Great and momentous events
Great and momentous events followed one after the other. There was the battle of Badr, in which Abu Salamah fought. The Muslims returned victorious and strengthened.
Then there was the battle of Uhud, in which Allah tested the Muslims. Abu Salamah came out of this very badly wounded. He appeared at first to respond well to treatment, but his wounds never healed completely and he remained bedridden.
Once, while Umm Salamah was nursing him, he said to her, “I heard the Messenger of Allah saying whenever a calamity afflicts anyone he should say, ‘We belong to Allah and to Him shall we return; O Allah, reward me for my affliction and give me something better than it in exchange for it.'”
Abu Salamah remained sick in bed for several days and then he passed away. With his blessed hands, the Prophet closed the eyes of his dead Companion and invoked Allah to forgive Abu Salamah, raise his degree among those who are rightly guided, take charge of his descendants who remain, make his grave spacious, and grant him light in it.
Umm Salamah remembered the prayer her husband had quoted from the Prophet and began repeating it, “O Lord, with you I leave this my plight for consideration….” But she could not bring herself to continue with “O Lord, give me something better than it in exchange for it.”
She kept asking herself, “Who could be better than Abu Salamah?” But after a while she completed the supplication.
Umm Salamah did not know a person better than Abu Salamah. She was not aware that Allah spared for her the best ever person-the Prophet himself. He (peace and blessings be upon him) married her, and so it was that Allah answered the prayer of Umm Salamah and gave her better than Abu Salamah. From that day on, Hind Al-Makhzumiyah was no longer the mother of Salamah alone but became the Mother of All Believers (Umm Al-Mu’mineen).
Source: Excerpted and edited from http://www.youngmuslims.ca.
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