Long, long ago there lived a blind man, a bald man, and a man inflicted with leprosy. Allah willed to show the people who among these three men was the most patient.
An angel came to the man with leprosy and asked him for his wish. The man asked that his leprosy would be cured because people don’t like to be around him. The Angel wiped over him and he was cured. Then the Angel asked him which livestock he liked most. The man asked for camels. He was given a pregnant female camel.
The Angel then went to the bald man who requested nice hair instead of his baldness; people avoided him because of that. The Angel wiped over him and he was cured. The livestock he wanted most was cows. He was given a pregnant cow and the Angel asked Allah to bless him.
When the Angel went to the blind man he asked for his eyesight to be returned so he could see the people and know his way around. By the Will of Allah, his eyesight was returned. The livestock he most wanted was sheep so he was given a pregnant sheep.
Years passed, and Allah blessed each one of these men with what they were given. Each one owned a valley full of his animal of choice. The first owned a valley full of camels, the second a valley full of cows, and the third a valley full of sheep.
The Angel returned to each of the men after they had become rich. He came to the first man in the same appearance he took when the man had leprosy. The appearance that is in the form he was with as a leper, without belittling the status of the Angel and what was reported about them in the Religion, to accentuate refuting him.
The Angel asked the man by Allah the One who gave him such good skin and much money to give him a camel to ride in his travels. The man denied the blessing of Allah and claimed that he inherited all his wealth from his ancestors. He was of course lying and the Angel asked Allah to return the leprosy to him and make him like he used to be in the past.
The Angel then went to the man who used to be bald. This man was no better than the first. He was also forgetful of Allah’s blessings and of the fact that Allah had given him this wealth and the nice hair when he had neither. He was a liar, so the Angel asked Allah to return him as he was before.
As for the man who used to be blind, he was better than the other two. He was full of faith, belief, and piety. When he saw the Angel who had the shape of a poor blind man he remembered himself and how he was when he was blind. Instead of giving the angel only one sheep he gave him the option of taking whatever he wanted. It was then that the Angel said to the man, “Keep your money. This was a test for all three of you. Allah who knows best has raised your rank because you remembered Allah’s blessings, whereas the other two men forgot that blessing, and deemed both of your companions deserving of His punishment.”
