The Messenger of Allah ﷺ sent us out as a company of three hundred riders under the command of Abu Ubayda bin Jarra to watch for a caravan of Quraysh. We stayed by the coast for half a month, where severe hunger struck us until we resorted to eating the leaves of the khabat tree, and so that army came to be called the Army of the Khabat.Then the sea cast out for us a creature called the Anbar (a whale). We ate from it for half a month and oiled ourselves with its fat until our bodies regained their strength. Abu Ubayda took one of its ribs and set it upright, then he summoned the tallest man among the company.Sufyan once said, "He took a rib from it and set it upright, then he took a man and a camel, and the camel passed beneath it."Jabir said, "One of the men slaughtered three camels, then another three, then another three, until Abu Ubayda forbade him from doing so."
بعثنا رسول الله ﷺ ثلاث مائة راكب، أميرنا أبو عبيدة بن الجراح نرصد عير قريش. فأقمنا بالساحل نصف شهر، فأصابنا جوع شديد حتى أكلنا الخبط. فسمي ذلك الجيش جيش الخبط. فألقى لنا البحر دابة يقال لها العنبر، فأكلنا منه نصف شهر، وادهنا من ودكه حتى ثابت إلينا أجسامنا، فأخذ أبو عبيدة ضلعا من أضلاعه، فنصبه فعمد إلى أطول رجل معه. قال سفيان مرة: ضلعا من أضلاعه فنصبه وأخذ رجلا وبعيرا فمر تحته، قال جابر: وكان رجل من القوم نحر ثلاث جزائر، ثم نحر ثلاث جزائر، ثم نحر ثلاث جزائر، ثم إن أبا عبيدة نهاه.
Bukhari narrated it in the Book of Military Expeditions (4361), and Muslim in the Book of Hunting (1935:18), both from the hadith of Sufyan, from Amr bin Dinar, who said, "I heard Jabir," and he mentioned it. The wording given is Bukhari's.For this reason, the majority of scholars among the companions, the successors, and those who came after them permitted eating fish that floats dead on the water, as long as it has not spoiled. Abu Hanifa and his companions considered it objectionable.