RECOGNIZING ONESELF

Recognizing Oneself ~ 210 ~ authority of Abu Huraira, while less than one hundred can be traced back to Khalid. Extraordinary as this disparity may seem, all it indicates is a difference in the arena in which they worked. It does not mean that one of them did more for Islam than the other. Abu Huraira and Khalid were both sincere, dedicated Muslims. But as regards talents, they were very different from each other. Each of them awoke to his separate vocation in life, and followed it implicitly. In accordance with his own particular abilities, Abu Huraira picked one arena in which to serve the cause of Islam, while Khalid picked another, equally suitable one, for himself. Before Khalid became a Muslim, he took part in several military campaigns against Islam. He later told of how he used to fight with the feeling the he had “adopted a mistaken stance”—that he was fighting for the wrong cause. His conscience continued to haunt him, until shortly before the conquest of Mecca, when he went to Medina and accepted Islam.