The Companions of the Rass, also known as the People of the Well or the People of Ar-Rass, were an

ancient Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history through late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the development of Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient h ...

community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...

, who are mentioned in the

Qur'an The Quran, also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation directly from God ('' Allāh''). It is organized in 114 chapters (, ) which consist of individual verses ('). Besides ...

. The

provides little information concerning them other than to list them with other communities, including

ʿĀd ʿĀd (, ') was an ancient tribe in pre-Islamic Arabia. 'Ad is best known for being mentioned two dozen times in the Quran, often in conjunction with Thamud. Recently, it has been shown that 'Ad was a tribe that existed two millennia ago in the W ...

Thamud The Thamud () were an ancient tribe or tribal confederation in pre-Islamic Arabia that occupied the northwestern Arabian Peninsula. They are attested in contemporaneous Mesopotamian and Classical inscriptions, as well as Arabic ones from the e ...

, the People of Noah and others; the

groups all these communities together as nations who went astray and were perished for their sins. Muslim scholars related that the Companions of the Rass were a community in the

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a Boundaries between the continents, transcontinental and landlocked country at the boundary of West Asia and Eastern Europe. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by ...

region. The root meaning of ''rass'' is a well or water pit, but some scholars have stated that Rass was the name of a river or the city itself. It is speculated that modern Aras River is ar-Rass. Another less common theory is that Companions of the Rass were an

Indus Valley civilisation The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation, was a Bronze Age civilisation in the Northwestern South Asia, northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 Common Era, BCE to 1300 BCE, and in i ...

. With Rass meaning "well" or "along the water channels" or "water tranches". Means refer to place which has lot of wells. Today we know that at

Mohenjo-daro Mohenjo-daro (; , ; ) is an archaeological site in Larkana District, Sindh, Pakistan. Built 2500 BCE, it was one of the largest settlements of the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation, and one of the world's earliest major city, cities, contemp ...

around 700 wells existed at the peak of their civilization. Similar estimates for the city of Harappa itself claim that it had 300 wells. Same about

Dholavira Dholavira () is an archaeological site at Khadirbet in Bhachau Taluka of Kutch District, in the state of Gujarat in western India, which has taken its name from a modern-day village south of it. This village is from Radhanpur. Also known loc ...

, where many trenches were created to store water. Some Arabs referred to Indus people as Companions of the Rass. As the Quran narrates that it is a 'confirmation' of what came before, and in the 17th Chapter narrates the tale of the Fall of

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, any scholar of the Scriptures will know that Companions of the Rass from Chapter 25 verse 38 or 'Water Well' from Chapter 50 verse 12 refers to the followers of King Zedekiah whom took the prophet Jeremiah whom warned the King and People of Israel to repent before the fall of Jerusalem, but as the King's followers did not like his words or prophecies, captured him and lowered him into a Well/Cistern filled with mud.

Account in Exegesis

Chester Beatty T 414 fol 66r Safwan and the Anqa

Other documents of

Islamic Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

give little information on the place or people of this particular community. However,

Ibn Kathir Abu al-Fida Isma'il ibn Umar ibn Kathir al-Dimashqi (; ), known simply as Ibn Kathir, was an Arab Islamic Exegesis, exegete, historian and scholar. An expert on (Quranic exegesis), (history) and (Islamic jurisprudence), he is considered a lea ...

states in his '' Stories of the Prophets'' that the

prophet In religion, a prophet or prophetess is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divinity, divine being and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings ...

sent to them was a man named Hanzalah ibn Safwan. Exegesis narrates that the people of this community threw the

into a well, with some accounts narrating that he died in the well and others narrating that he survived.''A-Z of Prophets in Islam and Judaism'', B.M. Wheeler, ''People of the Well'' Modern day scholars such as Imad Zuhair Hafidh, Hikmat ibn Bashir ibn Yasin and Muhammad Sulaiman al-Ashqar, three professors of tafseer from Muhammad Sulaiman al-Ashqar has viewed that ''Ashab al-Rass'' or peoples of Rass were the peoples who lived during the time of Shuaib, a prophet of Islam. There has been theories that People of the Well are ancestors of those now live in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

or ancestors of modern day

Russians Russians ( ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Eastern Europe. Their mother tongue is Russian language, Russian, the most spoken Slavic languages, Slavic language. The majority of Russians adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church ...

who refer to themselves as "Ross" or Kievan Rus who inhabited modern day Ukraine.

References

{{Qur'anic people Ancient peoples Semitic-speaking peoples Rass Indus Valley Civilisation