Umar ibn al-Khattab
He was the first to be called Commander of the Faithful, and Ibn Kathīr gives him ten years, six months and four days. In that span the book moves from Damascus to al-Qadisiyya, from the Bridge where the Muslims drowned to al-Mada'in, where the carpet of Chosroes is cut up and shared among the Muslims, and to Jerusalem, which ʿUmar enters in person. Then the two years in which the people perished: the plague of Amwas, twenty-five thousand dead in Syria, and the Year of Ashes, when ʿUmar ate nothing but bread and oil until his skin turned black and said, "What a wretched ruler I am if I eat my fill while the people go hungry." Egypt falls, the Nile is told to flow by a letter, Nihawand becomes the mighty conquest that breaks Persia, and the armies reach the Turks and the Barrier. Then a Wednesday at the dawn prayer, four nights left in Dhu al-Hijja, and a slave from Nihawand with a dagger. A hundred and two chapters, with the obituaries the years cost — Khālid, Bilāl, Muʿādh, Zaynab bint Jahsh — and ending on his description, his wives and children, the women's elegies, and some ten opinions on how old he was when he died.
Imam Ibn Kathīr
Monumental history Al-Bidāyah wa al-Nihāyah, the world's most widely read Qurʾanic commentary, and the classical Stories of the Prophets.
al-Maktaba al-Shāmila
The Arabic text we work from matches al-Maktaba al-Shāmila verbatim — the most comprehensive digital library of classical Arabic-Islamic scholarship, used by academic researchers and traditional ʿulamāʾ alike. The original Arabic will be published in BookKit (launching in a future release).
The author is deceased well before 1924, placing the original work firmly in the public domain worldwide. The translation that follows is an original editorial work of Joyful Muslims.
Joyful Muslims editorial team
Translated in-house from the Arabic manuscript. Each chapter passes through at least two reviewers — one focused on accuracy against the Arabic, one on English readability. Where the two are in tension, accuracy wins.
The full, unabridged English translation will be published alongside the Arabic in BookKit, launching in a future release. The audiobook adaptation — same translation, adjusted for listening — is what plays in the app today.
Narrated with care
The narration observes Islamic textual traditions — the pronunciation of Arabic names, the correct honorifics (ṣallā Allāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam, raḍiya Allāhu ʿanh), and the weight each passage should carry. Every word is aligned to the source text so readers in the app can follow along word by word.
Joyful Muslims
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