Umar bin Abdul-Aziz Rahmatullah Alaih

By S A Sagar 

Do You Know this is the tomb of Umar bin Abdul-Aziz, Rahmatullah Alaih, the eighth Umayyad Caliph who ruled from 99 to 101 A.H? Muslims historians agree that he was a just and devout ruler, compassionate, caring and beloved by his people. He was also a Tabiee (companion of the companions of the Holy Prophet Sallallahu Alaih Wasallam).
Umar bin Abdul-Aziz, also known in history as Umar II, was the first revivalist Amir in Islamic history. After Muawiya, the character of the Caliphate changed and dynastic rule was established. The corruption of the Umayyads reached its crescendo with Karbala. The Umayyads built lavish palaces, surrounded themselves with servants and maids, accumulated enormous estates, treated the public treasury as their privy purse and lived like princes and kings. There was no accountability for their wealth or for their actions. The populace had no say in the affairs of the state. The Caliph was not nominated nor could he be questioned. The people were there merely to obey the strongman, pay taxes and serve in the armed forces.

Umar bin Abdul Aziz became the Amir by a coincidence of history. When the Umayyad Amir Sulaiman (714-717) lay on his deathbed, he was advised that he could earn the pleasure of Allah by following the example of the early Caliphs and nominating someone besides one of his own sons as the next Amir. He therefore dictated in his will that Umar bin Abdul-Aziz, a distant cousin, was to succeed him and Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was to be followed by Yazid bin Abdul Malik. Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was a man of polish and experience, having served as the governor of Egypt and Madina for more than twenty-two years. He had been educated and trained by a well-known scholar of the age, Saleh bin Kaisan. Before his accession to the Caliphate, Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was a dashing young man, fond of fashion and fragrance. But when he accepted the responsibilities of Caliphate, he proved to be the most pious, able, far-sighted and responsible of all the Umayyad Amirs.

Indeed, Umar bin Abdul-Aziz set out to reform the entire political, social and cultural edifice of the community and to bring back the transcendental values that had governed the Islamic state in its infancy. He started by setting a good example in his own person. When news reached him of his nomination to the Caliphate, he addressed the people, 

“O people! The responsibilities of the Caliphate have been thrust upon me without my desire or your consent. If you choose to select someone else as the Caliph, I will immediately step aside and will support your decision”. 

Such talk was a breath of fresh air to the public. They unanimously elected him.

Umar bin Abdul-Aziz discarded his lavish life style and adopted an extremely ascetic life after the example of Abu Dhar Ghifari Radhi Allah Anhu, a well-known companion of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. Abu Dhar Radhi Allah Anhu is known in history as one of the earliest mystics and Sufis in Islam who retired from public life in Madina during the period of Hzt. Uthman Radhi Allah Anhu and lived in a hermitage some distance away from the capital. Umar bin Abdul-Aziz discarded all the pompous appendages of a princely life–servants, slaves, maids, horses, palaces, golden robes and landed estates–and returned them to the public treasury. His family and relatives were given the same orders. The garden Fidak provides a good example. This was a grove of palms owned by the Prophet. The Prophet’s daughter Fatima Radhi Allah Anha had asked for this garden as an inheritance but the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam had declined saying that what a Prophet owned belonged to the whole community. Fatima Radhi Allah Anha had pressed her claim before Abu Bakr Radhi Allah Anhu but Abu Bakr Radhi Allah Anha had denied the request saying that he could not agree to something that the Prophet Sallaahu Alaihi Wasallam had not agreed to. After the Caliphate of Ali Radhi Allah Anhu, Fidak had been made a personal estate of the Umayyads. Umar restored Fidak to the public treasury, as a trust for the whole community.

The Umayyads had no accountability to the treasury. To support their lavish life styles, they collected enormous taxes from Persia and Egypt. They compelled traders to sell them their merchandise at discount prices. The Amir’s appointees received gifts of gold and silver in return for favors. Umar reversed the process. Umar abolished such practices, punished corrupt officials and established strict accountability.

Some Umayyad officials, drunk with power, mistreated the conquered peoples. Oftentimes, their property was confiscated without due process of law. Contrary to the injunctions of the Shariah, even though people in the new territories accepted Islam, they continued to be subject to Jizya. Those who refused to pay the taxes were subject to harsh punishment. Omar abolished these practices and ensured fairness in the collection of taxes. Gone was the oppression of Hajjaj in Iraq and Qurrah bin Shareek in Egypt. The populace responded with enthusiastic support of the new Caliph. Production increased. Ibn Kathir records that thanks to the reforms undertaken by Umar, the annual revenue from Persia alone increased from 28 million dirhams to 124 million dirhams.

Following the example of the Prophet Sallaahu Alaihi Wasallam, Umar bin Abdul-Aziz sent out Amissaries to China and Tibet, inviting their rulers to accept Islam. It was during the time of Umar bin Abdul-Aziz that Islam took roots and was accepted by a large segment of the population of Persia and Egypt. When the officials complained that because of conversions, the jizya revenues of the state had experienced a steep decline, Umar wrote back saying that he had accepted the Caliphate to invite people to Islam and not to become a tax collector. The infusion of non-Arabs in large number into the fold of Islam shifted the center of gravity of the empire from Madina and Damascus to Persia and Egypt. As we shall elaborate in later chapters, this development had far reaching consequences during the Abbasid revolution (750) and the evolution of the schools of Fiqh (760-860).

Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was a scholar of the first rank and surrounded himself with great scholars like Muhammed bin Kaab and Maimun bin Mehran Rahmatullah. He offered stipends to teachers and encouraged education. Through his personal example, he inculcated piety, steadfastness, business ethics and moral rectitude in the general population. His reforms included strict abolition of drinking, forbidding public nudity, elimination of mixed bathrooms for men and women and fair dispensation of Zakat. He undertook extensive public works in Persia, Khorasan and North Africa, including the construction of canals, roads, rest houses for travelers and medical dispensaries.

Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was the first Caliph to commission a translation of the Qur’an from Arabic into another language. Upon the request of the Raja (king) of Sindh (in modern day Pakistan), Umar bin Abdul-Aziz had the Qur’an translated into the ancient Sindhi language and had it sent to the Raja (718 CE). To put this event into historical context, this was within ten years of the conquest of Sindh and Multan by Muhammed bin Qasim and the conquest of Spain by Tariq and Musa.

Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was also the first Amir to attempt a serious reconciliation of political and religious differences among Muslims. Since the time of Muawiya, it had become customary for khatibs to insult the name of Ali ibn Abu Talib Radhi Allah Anhu in Friday sermons. Umar bin Abdul-Aziz abolished this obnoxious practice and decreed instead that the following passage from the Qur’an be read instead: 

“God commands you to practice justice, enjoins you to help and assist your kin and He forbids obscenity, evil or oppression, so that you may remember Him” 

(Qur’an, 16:90). 

It is this passage that is still recited in Friday sermons the world over. He treated Bani Hashim and the Shi’as with fairness and dignity. He even extended his hand to the Kharijites. According to Ibn Kathir, he wrote to the Kharijite leader Bostam, inviting him to an open discussion about the Caliphate of Uthman Radhi Allah Anhu and Ali Ali Radhi Allah Anhu. He went so far as to stipulate that should Bostam convince him, Umar would willingly repent and change his ways. Bostam sent two of his emissaries to the Caliph. During the discussions, one of the emissaries accepted that Omar was right and gave up Kharijite extremism. The other went back unconvinced. Even so, the Caliph did not persecute the man.

Umar bin Abdul-Aziz was the first Muslim ruler who moved his horizons from external conquests to internal revival. He recalled his armies from the borders of France, India and the outskirts of Constantinople. There were few internal uprisings and disturbances during his Caliphate. Islam had momentarily turned its horizons on its own soul, to reflect upon its historical condition and replenish its moral reservoir. Faith flourished, as it had during the period of Umar ibn al Khattab Radhi Allah Anhu. It is for these reasons that historians refer to Umar bin Abdul Aziz as Umar II and classify him as the fifth of the rightly guided Caliphs, after Hzt. Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Ali Ridhwan Allah Anhum Ajmaeen.

But greed does not surrender its turf to faith without a battle. The reforms of Umar II were too much for the disgruntled Omayyads and the rich merchants. Umar II was poisoned and he died in the year 719, after a rule that lasted only two and a half years. He was thirty-nine years old at the time of his death. And with him died the last chance for Umayyad rule.