on the Day of the Saqīfah of Banū Sāʿidah I had laid the affair squarely upon ʿUmar—or upon Abū ʿUbaydah. I wish I had sent Khālid ibn al-Walīd to fight the apostates while I myself remained at Dhū’l-Qaṣṣah: had the Muslims triumphed, all well and good; if not, I would have been their reserve and support. I wish that when al-Ashʿath was brought before me in chains I had struck off his head, for it seems to me that no evil ever appears but that he hastens to take part in it. I wish that when al-Fujāʾah al-Sulamī was delivered to me I had not burned him, but either killed him outright or released him. I wish that when I dispatched Khālid ibn al-Walīd to Syria I had sent ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb to Iraq, so that my right hand and my left would both have been extended in the path of Allah. I wish I had asked the Messenger of Allah ﷺ about to whom this authority truly belongs, so that none would dispute its rightful people; and that I had asked him whether the Anṣār have any share in it; and that I had asked him about the paternal aunt and the brother’s daughter, for I still feel uncertain about them.’

This was narrated in this form—indeed, at greater length—by Ibn Wahb from al-Layth ibn Saʿd, from Ṣāliḥ ibn Kaysān, and Ibn ʿĀyidh transmitted it likewise.

Muhammad ibn ʿAmr ibn ʿAlqamah ibn Waqāṣ reported from his father, from his grandfather, that ʿĀʾishah said: ‘I was present when my father was dying, and he fell into a faint. I recited:
Whoever forever stifles his tears,
One day those tears will surely pour.
He raised his head and said, “My daughter, not so; rather, as Allah the Exalted says: ‘And the throes of death have come with the truth—this is what you used to avoid.’ (Qāf 50:19).”

Mūsā al-Juhanī related from Abū Bakr ibn Ḥafṣ ibn ʿUmar that ʿĀʾishah recited, while Abū Bakr was in his death-sickness:
By your life, a man’s wealth avails him not
When his breath rattles and his chest grows tight.
He replied, “Not so; rather: ‘And the throes of death have come with the truth…’ Indeed, I have—”