the Messenger of Allah ﷺ left you with.”

They asked, “What will you say to your Lord when you meet Him?” He replied, “I will say: O Allah, You kept me among them for as long as You willed, then You took me back to Yourself while You remained over them. If You will, You set them aright; and if You will, You ruin them.”

Al-Aʿmash narrated, from Ḥabīb ibn Abī Thābit, from Thaʿlabah ibn Yazīd al-Ḥamānī, who said: I heard ʿAlī say, “I testify that the Prophet ﷺ once confided to me, ‘This (your beard) will certainly be stained with the blood of this (your head); nothing is delaying it but the most wretched of people.’”

Shurayk narrated, from ʿUthmān ibn Abī Zarʿah, from Zayd ibn Wahb: A delegation of Khārijites from Basra came to ʿAlī. One of them, al-Jaʿd ibn Baʿjah, said, “Fear Allah, O ʿAlī, for you are a dead man.” ʿAlī replied, “No—rather I shall be killed: one blow to this (my head) will redden this (my beard). It is a promise already given and a decree already decided, and ruined is the one who fabricates lies.”

The same man reproached him for his clothing, and ʿAlī said, “What concern have you with my dress? It is farthest from excess and more fitting for a Muslim to emulate.”

Fitr narrated, from Abū al-Ṭufayl, that ʿAlī recited:

Gird your loins for death—
for death will surely find you;
and do not quake at killing
when it descends upon your valley.

Ibn ʿUyaynah narrated, from ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Aʿyan, from Abū Ḥarb ibn Abī al-Aswad al-Duʾalī, from his father, from ʿAlī, who said: “ʿAbd Allāh ibn Salām came to me just as I had set my foot in the stirrup and said, ‘Do not go to Iraq, for I fear the tip of the sword will reach you there.’ I replied, ‘By Allah, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ has already told me so.’” Abū al-Aswad commented, “Never in my life have I seen a combatant informed of such a fate and still…"