A will, Umar said, was unnecessary because “the Book of God is sufficient for us.

A will, Umar said, was unnecessary because “the Book of God is sufficient for us.” But in Saqifa, he and Abu Bakr forgot that Book, according to which superiority is judged not by blood and country but by piety. In that Book this is what we read: Verily, the most honored of you in the sight of God is he who is most righteous of you. (Chapter 49; verse 13) In the sight of God only those people are superior who have high character, who are God-fearing and who are God-loving.

But the one thing to which Abu Bakr and Umar did not advert in Saqifa, was the Book of God. Before entering Saqifa, they had forgotten that the body of the Apostle of God was awaiting burial; and after entering, they forgot the Book of God – a curious “coincidence” of forgetfulness! Dr. Muhammad Hamidullah The Qur’an has rejected all superiority on account of language, color of skin or other ineluctable incidences of nature, and recognizes only superiority of individuals as that based on piety.

(Introduction to Islam, Kuwait, 1977) Abu Bakr's claim of the superiority of the Quraysh on the grounds of blood and country, was the first symptom of the recrudescence of paganism in Islam! Sir John Glubb On events following the death of the Prophet of Islam.

This wild scene was scarcely over when a man hastened up to Abu Bakr to inform him that the people of Medina were gathering in the guest hall of the Banu Saeda clan, proposing to elect Saad ibn Ubada, shaikh of the Khazraj tribe, as their successor to the Prophet. Mohammed was not dead an hour before the struggle for power threatened to rend Islam into rival factions. The mild and quiet Abu Bakr and the fiery Umar ibn al-Khattab set off in haste to meet this new challenge.

They were accompanied by the wise and gentle Abu Ubaida, one of the earliest converts, of whom we shall hear more later. Ten years before, the Helpers had welcomed the persecuted Prophet into their homes and had given him their protection, but Mohammed had gradually become famous and powerful, and had been surrounded by his own Quraish relatives (sic). The men of Medina, instead of being the protectors, of the Muslims, found themselves in a subordinate position in their own town.

Criticism was silenced during the Prophet's lifetime, but he was scarcely dead when the tribes of Aus and Khazraj decided to throw off the yoke of Quraish. “Let them have their own chief,” the men of Medina cried.