His son told me: “After they had kept my father in custody for some time in Isfahan, they brought him out to be crucified. The executioner said to him, ‘Pray two rakʿahs.’ He replied, ‘This is no time for prayer; get on with what you have been ordered to do. I heard my shaykh say, “When you hang the feedbag of barley on the animal at the foot of the pass, it does not carry you to the summit at once; prayer is beneficial in times of ease, not at the hour of distress.”’

A messenger then arrived in haste from the sultan bearing the signet that authorized his release—the khātūn had taken a special interest in his case (1). Once he was freed (2), he went straight back to making complaints and exposing wrongdoing.

Al-Samʿānī said: I heard ʿAbd al-Khāliq ibn Ziyād say:

“One of the governors ordered that ʿAṭāʾ al-Fuqqāʿī be given one hundred lashes during the ordeal of the martyr ʿAbd al-Hādī, the son of Shaykh al-Islām. He was flung face-down, and the whipping continued until they had reached sixty strokes. They then began to argue—had he been struck fifty times or sixty?

“ʿAṭāʾ said, ‘Count the lesser number, to be on the safe side.’

“He was afterwards imprisoned together with a group of women. There were some shields in the place, so, summoning what strength remained after the beating, he set the shields up as a barrier between himself and them, saying, ‘The Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him—forbade a man to be alone with a woman who is not his relative (3).’”

Muḥammad ibn ʿAṭāʾ said: “My father passed away, according to the best estimate, in 535 AH.”