Ubayd-Allah Ibn Jahsh

First Cousin of Muhammad and the First Muslim Convert to Christianity

According to Islamic sources, before the advent of Islam, Ubayd-Allah ibn Jahsh was a follower of a monotheistic sect called Hanif. He was among the few individuals who rejected Arabian idolatry to seek the true God of Abraham. When Muhammad started preaching his new religion, Ubayd-Allah embraced Islam and became one of the first Muslims. He was a son of Jahsh ibn Riyab and Umama bint Abdulmuttalib, hence a first cousin of Muhammad. He was also a brother of Zaynab bint Jahsh, one of the wives of Muhammad (whom he married after her divorce with his own adopted son!).

According to Ibn Ishaq, in the year 615, Ubayd-Allah, with his Muslim wife and daughter, accompanied by a group of Muslim refugees, migrated to Ethiopia to escape Meccan persecution. While he was in Ethiopia, he converted to Christianity and started preaching to his Muslims comrades. Ibn Ishaq who penned the very first biography of Muhamma wrote:

“Ubaydullah went on searching until Islam came; then he migrated with the Muslims to Abyssinia taking with him his wife who was a Muslim, Umm Habiba, d. Abu Sufyan. When he arrived there he adopted Christianity, parted from Islam, and died a Christian in Abyssinia.

Muhammad b. Ja`far b. al-Zubayr told me that when he had become a Christian `Ubaydullah as he passed the prophet’s companions who were there used to say: ‘We see clearly, but your eyes are only half open,’ i.e. ‘We see, but you are only trying to see and cannot see yet.’ He used the word sa’sa’ because when a puppy tries to open its eyes to see, it only half sees. The other faqqaha means to open the eyes. After his death the apostle married his widow Umm Habiba.” (Ibn Ishaq, The Life of Muhammad, translated by Alfred Guillaume, 1967, p. 99)

His wife Ramlah bint Abi Sufyan (better known as Umm Habibah) and his daughter Habibah bint Ubayd-Allah remained Muslims and went back to Arabia. Later on Muhammad married Ubayd-Allah’s widow Umm Habibah and his sister Zaynab bint Jahsh. Ubayd-Allah, though it costed him his marriage and everything he had, chose to follow Christ and eventually died as a Christian in Ethiopia. He found the true God of Abraham whom he had been searching all his life and left behind everything to follow him unreservedly. His story reminds us the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ:

“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.” (Matthew 13:46)