Hadith 459

ced one is enslaved. Greetings. Sulaym said, ‘When Ali-asws read his letter, he smiled and said, ‘I-asws wonder at Muawiya and his trying to deceive me-asws’. He-asws called his-asws writer Ubeydullah Bin Abu Raf’a and said to him: ‘Write! ’
‘Your letter came to me-asws in which you mentioned that, ‘Had you-asws known that the battle would reach to this stage that it has reached to between us and between you, and had we known it, that one of us would not be able to overcome the other’, and I-asws and you – O Muawiya – are upon a destination which we will not reach to afterwards. As for your seeking Syria, I-asws will not give you today that which I-asws did not give you yesterday. And as for us being in fear and the hope, so you have spent (your life) on the doubts as I-asws have upon the conviction, and the people of Syria are not greedier for the world as the people of Iraq are for the Hereafter. And as for your words, ‘And we are the children of Abd Manaaf, and there is no preference for one of us above the other’, so that is what we are, but Umayya is not like Hashim-as, nor is Harb like Abdul Muttalib-asws, nor is Abu Sufyan like Abu Talib-asws, nor is the freed captive like the Emigrant, nor is a hypocrite like a believer and the falsehood like the truth. In our-asws hands is the preference of Prophet-hood with which we-asws govern the Arabs and enslave the non-Arabs by it’. Greetings’. When the letter of Ali-asws ended up with Muawiya, he concealed it from Amro, then he called him and read it out to him. Amro humiliated him over it, and he had forbidden it (not to write a letter at first place). And there was no one from the Quraysh who had greater respect for Ali-asws than Amro after the day in which he-asws made him to fall down from his ride. Amro said (in a poem), ‘To Allah-azwj is the level, O son of Hinda, and it is a dark condition of yours that you covet – it is not for you, with regards to Ali-asws, and he-asws has struck iron with iron, and you hope to deceive him-asws by doubts. And you are hopeful of scaring him-asws by uncovering the lid and starting a war. The hair on the heads of children goes grey at the prospect of it. He-asws has people who go out like enraged lions, and he-asws says to them when they return and receives them with the taunt for they do not return as they went. This is not surprising for Abu Al-Hassan-asws, and it is not far from him-asws. And you have spoken to him with the words of a beggar, weak of heart with his vein cut off. You sought Syria which would have sufficed for you O son of Hinda. From a meagre opinion, even if he-asws were to give it to you, it will not increase your honour, and it would not be for you to increase your demands. You will not be able to break the promise with this opinion, even if it was anything other than a promise. Muawiya said, ‘By Allah-azwj, I know what you intend by this’. Amro said, ‘And what do I intend by it? ’ He