Guillaume--Life of Muhammad.pdf - Radical Truth

The Life of Muhammad
As Koah's son said 'I will climb
A lofty mountain to escape the waters.'
God smote himI in his body as he smote
In defence of His holy Temple
The armies leading the elephant until
lIe turned them to dust haughty as they were.
May you be preserved as the temple was when
The leader of the foreign polytheists brought his elephantl
'Abdullah b. Qays al.Ruqayyiit, one of B. 'Amir b. Lu'ayy b. Ghiilib
mentioning Abraha the split-nosed and his elephant, said:
Split-nose bringing his elephant drew near
But retreated, his army overthrown;
Birds \vith pebbles hovered over them
So that they were as though they had been stoned.
\Vhosoever shall attack it will withdraw
Defeated and covered with shame.
49· Abu 'Ubayda told me that when Sayf. b. Dhii Yazan entered his presence
he bowed his head and the king said: 'Does this fool come in to me
by a high door and then bow his head.?' When Sayf was told of this he said:
'1 did this only because of my anxiety, for everything presses on me!'
50. Khalliid b. Qurra al-Sadusi quoted to me the last of these verses as
coming from an ode of A'shii of B. Qays b. Tha'laba, but other authorities
on poetry deny that he wrote it. 2
51. Others say Umayya b. Abu'l·i;lalt.
52. These lines which Ibn ISQaq reported are genuine except the last verse
which belongs to al-Nabigha al-]a'dI whose name was I:Iibban b. "Abdullah
b. Qays, one of R. ]u'da b. Ka'b b. Rabta b. 'Amir b. $a'!?a'a b. I\1u'awiya b.
Bakr b. Hawazin.
53. i.e. one of the sons of Imru'u'l-Qays b. Zayd Manat b. TarnIm, or as
others say, 'AdIy one of the 'Ibad of al-I;IIra.
54. Abu Zayd al-An~arIquoted to me the verse 'THe day that the barbarians,
&c.' as from al-IVIufat;:l