The Bells! The Bells!
- philhoraia
- Aug 26, 2024
- 5 min read
Allah's boss claimed that part of his 'revelation' came with the sound of bells.
It was narrated from Aishah that:
Al-Harith bin Hisham asked the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ): 'How does the Revelation come to you?' He said: 'Like the ringing of a bell, and this is the hardest on me. When it departs I remember what he said. And sometimes the Angel appears to me in the form of a man and speaks to me, and I remember what he said." Aishah said: "I saw him when the Revelation came to him on a very cold day, and his forhead was dripping with sweat."
We further read:
‘Abd Allah (b. Mas’ud) reported the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) as saying:
"When Allah, the exalted, speaks to send revelation, the inhabitants of heaven hear the clanging of a bell from the heavens like a chain being dragged across a rock, and they swoon. They continue to remain like that until Jibril comes to them. When he comes to them, they recover and say: 'O Jibril, what did your Lord say?' He would say: 'The truth,' and they would say: 'The truth, the truth.'"
We further read:
Abu Hurairah reported the Apostle of Allaah(ﷺ) as saying “The bell is a wooden wind musical instrument of Satan.”
The Arabic says: " مِزْمَارُ الشَّيْطَانِ " . Mizmar al-Shaytan.
Definitions:
مِزْمار
- A woodwind instrument with a double_reed mouthpiece
- Strip of metal or cane that vibrates to produce sounds
- A kind of small shrill flute used with the drum in military music
- fife; flute; oboe; reed; clarinet; pipe
المختصر
مِزْمار
- glottis
مِزْمار
- Opening between the vocal cords in the upper part of the windpipe
None of these definitions fit the bell. Now, Al-Mazamir is the name for the Book of Psalms in the Arabic Bible. Is he actually saying 'The psalm of Satan'?
Angels don't enter a house in which there is a bell.
Umm Salamah, the wife of the Prophet [SAW], said:
"I heard the Messenger of Allah [SAW] say: 'The angels do not enter a house in which there is a small bell, or a bell, and the angels do not accompany groups of people who have bells with them.'"
It was narrated that Abu Bakr bin Abi Shaikh said:
"I was sitting with Salim when a caravan belonging to Umm Al-Banin passed by us, and they had bells with them. Salim narrated to Nafi' from his father, that the Prophet [SAW] said: 'The angels do not accompany a caravan that has small bells with them.' How often do you see small bells with these people."
‘Uthman b. ‘Abdallah b. Mauhib said:
My people sent me to Umm Salama with a bowl of water. Whenever anyone was smitten by the evil eye or anything else he sent her a basin, and she took out some hairs of God’s messenger which she kept in a little silver bell.* She moved it about for him in the water and he drank some of it. I looked into the little bell and saw some red hairs. Bukhari transmitted it. * Mirqat, iv, 515, says that although the word means a bell, it may here be used of a small box in the shape of a bell. This is the kind of bell that would be used on a tambourine.
The editor suggests that the word translated bell may be a bell-shaped box. Where is he getting this idea from? Is this an attempt at damage limitation? The kind of bell used in a tambourine is a jingle.
Now it gets particularly interesting:
‘Abdallah b. Zaid b. “Abd Rabbihi said:
When God’s Messenger ordered a bell to be made so that it might be struck to gather the people for prayer, a man carrying a bell in his hand appeared to me while I was asleep, and I said, “Servant of God, will you sell the bell ?” When he asked what I would do with it and I replied that we would use it to call people to prayer, he said, “Shall I not guide you to something better than that?" I replied, “Certainly”; so he told me to say, “God is most great ...” and similarly in the iqama. When I told God’s Messenger in the morning what I had seen he said, “It is a genuine vision, if God will; so get up along with Bilal, and when you have taught him what you have seen let him use it in making the call to prayer, for he has a stronger voice than you have. So I got up along with Bilal and began to teach it to him, and he used it in making the call to prayer. ‘Umar b, al-Khattab heard that when he was in his house, and he came out trailing his cloak and said, “Messenger of God, by Him who has sent you with the truth, I have seen the same kind of thing as has been revealed," to which God’s Messenger replied, “To God be the praise!” Abu Dawud, Darimi and Ibn Majah transmitted it, but Ibn Majah did not mention the iqama. Tirmidhi said that this is a sahih, tradition, but that it did not make the story of the bell explicit.
Allah's boss ordered a bell to be made. He seems to be okay with bells. Abdallah reports a dream in which he's told to say XYZ. The man supposedly speaking to him says nothing about the evils of the bell. Umar too supposedly had this dream. Now, why didn't 'Allah's messenger' have the dream?
Narrated Ibn `Umar:
When the Muslims arrived at Medina, they used to assemble for the prayer, and used to guess the time for it. During those days, the practice of Adhan for the prayers had not been introduced yet. Once they discussed this problem regarding the call for prayer. Some people suggested the use of a bell like the Christians, others proposed a trumpet like the horn used by the Jews, but `Umar was the first to suggest that a man should call (the people) for the prayer; so Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) ordered Bilal to get up and pronounce the Adhan for prayers.
Ibn Umar narrated:
"When the Muslims arrived in AI-Madinah, they used to assemble for the Salat, and guess the time for it there was no one who called for it (the prayer). One day they discussed that and some of them said that they should use a bell like the bell the Christians use. Others said they should use a trumpet like the horn the Jews use. But Umar [bin Al-Khattab] said: 'Wouldn't it better if we had a man call for the prayer?'" He said: "So Allah's Messenger said: 'O Bilal! Stand up and call for the Salat.'"
In this one there's no mention of a dream and Umar suggests calling to salat. If the Adhan was Umar's idea, why didn't Allah tell its boss to introduce it?
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