A023 - 'Umar ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz

 Umar ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz ibn Marwan

‘Umar ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz ibn Marwan (Umar ibn Abdul Aziz) (Umar II) (November 2, 682 - February, 720).  Umayyad caliph (r. 717-720).  In 706, he became governor of the Hejaz and settled at Medina where he formed an advisory council.  He became famous for his piety and frugality, feeling no obligation to spread Islam by the sword.  He preferred peaceful missionary activity, which method proved successful among the Berbers and in Sind.  He adopted a kindly attitude towards the ‘Alids, the Christians, the Jews and the Zoroastrians, and reduced discrimination against non-Arab converts to Islam.  His most important measure was the reform of taxation.  The ever-increasing conversion to Islam of non-Arabs led to more and more subjects being exempt from taxation.  Furthermore, agriculture suffered to a great extent as a result of many converts settling in the cities.  Al-Hajjaj therefore had imposed the land-tax (in Arabic, kharaj) also upon Muslim landowners and prohibited immigration to the cities. ‘Umar, however, adhered to the principle that Muslims should pay no tribute and propounded that conquered land was the common property of the Muslim community and conquered land was the common property of the Muslim community and could not be transformed into immune private property by sale to individual Muslims.  In 718, he forbade Muslims to buy land which should pay tribute and permitted immigration of new converts into the cities.  In course of time a whole cycle of pious legends gathered round his name.  Even the historians of the ‘Abbasid period give him the highest praise, and his tomb at Dayr Sam‘an near Aleppo was left undisturbed after the ‘Abbasid triumph.

Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz was an Umayyad caliph who ruled from 717 to 720. He was also a cousin of the former caliph, being the son of Abd al-Malik's younger brother, Abd al-Aziz. He was also a great-grandson of the companion of the Prophet Muhammad, Umar ibn Al-Khattab.

Umar was born around 682. Some traditions state that he was born in Medina while others claim that he was born in Egypt.

According to a Sunni Muslim tradition, Umar's lineage to Umar ibn al-Khattab stems from a famous event during the second Caliph's rule. During one of his frequent disguised journeys to survey the condition of his people, Umar overheard a milkmaid refusing to obey her mother's orders to sell adulterated milk. He sent an officer to purchase milk from the girl the next day and learned that she had kept her resolve; the milk was unadulterated. Umar summoned the girl and her mother to his court and told them what he had heard. As a reward, he offered to marry the girl to his son Asim. She accepted, and from this union was born a girl named Layla that would in due course become the mother of Umar ibn Abdul Aziz.

Umar would grow up in Medina and live there until the death of his father, after which he was summoned to Damascus by Abd al-Malik and married to his daughter Fatima. His father-in-law would die soon after, and he would serve as governor of Medina under his cousin Al-Walid I.

Unlike most rulers of that era, Umar formed a council with which he administered the province. His time in Medina was so notable that official grievances sent to Damascus all but ceased. In addition, many people emigrated to Medina from Iraq seeking refuge from their harsh governor, Al-Hajjaj bin Yousef. This angered Al-Hajjaj, and he pressed al-Walid to remove Umar. Much to the dismay of the people of Medina, al-Walid bowed to Hajjaj's pressure and dismissed Umar from his post. However, by this time, Umar had developed an impeccable reputation across the Islamic empire.

Umar continued to live in Medina through the remainder of al-Walid's reign and that of Walid's brother Suleiman. Suleiman, who was Umar's cousin and had always admired him, ignored his own brothers and son when it came time to appoint his successor and instead nominated Umar. Umar reluctantly accepted the position after trying unsuccessfully to dissuade Suleiman, and he approached it unlike any other Ummayad caliph before him.

Umar was extremely pious and disdainful of worldly luxuries. He preferred simplicity to the extravagance that had become a hallmark of the Umayyad lifestyle, depositing all assets and finery meant for the caliph into the public treasury. He abandoned the caliphate palace to the family of Suleiman and instead preferred to live in modest dwellings. He wore rough linens instead of royal robes, and often went unrecognized.

According to a Muslim tradition, a female visitor once came to Umar's house seeking charity and saw a raggedly-dressed man patching holes in the building's walls. Assuming that the man was a servant of the caliph, she asked Umar's wife, "Don't you fear God? Why don't you veil in the presence of this man?" The woman was shocked to learn that the "servant" was in fact the caliph himself.

Though he had the people's overwhelming support, he publicly encouraged them to elect someone else if they were not satisfied with him (an offer no one ever took him up on). Umar confiscated the estates seized by Ummayad officials and redistributed them to the people, while making it a personal goal to attend to the needs of every person in his empire. Fearful of being tempted into bribery, he rarely accepted gifts, and when he did; he promptly deposited them in the public treasury. He even encouraged his own wife—who had been daughter, sister and wife to three caliphs in their turn—to donate her jewelry to the public treasury. He is widely known for reinforcing the Zakat and according to Muslim tradition, at the end of his rule, there were scarcely any poor people to receive the charity money.

At one point Umar almost ordered the Great Umayyad Mosque in Damascus to be stripped of its precious stones and expensive fixtures in favor of the treasury, but he desisted on learning that the Mosque was a source of envy to his Byzantine rivals in Constantinople. These moves made him unpopular with the Umayyad court, but endeared him to the masses, so much so that the court could not move against him in the open.

Umar made a number of important religious reforms. According to both Sunni and Shi'i sources, he abolished the long-standing Umayyad and Khawaarij custom of cursing Ali ibn Abi Talib, at the end of Friday sermons and ordered the following Qu'ranic verse be recited instead:

- Surely God enjoins justice, doing of good and giving to kinsfolk.

In addition, Umar was keen to enforce the Sharia, pushing to end drinking and bathhouses where men and women would mix freely. He continued the welfare programs of the last few Umayyad caliphs, expanding them and including special programs for orphans and the destitute. He would also abolish the Jizya tax for converts to Islam, who were former dhimmis, who used to be taxed even after they had converted under other Umayyad rulers.

Generally, Umar II is credited with having ordered the first collection of hadith material in an official manner, fearing that some of it might be lost. Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn Hazm and Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri, are among those who compiled hadiths at `Umar II’s behest.

Though Umar did not place as much of an emphasis on expanding the Empire's borders as his predecessors had, he was not passive. He sent Ibn Hatim ibn al-Nu'man to repel Turks invading Azerbaijan. He faced a Kharijite uprising and preferred negotiations to armed conflict, personally holding talks with two Kharijite envoys shortly before his death. He recalled the troops besieging Constantinople. These were led by his cousin Maslama. This Second Arab siege of Constantinople had failed to take the city and was sustaining heavy losses at the hands of allied Byzantine and Bulgarian forces. Its defeat was a serious blow to Umayyad prestige.

Umar's reforms in favor of the people greatly angered the nobility of the Umayyads, and they would eventually bribe a servant into poisoning his food. Umar learned of this on his death bed and pardoned the culprit, collecting the punitive payments he was entitled to under Islamic Law but depositing them in the public treasury. He died in February, 720, in Aleppo.  He was succeeded by his cousin Yazid II.

Although Umar's reign was very short (three years), he is very highly regarded in Muslim memory. He is considered one of the finest rulers in Muslim history, second only to the Four Rightly Guided Caliphs. In fact, in some circles, he is affectionately referred to as the Fifth and the last Rightly Guided Caliph.

Umar ibn Abdul Aziz see ‘Umar ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz ibn Marwan
Umar II see ‘Umar ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz ibn Marwan