Guillaume--Life of Muhammad.pdf - Radical Truth

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4 S6 The Life of Muhammad
had intended, he said, "Vere we to come down to 'usfan the ~eccans
would think that we intend to come to l\Iecca.' So he wellt out wIth two
hundred riders until he came to 'Usfan, when he sent two horsemen from
his companions who wellt as far as Kura'u'1-Ghamim. 1 Then he turned
and went back. .
Jabir b. 'Abdullah used to say, 'I heard the apostle say when he set his
face towards Medina "Returning repentant If G~d wIll, wvmg thanks ,to
out. Lord. I take refuge in God from the difficultIes of the JO,~;ney and Its
unhappy ending, and the evil appearance of m.an and ~ea~t. •
The tradition about. the raid on B. Li1?yan IS from A~lm tb. Uma~ .b.
Qatada and 'Abdullah b. Abu Bakr from 'Abdullah b. Ka b b. Mahk.
Kab b. Malik said:
If B. Li!)yan had waited
They would have met bands in their settlements, fine fighters. ,
They would have met audacious warrIOrs whose terror fills the way
In front of an irresistible force glivering like stars.
But they were as weasels who stick to the,
Clefts of the rocks', which have no means of escape.
THE ATTACK O~
DHU QARAD
The apostle had spent only a few nights in Medina when 'U~ayna.b. I:Ii~n
b. Hudhayfa b. Badr al-Fazar! with the cavalry of Gha\afan raided the
apo~tle's milch-camels in al-Ghaba.' A man of B. Ghifar, who had hiS
wife with him, was in charge of the camels. HIm they kIlled and earned
off his wife with the camels.
'Asim b, 'Umar b. Qatada and 'Abdullah b. Abu Bakr and a man 1do
not s~spectfrom 'Abdullah b. Kab b. Malik contribu~ed to the story w?,ch
follows. The first to know of them was Salama b. Amr b. al-Akwa al­
Aslami. That morning he was making for al-Ghaba a~med With bow and
arrows accompanied by a slave belongmg to Tal!)a b. Ubayd~ll~? With a
horse which he was leading. \Vhen he got to the pass of ai-Vii ada he s~w
some of their cavalry and looked down in the direction of Sal~ ~nd cned
aloud, '0 (what a) morning!' Then he hurried off after the raldmg party
like a lion. \\Then he came up with them he began to keep them at bay
with arrows, saying as he shot:
Take that, al-Akwa"s son am I.
Today, mean crowd, you die!
Whenever the horsemen made for him he fled from them; then back he
would come and take a shot at them when he could, saying the. same words.
One of them said, 'Our little Akwa' comes early in the mornmgl'
I Between I\1ecca and Medina, a wadi some eight miles from 'Usfan.
~ Or, with a different vowel, 'the heart'.
3 A variant is 'passes of J:lijiz'. .. Near Medina in the direction of Syria.
The LIfe of Muhammad 487
Ibnu'l-Akwa"s call for aid reached the apostle and he ordered the alarm
to be sounded in lVledina and the cavalry raWed to him. The first horseman
to arr;ve was al-Miqdad b. 'Amr called b. al-Aswad, ally of B. Zuhra.
The next to arrive from. the An~Jr were'Abbiid b. Bishr b. \Vaqsh b.
Zughba b. Zaura', one of B. 'Abdu'I-Ashhal; So'd b. Zayd, one of B. Ka'b
b. 'Abdu'l-Ashhal; Gsayd b. (:uhaxr, brother of B. Haritha b. al-J.1arith,
though there is some doubt about him; 'Ukasha b. Miry1?an, brother of B.
Asad b. Khuzayma; Muhriz b. ~adla, brother of B. Asad b. Khuzayma;
Abu Qatada al-J::!arith b. Rib'i, brother of B. Salima; and Abu 'Ayyash
who was 'Ubayd b. Zayd b. al-Samit, brother of lJ. Zurayq. When they
had gathered to the apostle, he set Sa'd b. Zayd over them according to my
information and told them to go in pursuit of the band until he himself
overtook them with the army.
I have heard from some men of B. Zurayq that the apostle had said to
Abu 'Ayyash: 'How would it be if you were to give this horse to a man
who is a better rider than you and he caught up with the band?' He
replied: 'I am the best horseman of the people! Then I beat the horse,
and by Allah he had not taken me fifty cubits before he threw me. r was
AStonished that the apostle should say that he wished that r had given him
to a better horseman and that I should have said that 1 was the best horseman.'
Men of B. Zurayq allege that the apostle gaye Abu 'Ayyiish's horse 721
to Mu'adh b. Ma'is, or to ')\'idh b. Mil'is b. Qays b. Khalada who was the
eighth. Some people count Salama b. 'Amr b. aI-Alma' as one of the eight
and exclude Usayd b. Zuhayr, but God knows what happened, seeing that
Salama was not riding that day but was the first to catch up with the band
on foot. The horsemen went in pursuit ofthe band until they overtook them.
'A~im b, 'Umar b. Qatada told me that the first horseman to catch up
with the band was Mu!)riz b. Nac.lla who was called 'al-Akhram' and
IQumayr', and that \vhen the alarm sounded a horse belonging to l\1a1)mud
b, Maslama ran round the plantation when it heard the neighing of the
horses, for it was a treasured animal not put to work. \Vhen some \vomen
of B. 'Abdu'I-Ashhal saw the horse running round the plantation \vith the
stump of wood to which it was tied they said: 'How would you like to ride
this horse, Qumayr? You can see what it is like. Then you could overtake
the apostle and the Muslims.' He agreed and they handed it over to him,
and he soon outstripped the rest of them because it was full ofspirit. \Vhen
he overtook the band and came to a halt in front of them he said: 'Stop,
you rascals, until the emigrants and An~ar \\'ho are behind you catch up
with you.' One of them attacked and killed him. The horse wheeled and
they could not stop him until it stood by its stable among B. 'Abdu'l­
Ashhal. This man was the only Muslim to be killed (732).
Ma!)miid's horse was called Dhu'l-Limma (733).
One whom I do not suspect told me from 'Abdullah b. Ka'b b. Malik
that Mu!)riz rode a horse of ' Ukashas called al-Janal). Mu!)riz' was killed 722
I
C. has Mujazziz, but gives no authority for the reading.