Public Health · a Light

Umar turned an army around at the edge of a plague

In 638 plague broke out at Amwas in Syria and killed on a scale the chroniclers count in the tens of thousands, among them the commander Abu Ubayda ibn al-Jarrah. Umar ibn al-Khattab was travelling towards Syria and halted at Sargh on the border. He consulted those with him, and the argument put to him was that to go on was to walk into a plague. When he ordered the return, Abu Ubayda asked whether he was fleeing the decree of Allah, and Umar answered that he was fleeing from the decree of Allah to the decree of Allah. Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf then reported the Prophet's ﷺ instruction not to enter a land where plague has broken out, and not to leave it if you are already there. The rule cuts both ways, and Muslim authorities cited it again in 2020.

Plague of Amwas · Syria, 638 CE

Source · Sahih al-Bukhari, Kitab al-Tibb; Sahih Muslim, Kitab al-Salam