the most judicious and fairest of judges—that anything should escape me.’

Mundhir ibn Saʿīd’s face lit up and he said, ‘Boy, bring the rain-cloak (1) with you; when the tyrant of the earth humbles himself, the All-Compelling Lord of heaven shows mercy.’

Ibn ʿAfīf relates, among the well-known reports about him, that the Commander of the Faithful once built on one of the terraces of al-Zahraʾ a domed pavilion of gold and silver. He sat inside it while the leading notables were admitted. Mundhir ibn Saʿīd arrived, and the caliph said to him, as he had said to those before him, ‘Have you ever seen or heard of any caliph before me who has done the like of this?’ Tears began to stream from the judge’s eyes and he replied, ‘By Allah, O Commander of the Faithful, I never thought Satan would get this far with you, bringing you down to the stations of the unbelievers.’ ‘How so?’ asked the caliph.

He said, ‘Allah—exalted is He—says: “And were it not that mankind might become one community, We would have supplied those who disbelieve in the All-Merciful with roofs of silver for their houses … but the Hereafter with your Lord is for the God-fearing” (al-Zukhruf 43:33-34).’ Al-Nāṣir lowered his head for a long time and then said, ‘May Allah reward you on our behalf and on behalf of the Muslims; what you have spoken is the truth,’ and he ordered the silver roof of the pavilion to be dismantled.

On another day he preached and was pleased with his own eloquence, whereupon he said, ‘How long shall I admonish yet take no admonition, forbid yet not refrain, point out the path to those seeking guidance, yet remain standing with the bewildered? No indeed—this is manifest tribulation!’

‘O Allah, turn my desire toward that for which You created me, and do not occupy me with what You Yourself have guaranteed for me.’

Once, while delivering a sermon in the congregational mosque of al-Zahraʾ, he became carried away and wove into it: ‘Do you build on every prominence a monument for mere frivolity, and erect fortresses as though you would live forever? And when you strike, you strike as tyrants’ (al-Shuʿarāʾ 26:128-130). In consequence, al-Nāṣir chose Aḥmad ibn Muṭarrif to deliver the sermon at al-Zahraʾ whenever the caliph was present.

(1) A leather or waxed cloak kept for use in rain.