Al-Wāqidī said: This expedition took place in the month of Ṣafar in the fourth year of the Hijra. The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) sent this detachment to the Meccans in order to request permission for them to perform the ḥajj and ʿumra.
Raʿjīʿ is the name of a place eight miles from Usfān.
Al-Bukhārī, through Ibrāhīm b. Mūsā, narrates from Abū Hurayra as follows:
"The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) dispatched a military unit under the command of ʿĀṣim b. Thābit (may Allah be pleased with him), the grandfather of ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb's son, as a patrol. The unit reached a place between Usfān and Mecca. There, a clan from the tribe of Hudhayl, called the sons of Lihyān, became aware of them and pursued them with a group of nearly one hundred skilled archers. ʿĀṣim and his companions had eaten dates at a certain place. When the pursuers saw the date pits, they said:
- These pits are from the dates of Medina, and by following their tracks, they found them. When ʿĀṣim and his companions saw them, they took refuge on a steep and high hill. The pursuers surrounded the hill and said:
- If you surrender, we will not kill you, giving them a guarantee. But ʿĀṣim replied:
- I personally cannot accept the guarantee of the disbelievers. O Allah, inform Your Prophet about us, and he began to fight them.
Eventually, seven of them, including himself and his companions, were martyred. Only Hubayb, Zayd, and another survived and requested a guarantee, and when it was granted, they descended and surrendered. However, the pursuers broke their promise and, as soon as they had them in custody, untied the strings of their bows and
bound their arms with them. The third man among them said:
- This is the beginning of your breaking the guarantee you gave, and he refused to let them bind his arms. They dragged him on the ground and, unable to tie him, killed him. Hubayb and Zayd were taken and sold in Mecca. The sons of Ḥārith b. ʿĀmir b. Nawfal bought Hubayb. Because Hubayb had killed their father Ḥārith b. ʿĀmir at the Battle of Badr, after keeping him for a while, they decided to kill him. At that time, Hubayb asked one of the daughters of Ḥārith for a razor to shave his pubic hair. The woman gave him the razor. She said:
- At one point, I forgot to watch my child. Suddenly, I saw that Hubayb had opened the razor and placed it on the child’s thigh. When I saw that terrifying scene, I was very frightened.
He said to me:
- Are you afraid that I will kill the child? Do not fear, I would never do such a thing.
The woman always said:
- I have never seen a better captive than Hubayb. I swear, at times when there were no fresh dates in Mecca and he was bound in iron chains, I would see bunches of dates in his hand. This was nothing but provision sent to him by Allah.
Eventually, they took him outside the sanctuary of Mecca to kill him. As they were about to execute him, he said to them:
- Allow me to pray two rakʿas before you kill me, and after performing two rakʿas, he said to them:
- If you did not think that I was prolonging the prayer out of fear of death, I would have made it longer.
Thus, Hubayb was the first to establish the custom of praying two rakʿas before execution. After praying, he said to them:
- O Allah, destroy them all! Then he recited a poem with the following meaning:
"As I am killed as a Muslim in the path of Allah, I do not care on which side I fall. For my death is in the path of Allah. If Allah wills, even my torn and scattered limbs will be blessed."
After he said this, ʿUqba b. al-Ḥārith rose and killed him.
As for ʿĀṣim, because he had killed one of the leaders of Quraysh at the Battle of Badr, after he was killed, the Quraysh sent men to the place where he was killed to bring back a part of his body.
But Allah created a dense swarm of bees over his corpse like a cloud, so the men sent could not approach the body at all."
Al-Bukhārī, through ʿAbdullāh b. Muḥammad, narrates from Jābir b. ʿAbdullāh: "The one who killed Hubayb was Abū Sarwāʿa."
I say: The name of the person who killed Hubayb is ʿUqba b. al-Ḥārith, who later became Muslim. He narrated a hadith concerning breastfeeding. It is also said that Abū Sarwāʿa and ʿUqba were brothers. Allah knows best.
Muḥammad b. Isḥāq narrates from ʿĀṣim b. ʿUmar b. Qatāda: After the Battle of Uḥud, a group from ʿAdal and Qāra came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) and said:
- O Messenger of God, we are Muslims. Send some of your Companions with us to teach us religious knowledge, to recite and teach us the Qur'an, and to instruct us in the rulings of Islam.
Thereupon, the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) sent with them the following six Companions, whose names are listed below:
Marsad b. Abī Marsad al-Ghanawī (an ally of Ḥamza b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib; according to Ibn Isḥāq, he was the leader of the six-man group), Khālid b. Bukayr al-Laythī (an ally of Banū ʿAdiyy), ʿĀṣim b. Thābit b. Abī al-Aqlāḥ (a brother of Banū ʿAmr b. ʿAwf), Hubayb b. ʿAdiyy (a brother of Banū Jahjaba b. Kulfa b. ʿAmr b. ʿAwf), Zayd b. Dathina (a brother of Banū Bayāḍa b. ʿĀmir), and ʿAbdullāh b. Ṭāriq (an ally of Banū Zafar). May Allah be pleased with them all.
Ibn Isḥāq stated that they were six in number. Mūsā b. ʿUqba said the same and listed their names as did Ibn Isḥāq.
According to al-Bukhārī, however, the Messenger of God sent ten men, the leader of whom was ʿĀṣim b. Thābit b. Abī al-Aqlāḥ. Allah knows best.
Ibn Isḥāq said: This group of Companions, together with those who came, reached a water source belonging to the tribe of Hudhayl in the Ḥijāz region. When they reached the slopes of the valley of Had'a, they were betrayed. The Companions called for help from the tribe of Hudhayl. No one but the surrounding guards noticed what was happening. Thereupon, the traitors took up their swords and surrounded the Companions, saying:
- We do not want to kill you; we only want to use you as leverage to obtain something from the Meccans. We swear by Allah that we will not kill you.
When Marsad b. Abī Marsad, Khālid b. Bukayr, and ʿĀṣim b. Thābit heard this, they said:
- By Allah, we will never accept any covenant or agreement from any polytheist. ʿĀṣim b. Thābit recited the following poem: "What is wrong with me, for I am an archer, strong and firm.
The bowstring is thick and taut.
The long, broad arrowhead flies because of it. Death is true, and life is false.
Whatever the Deity has decreed will befall a person, and he will reach that reality.
If I do not fight you, may my mother be bereaved of me!"
ʿĀṣim also recited this poem to them:
"The arrow of Abū Sulaymān and a man who carves arrows, a curve like a burning Hellfire,
Swift camels came and stood, but I did not tremble with fear.
The shield is made of plain ox hide.
I believe in what has come upon Muḥammad.
Abū Sulaymān and one like me shoot.
My people are a noble group."
After saying this, ʿĀṣim b. Thābit fought the Hudhaylites. His two companions were also killed.
When ʿĀṣim was killed, the Hudhaylites wanted to take his head to sell it to Sulāfa bint Saʿd b. Suhayl. This woman had made a vow on the day of Uḥud, when her two sons were killed:
"If I get hold of ʿĀṣim’s head, I will surely drink wine from his skull!"
But bees prevented her from fulfilling her wish. When the bees came between ʿĀṣim and them, the Hudhaylites said:
"Leave him; when evening comes and the bees depart, we will take his head."
Then Allah sent a flood, which swept ʿĀṣim away. ʿĀṣim had pledged to Allah that no polytheist would touch him and that he would never touch a polytheist because of their impurity.
When ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb heard that bees had protected ʿĀṣim, he said:
"Allah protects His believing servant. ʿĀṣim had pledged to Allah that no polytheist would touch him and that he would never touch a polytheist in his life. Thus, Allah protected him in his life and after his death."
Ibn Isḥāq said: As for Hubayb, Zayd b. Dathina, and ʿAbdullāh b. Ṭāriq, their hearts softened and they desired to live. They surrendered to the polytheists, who took them captive and brought them to Mecca to sell them. When they reached Zahrān, ʿAbdullāh b. Ṭāriq freed his hand from the rope with which he was bound as a captive. Then he seized his sword. The Hudhaylites withdrew. They stoned him, striking him with stones until he was killed. His grave is at Zahrān. As for Hubayb b. ʿAdiyy and Zayd b. Dathina, they were brought to Mecca with the captors. The Hudhaylites sold these two to the Quraysh in exchange for two of their own captives held in Mecca, thus ransoming their people.
Ibn Isḥāq said: Juhayr b. Abī Ilḥab al-Tamīmī, an ally of Banū Nawfal, bought Hubayb for ʿUqba b. al-Ḥārith b. ʿĀmir b. Nawfal. Abū Ilḥab was the maternal brother of Ḥārith b. ʿĀmir. Hubayb was bought to be killed in retaliation for his father.
As for Zayd b. Dathina, he was bought by Ṣafwān b. Umayya so that he could be killed in retaliation for his father Umayya b. Khalaf. Ṣafwān sent him with a slave named Nistar to Tanʿīm to be executed outside the sanctuary. A group from Quraysh gathered, including Abū Sufyān b. Ḥarb. When Zayd was brought to be executed, Abū Sufyān said to him:
- O Zayd, may Allah grant you goodness. Would you like Muhammad to be in your place now so that we could strike his neck, and you be with your family?
Zayd replied:
- By Allah, I would not wish for Muhammad to be pricked by a thorn where he is now, even if I were with my family.
Abū Sufyān used to say:
- I have never seen anyone love another as Muhammad’s Companions love Muhammad!
Nistar then killed Zayd.
As for Hubayb b. ʿAdiyy: ʿAbdullāh b. Abī Najīḥ narrated from Muʿāwiya (Muʿāwiya was the slave-girl of Ḥujayr b. Abī Ilḥab and had become Muslim), who said:
"Hubayb was with me, imprisoned in my house. One day I saw that he had a bunch of grapes the size of a man’s head, from which he was eating. I had never seen such grapes growing in the land of Allah."
Ibn Isḥāq, through ʿĀṣim b. ʿUmar b. Qatāda and ʿAbdullāh b. Abī Najīḥ, narrated that Muʿāwiya said:
When Hubayb was brought to be executed, he said to me:
- Send me a knife so I can shave.
I gave a razor to a boy from our tribe and said:
- Take this to the man in the house.
The boy readily agreed to take the knife. Then I thought: "What have I done! By Allah, the man might kill the boy and take revenge, and it would be retaliation for retaliation." Hubayb took the knife from the boy’s hand.
Then he said: "By your life, did your mother not fear for you when she sent you to me with this knife?" Then he released the boy.
According to Ibn Hishām, the boy was the son of that woman.
Ibn Isḥāq narrated from ʿĀṣim that they then brought Hubayb out and took him to Tanʿīm to be crucified. Hubayb said to them:
- If you permit, allow me to pray two rakʿas.
They accepted his request and allowed him to pray. He prayed two rakʿas, performing the prayer calmly and perfectly. Then he turned to them and said: By Allah, if you did not think I was prolonging it out of fear of death, I would have prayed more.
Hubayb thus became the first to establish the sunnah of praying two rakʿas before execution for Muslims. Then they placed him on a piece of wood and raised him up. When they tied him, he said:
- O Allah! We have conveyed the message of Your Messenger. So inform him of what has been done to us in the morning. O Allah! Destroy their numbers, scatter them, and do not let any of them survive. After saying this, they killed him.
Muʿāwiya b. Abī Sufyān said: On that day, I was among those present with Abū Sufyān. My father, fearing Hubayb’s supplication, made me lie down on the ground. They used to say: "When a man is cursed and he lies down on his side, the curse does not reach him." According to Mūsā b. ʿUqba in his work "al-Maghāzī," Hubayb and Zayd b. Dathina were killed on the same day. It was heard that the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said on the day they were killed: "Peace be upon you. The Quraysh have killed Hubayb."
Again, according to Mūsā b. ʿUqba, when the polytheists hanged Zayd b. Dathina, they shot arrows at him to make him renounce his religion, but this only increased his iman (faith) and submission.
According to ʿUrwa and Mūsā b. ʿUqba, when the polytheists hanged Hubayb, they called out to him:
- Would you like Muhammad to be in your place?
- No, by the Exalted Allah, I would not wish for even a thorn to prick Muhammad’s foot in exchange for saving my own life.
Upon hearing this, the polytheists laughed. Ibn Isḥāq also mentions such an incident in his account of Zayd b. Dathina’s execution. Allah knows best.
Mūsā b. ʿUqba said: The person who buried Hubayb was ʿAmr b. Umayya.
Ibn Isḥāq, through Yaḥyā b. ʿAbbād b. ʿAbdullāh b. al-Zubayr, narrates from ʿUqba b. al-Ḥārith as follows:
- By Allah, I did not kill Hubayb. I was younger than him. But Abū Maysara, the brother of Banū ʿAbd al-Dār, took the spear, put it in my hand, and then held my hand and the spear, and thrust it into him. Thus, he was killed."
Ibn Isḥāq narrates from some Companions: "ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb (may Allah be pleased with him) appointed Saʿīd b. ʿĀmir b. Ḥizyam al-Jumahī as governor over part of Syria. Once, while among the people, he fainted. This was reported to ʿUmar, and it was said: The man has fallen ill. When ʿUmar visited him, he asked:
- O Saʿīd, what is your condition?
- By Allah, O Commander of the Believers! There is nothing wrong with me. But I was among those present at the execution of Hubayb b. ʿAdiyy. I heard his supplication. By Allah, whenever I remember that supplication in any gathering, I faint.
Because of this, Saʿīd’s standing with ʿUmar increased."
Al-Umayyī narrates from ʿUmar: "Whoever wishes to look at a man unique in his own right, let him look at Saʿīd b. ʿĀmir!" Ibn Hishām said: Hubayb remained in the hands of the polytheists. When the sacred months ended, they killed him.
Al-Bayhaqī, through Ibrāhīm b. Ismāʿīl, narrates from ʿAmr b. Umayya: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) sent me alone as a scout and patrol. I came to the gallows where Hubayb was hanged. Fearing spies and those watching me, I climbed up the gallows and untied the rope. Hubayb’s body fell to the ground. I moved away. When I looked back, I saw nothing. It was as if the earth had swallowed him. To this day, it has not been reported that any part of Hubayb’s body has been seen.
Ibn Isḥāq, through Muḥammad b. Abī Muḥammad, narrates from Ibn ʿAbbās: When the Companions who participated in the Raʿjīʿ expedition were killed, some of the hypocrites said:
"Alas, alas, those deluded ones have perished. They neither stayed with their families nor conveyed Muhammad’s message to the people."
Concerning them, Allah revealed the following verse:
"And among the people is he whose speech pleases you in worldly life, and he calls Allah to witness as to what is in his heart, yet he is the fiercest of opponents." (al-Baqara 2:204)
And concerning those who participated in the Raʿjīʿ expedition, Allah revealed the following verse:
"And of the people is he who sells himself, seeking means to the approval of Allah. And Allah is kind to [His] servants." (al-Baqara 2:207)
Ibn Isḥāq said: One of the poems recited about the expedition of Raʿjīʿ is the following, which Hubayb recited when the polytheists gathered to kill him. According to Ibn Hishām, some do not attribute this poem to Hubayb. The poem is:
"The factions gathered around me. They gathered their tribes.
All of them revealed their enmity and strove against me.
For I am bound in chains. They gathered their sons and women.
I was brought to an unbreakable, tall tree. I complain of my loneliness, sorrow, and grief only to Allah.
I also complain to Allah of the factions gathering against me as I fall to the ground.
O Lord of the Throne! Grant me patience against what they intend for me.
They have torn my flesh to pieces, and I have lost hope.
This is in the hand of Allah. If He wills, He will unite the torn and severed joints and bless me.
They have made me choose between disbelief and death.
Yet my eyes shed tears without impatience.
I do not flee from death, for I am dead. But my avoidance would mean being consumed by the blazing fire of Hell that surrounds everything.
By Allah, if I am killed as a Muslim, it does not matter where I fall and die.
I am not one to yield to the enemy, nor do I show impatience. For my return is to Allah."
Al-Bukhārī’s Ṣaḥīḥ also records these two verses from this poem:
"When I am killed as a Muslim, it does not matter on which side I fall. For my death is in the path of Allah.
This is in the hand of Allah. If He wills, He will unite the torn and severed joints and bless me."
According to Ibn Isḥāq, Ḥassān b. Thābit recited the following elegy for Hubayb:
"What has happened to your eyes, that their tears flow like pearls upon the chest without ceasing?
The bravest of the brave weep for Hubayb.
My eyes know that when Hubayb met the enemy, he neither feared nor weakened nor was he of bad character.
So go, O Hubayb! May Allah reward you with good things and Paradise, and may you remain forever among companions and houris.
When the Prophet says to you, as pure and good angels appear on the horizon, what will you say?
Why did you kill Allah’s witness in exchange for a wicked man, who spreads corruption in the cities and among his companions!"
Ibn Hishām said: Some parts of this poem have been omitted here due to inappropriate expressions.
According to Ibn Isḥāq, Ḥassān satirized some of the Banū Lihyān who betrayed the Companions at Raʿjīʿ as follows:
"If pure treachery pleases you, go to Raʿjīʿ and ask about the land of Lihyān.
A people who advised each other to devour their neighbors.
Thus, dog, monkey, and man resemble each other.
If a he-goat were to speak one day, it would rise and address them.
He was a man of honor among them."
For their betrayal of the Companions who participated in the Raʿjīʿ expedition, Ḥassān b. Thābit also satirized the tribes of Hudhayl and Banū Lihyān in another poem:
"By my life, the events concerning Hubayb and ʿĀṣim surely disgrace Hudhayl b. Mudrika.
The worst of the events of Lihyān befell them.
Lihyān are the worst of criminals.
Some people are of their tribe, pure-blooded, like the hair on the backs of hands.
They betrayed on the day of Raʿjīʿ. They betrayed and abandoned the Messenger of God’s envoy, a man of chastity and high morals,
Hudhayl never refrained from the vilest of forbidden things.
Because of the killing of ʿĀṣim, who was protected from the impure disbelievers, they will one day see that victory will turn against them.
Defenders like such birds (bees) protect the flesh of the martyr from great battles.
Perhaps the tribe of Hudhayl, by killing him, will see the places of death or gatherings of mourning women. We will strike them such a blow that, because of it, caravans from the market people will settle their scores.
By the command of the Messenger of God, whose envoy recognized Lihyān with sound judgment.
If they are wronged, they do not repel the hand of the oppressor. They do not defend against him.
When people settle in a wide place, you will see them in the beds of torrents. Their places are the abode of death.
And when something befalls them, their opinions are like those of animals!"
Ḥassān praised the Companions of Raʿjīʿ, mentioning their names in his poem as follows:
"May Allah have mercy on those who departed one after another on the day of Raʿjīʿ, thus being honored and rewarded.
The head and commander of the detachment was Marsad.
Ibn Bukayr was their leader. Death took Hubayb, Ibn Ṭāriq, and Ibn Dathina as was decreed.
ʿĀṣim, who was killed at Raʿjīʿ, attained lofty virtues. He is among the successful.
He did not accept humiliation or submission to them, and finally fought with the sword, for he was noble."
Ibn Hishām said: Most of those knowledgeable in poetry say this poem does not belong to Ḥassān.