Guillaume--Life of Muhammad.pdf - Radical Truth

12
The Life of Muhammad
And left those men an example to the discerning.
Dhu'l-Qarnayn before me was a Muslim
Conquered kings thronged his court,
East and west he ruled, yet he sought
Knowledge true from a learned sage.
He saw where the sun sinks from view
In a pool of mud and fetid slime.
Before him Bilqis my father's sister
Ruled them until the hoopoe came to her.)'
THE REIGN OF HIS SON I;IASSAN IBN TIBAN AND HOW
'AMR KILLED HIS BROTHER
When his son I;Iassan b. Tiban As'ad Abu Karib came to the throne he
set out with the Yamanites to subdue the land of the Arabs ~nd P~rslans.
However, when they reached a place in Iraq (27) the I;Ilmyante an?
Yamanite tribes were unwilling to go farther and wanted to return to th~lr
families, so they approached one of his brothers call~d 'Amr who was WIth
him in the army and said that if he would kIll hIS brother th.ey would
make him king so that he might lead them home agam. He_saId, that he
would do so, and they all agreed to join in the plot except Dhu Ru ayn th~
I;Iimyarite. He forbade him to do this, but he would not heed, so Dhu
Ru'ayn wrote the following verses:
Oh who would buy sleeplessness for sleep?
Happy is he who passes the night in peace;
Though I;Iimyar have been treacherous,
God will hold Dhu Ru'ayn blameless.
He sealed the document and brought it to 'Amr, saying: 'Keep this with
you for me,' and he did so. Then 'Amr killed his. brot~er I;Iassan and
returned to the Yaman with his men.' One of the I;Ilmyantes was moved
to say:
In former generations
What eyes have seen .
The like of Hassiin who has been slam I
The princes 'slew him lest they should be kept at war.
On the morroW they said 'It is naught!'
Your dead was the best of us and your living one
Is lord over uS while all of you are lords.
t The poem is spurious; it is not difficult to see how 1. IsOiiq pe.rsua~ed hirna,elf to
incorporate such an obvious forgery in a serious historical work. At_~J:U8 POInt Tab. lI?trOduces
a long passage from I. I. A much longer story via 'Uthman b. Saj 18 gIven by Azr. 1. 79·
2 T. 9 1 5. 1;18888n vainly appeals to his brother thus:
Do not hasten my death, 0 'Ann.
Take the kingdom without using force.
The Life of Muhammad '3
The words 'labiibi lababi' mean 'no matter' in the I;Iimyari language (28).
. Whe~ Amr b. Tibiin retu':'led to. the Yaman he could not sleep and '9
msomma took a firm hold of him. Bemg much concerned at this, he asked
the physicians and those of the soothsayers and diviners who were seers
about his trouble. One of them said: 'No man has ever killed his brother or
kinsman tr~acherously "': you kille,d your .brother without losing his sleep
and becommg a prey to msomma. At thIS he began to kill all the nobles
who had urged him to murder his brother I;Iassan, till finally he came to
Dhu Ru'ayn who claimed that 'Amr held the proof of his innocence,
namely the paper which he had given him. He had it brought to him and
when he had read the two verses he let him go, recognizing that he had
~ven .him good counsel.' When'Amr died the I;Iimyarite kingdom fell
mto dISorder and the people split up into parties.
HOW LAKHNI' A DHU SHANATIR SEIZED THE THRONE OF
THE YAMAN
A I;Iimyari who had no connexion with the royal house called Lakhni'a
Yanuf D~u Shanatir' arose and killed off their leading men and put the
royal famIly to open shame. Of this man a certain I;Iimyari recited:
J:Iimyar was slaying its sons and exiling its princes,
Working its shame with its own hands,
Destroying its worldly prosperity with frivolous thoughts.
Even greater was the loss of their religion.
So did earlier generations bring their doom
By acts of injustice and profligacy.
Lakhni"a was a most evil man-a sodomite. He used to summon a
young man of the royal family and assault him in a room which he had
constructed for this very purpose, so that he could not reign after him.
The~ he used to go from this upper chamber of his to his guards and
soldiers, (who were below) having put a toothpick in his mouth to let them
~ow that he had accomplished his purpose. (T. Then he would release
him and he would appear before the guards and the people utterly disgraced.)
One day he sent for Zur'a Dhu Nuwiis son of Tibiin As'ad
brother ofI;lassan. He was a little boy when I;Iassiin was murdered and had
become a fine handsome young man of character and intelligence. When
the messenger came he perceived what was intended and took a fine sharp
knife and hid it under the sole of his foot and went to Lakhni'a. As soon 20
as they were alone he attacked him and Dhu Nuwiis rushed upon him and
stabbed him to death. He then cut off his head and put it in the window
I Tab. 916 f. contains a long poem ascribed to "Amr
• S Nald., Oesch. d. Persn u. Araber, .73. notes that th~ name Lakhi'atha occurs in inscriptions
and that shamitir means 'fingers'.