of protector are you? You are the chief of this family and you do this to al-ʿAbbās's household while he is not here to protect us?'

The words landed. Abū Lahab, already broken inside by grief over the defeat, now confronted with his own humiliation at having beaten an innocent slave and a woman in a fit of rage, felt a wave of shame so acute that he fled from the house.

He was then afflicted with a severe disease. The books of Tafsīr and Sīrah mention various accounts of its nature, some say a form of plague with pustules, others a disease with worm-like symptoms, but the common element is that he fell desperately ill and was shunned. Even his own family kept their distance. He died within days, still in Makkah, and such was the fear of infection that his sons initially refused to bury him. His body remained for three days. Finally some men came out and, using sticks, pushed him into a pit without properly cleaning or preparing him.

Dr. Yasir Qadhi notes the poetry of the moment. Allah had said in Sūrat al-Masad, revealed years before in Makkah, while Abū Lahab was still at the height of his power: 'Tabbat yadā Abī Lahabin wa tabb.' His hands have perished and he has perished. 'Mā aghnā ʿanhu māluhu wa mā kasab.' His wealth and what he earned have been of no use to him. The prophecy was now fulfilled. The last of the 'senior scum of Makkah', as Dr. Qadhi describes the inner circle of Islam's most committed enemies, was gone. Almost all of the others, many who had a measure of personal decency, had either been killed at Badr or were prisoners of war. Abū Lahab alone among the very worst had remained behind, and Allah took him in a different way, through disease and shame, within days of the battle he had not even attended.