‘Umar bin Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) says: I heard the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) say:“There are four types of martyrs: The first is the believer with good faith who faces the enemy and fulfills the promise made to Allah until he is martyred. He is the one whom people will look up to on the Day of Resurrection, and (the narrator Fadala bin Ubaid, in order to describe this state, said) he raised his head until his cap fell off.”The narrator Abu Yazid Khawlani says: I do not know whether Fadala meant the cap of ‘Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) or that of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him). He (the Prophet) said:“The second is the believer with good faith who faces the enemy, but due to his cowardice, his skin is wounded by the thorns of «طلح» (a large thorny tree), and an arrow comes from behind (from an unknown source) and strikes him and kills him. He is of the second rank. The third is the believer who does both good and bad deeds. When he faces the enemy, he fulfills the promise made to Allah (i.e., he fights bravely) until he is martyred. He is of the third rank. The fourth is the believer who wrongs himself (i.e., due to excessive sins, but he fights bravely) until he is martyred. He is of the fourth rank.” Imam Tirmidhi says:
This hadith is gharib; we know it only from the narration of ‘Ata bin Dinar. I heard Muhammad bin Isma’il Bukhari say: This hadith was narrated by Sa’id bin Abi Ayyub from ‘Ata bin Dinar, and he narrated it from the elders of Khawlan, and in it he did not mention Abu Yazid. And ‘Ata bin Dinar said: (that in this hadith) there is no harm.