Hadith 47

whims rather than the good. So, they are cheering with the people of Al-Hijaz, and the people of Al-Iraq. Then he (Muawiya) will cast a matter, his own neck would suffocate in it and there would be deficiency for him from himself’. He-asws said: ‘You have done well, by Allah-azwj, O Qays, and beautiful’. And Umm Fazal Bin Al-Haris wrote to Ali-asws, informing him-asws of the travelling of Ayesha and Talha and Al-Zubeyr, and the set journey. It reached him, the sluggishness of Sa’ad, and Usama Bin Zayd, and Muhammad Bin Maslama. Sa’ad said, ‘I will not brandish a sword until the Momin is recognised from the Kafir’. And Usama said, ‘I will not fight against a man who is saying, ‘There is no god except Allah-azwj’, and if I was in a den of the lion, I would have entered into it with you-asws’. And Muhammad Bin Maslama said, ‘Rasool-Allah-saww gave me a sword and said: ‘When the Muslims differ, then strike with it in the land of Ohad and stay in your house’. And Abdullah Bin Umar opposed from it. Ammar Bin Yasser said, ‘Leave the group! As for Abdullah, he is weak, and as for Sa’ad, he is jealous, and as for Muhammad Bin Maslama, your-asws wrong to him is that you-asws killed his brother Marhab’. Then Ammar said to Muhammad Bin Maslamah, ‘Will you not be in the warring party? By Allah-azwj! If a side were to incline upon me, I would incline with Ali-asws’. And Ka’ab Bin Malik said, ‘O Amir Al-Momineen-asws! It has reached you-asws about us, community of the Helpers, what if it were others, they would not stand with you-asws. By Allah-azwj! Not everything we see as permissible is permissible, nor is everything what we see as prohibited is prohibited. And among the people there is one who is more knowing with the treachery of Usman than the ones who actually killed him, and you-asws are more knowing with our situation than we are. If he (Usman) was killed being an oppressor, we will accept your-asws words, and if he was killed as an oppressed, (even) then accept our words. If we are left in it to our doubts, then our certainty would be strange and we will doubt you-asws, and you-asws have already said to us: ‘With me-asws is the breaking of what they have united upon, and a decision of what they are differing in’. He said (a couplet), ‘The first of the people of Al-Medina with the help was Ali-asws and the family of Abd Manaf to that which is in his-asws hand from the Santuary of Allah-azwj and closer to the loyalty after the clearance’. And Ka’ab Bin Malik was from the loyalists of Usman, and Al-Ashtar stood up to Ali-asws and spoke to him-asws with a speech urging him-asws against the staying people (not going to fight). Ali-asws disliked that until he-asws complained to him, and he was from the views of Ali-asws, that he should not mention them with anything. Al-Ashtar said, ‘O Amir Al-Momineen-asws! We, and even though we do not happen to be from the Emigrants and the Helpers, but we are among them and this is a general allegiance, and the one exiting from it is an insurgent, and the one delaying from it is a reducer, and if you-asws could educate them today with the tongue and tomorrow with the sword, and the one heavy