intending that you convey it to him.’

So I rose, made my way through the people, and sat at ʿUmar’s head. I said, ‘Commander of the Believers.’ He lifted his head and I continued, ‘Kaʿb swears by Allah that if the Commander of the Believers were to supplicate, Allah would certainly let him live on and exalt him for the sake of this ummah.’

ʿUmar said, ‘Call Kaʿb.’ They did so, and he asked him, ‘What is it that you say?’ Kaʿb replied, ‘Exactly what you have been told.’ ʿUmar responded, ‘No, by Allah, I will not supplicate. ʿUmar is doomed unless Allah forgives him.’

Then Suhayb arrived, crying out, ‘Alas for my pure friend! Alas for my close companion! Alas for ʿUmar!’ ʿUmar said, ‘Easy, Suhayb. Have you not heard that a person may be punished for part of his family’s weeping over him?’

Ibn ʿAbbās said: Abū Luʾluʾah was a Magian.

Zayd ibn Aslam narrated from his father: Ibn ʿUmar said, ‘Commander of the Believers, would it not be better if you exerted yourself a little more and appointed someone to govern after you?’ ʿUmar answered, ‘Sit me up.’ ʿAbd Allāh (ibn ʿUmar) commented, ‘When he said, “Sit me up,” I wished the breadth of Madinah lay between us out of fear of him.’ Then ʿUmar said, ‘Whom have you proposed?’ I replied, ‘So-and-so.’ He said, ‘If you appoint him, he is one of your venerable elders.’

Turning to ʿAbd Allāh, he said, ‘May your mother lose you! Consider a child raised alongside another from infancy and then growing old with him—do you think he truly knows who created him?’ ‘Yes, Commander of the Believers,’ he replied. ʿUmar continued, ‘What shall I say to Allah when He asks me about the one I placed in authority and I answer, “So-and-so,” while I know of him what I know? No—by the One in whose hand is my soul, I will return this matter to the One who entrusted it to me in the first place. I would gladly see it borne by someone better than I, for that would not diminish in the least what Allah has granted me.’