Rabia of Basra (Arabic: رابعة البصري, romanized: Rābiʿa al-Baṣrī; c. 714, 717 or 718—801) was an Arab Muslim saint and Sufi mystic.She is known in some parts of the world as, Hazrat Bibi Rabia Basri, Rabia Al Basri or simply Rabia Basri.
Rābiʻa is said to have been born between 714 and 718 CE (95 and 98 Hijri) in Basra, Iraq, of the Qays tribe. Farid ud-Din Attar, a later Sufi saint and poet, recounted much of her early life.
She was the fourth daughter of her family and so named Rābiʻa, meaning “fourth”.
According to Fariduddin Attar, when Rābiʻa was born, her parents were so poor that there was no oil in the house to light a lamp, nor even a cloth to wrap her with. Her mother asked her husband to borrow some oil from a neighbor, but he had resolved in his life never to ask for anything from anyone except God. He pretended to go to the neighbor’s door and returned home empty-handed. At night Muhammad appeared to him in a dream and told him,
“Your newly born daughter is a favorite of the Lord, and shall lead many Muslims to the right path. You should approach the Amir of Basra and present him with a letter in which should be written this message: ‘You offer Durood to the Holy Prophet one hundred times every night and four hundred times every Thursday night. However, since you failed to observe the rule last Thursday, as a penalty you must pay the bearer four hundred dinars'”.
