Hadith 345

t. Abu Abdullah-asws said: ‘The description is ratified, and the time has drawn near. This is the bearer of the flags which he would be coming with from Khurasan’. Then he-asws said: ‘O Mo’tab! Catch up with him and ask him what his name is’. Then he-asws said: ‘If it were to be ‘Abdul Rahman’, then by Allah-azwj, it is he! ’
He (the narrator) said, ‘Mo’tab returned and said, ‘He said his name is ‘Abdul Rahman’! ’
He (the narrator) said, ‘When the sons of Al-Abbas ruled, I looked at him, and behold, it was Abdul Rahman Abu Muslim (bearing the black flags)’’. [200]
And in ‘Ramish’ of Afzzaie –
‘Abu Muslim Al-Khallal, minister of family of Muhammad presented the caliphate to Al-Sadiq-asws before arrival of the army to him. He-asws refused and informed him that Ibrahim the imam will not be arriving from Syria to Al-Iraq, and this command (caliphate) is for his younger brother, then the older, and will remain in the children of the elder, and that Abu Muslim will remain without purpose’. When the (black) flags came, he wrote with his words as well and informed him: ‘Seventy thousand fighters shall arrive to us, so we are awaiting your-asws orders’. He-asws said: ‘The answer is like what I-asws had shown you’. The matter happened like what he-asws had mentioned. Ibrahim the imam remained in prison of Marwan, he was addressed with the name ‘Al-Saffah’’. [201]
And I read in one of the histories –
‘When (a messenger) brought the letter of Abu Muslim Al-Khallal to Al-Sadiq-asws at night, he-asws read it and placed it upon the lamp (flame) and burnt it. The messenger said to him-asws, and he thought that his-asws burning was a covering, and a concealment, and a defence of the matter, ‘Is there an answer? ’ He-asws said: ‘The answer is what you have seen’. And Abu Hureyra Al-Abbar, companion of Al-Sadiq-asws said (a poem), ‘When the caller called my Master-asws, he did not happen to praise him-asws with correctness, and when he called him-asws with the letter, he-asws answered them by burning the letter, besides responding an answer, and my Master-asws was not going to buy the straying, no be wearing from it a robe (caliphate) as reward, but he-asws was a Divine Authority of Allah-azwj in the earth, a pointer to good and excellent return (Hereafter)’’. [202]