When death drew near to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, he began to throw a striped cloak over his face. When he became distressed by it, we removed it from him, and he was saying, "May Allah curse the Jews and the Christians, for they took the graves of their prophets as places of worship."Ayesha said, "He was warning against doing the like of what they did."
حدثنا عبد الأعلى عن معمر عن الزهري عن عبيد الله بن عبد الله
لما نزل برسول الله ﷺ طفق يلقي خميصة على وجهه فلما اغتم رفعناها عنه وهو يقول لعن الله اليهود والنصارى اتخذوا قبور أنبيائهم مساجد تقول عائشة يحذرهم مثل الذي صنعوا
Its isnad is sahih. Abdul-Ala is Ibn Abdul-Ala al-Sami, and he is trustworthy. Ubaydullah bin Abdullah bin Utba bin Masud is the well-known Successor, mentioned previously at 1666. In manuscript H it appears as "Abdullah bin Ubaydullah bin Abbas," which is an error. We have corrected it from manuscript K and from other sources. This hadith was narrated by Bukhari (1:444) and Muslim (1:149), both through Zuhri, from Ubaydullah bin Abdullah bin Utba, from Ayesha and Ibn Abbas."When it descended upon the Messenger of Allah," whether cast in the active voice or the passive voice, there are two well-known versions, meaning when death descended upon him. Tafiqa is with kasra on the fa, which is the more refined dialect, though fatha on the fa is also permissible, a dialect reported by Zajjaj and Akhfash. The khamisah is a cloak bearing markings.Most Muslims did not heed the warning the Messenger of Allah ﷺ gave them at the end of his life, so that they might prepare to meet their Lord. Instead, they took the graves of those they called saints as masjids, and the graves of the people of the House as masjids, and went to great excess in that. Indeed, they even placed the graves of kings and princes inside masjids, and Allah knows best about them, about what deeds they did in their worldly life, and about the effect, good or bad, they had on Islam and the lands of Islam.They only grew further from obedience to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, so that if a man among them had wealth, he would build a masjid for himself, or his family would build one for him, and then they would bury him in it. From this the standing of the Muslims weakened, and they became lowly in their own eyes and in the eyes of their enemies, because of their disobedience to the command of their Lord and because of their doing what those whom Allah cursed through the tongue of His Messenger used to do. May Allah guide us all to follow the sunnah and what He loves and is pleased with.See also 1691, 1694.