“Gird yourself, for your resolve is sharp and swift;
let no scattering or change dismay you.
If the empire of the sons of Sāsān should be struck,
know that Time moves in capricious, crushing turns.
Many a time they have flung men from stations
where even ravenous lions would shrink from their assault.
Among them are the lord of the citadel, Bahrām, his brothers,
al-Hurmuzān, Shāpūr and Shāpūr.
People are half-siblings of different mothers:
whom they see weakened is despised and cast aside;
yet they are full brothers—should they glimpse spoils,
the unseen keeps those spoils guarded and victorious.
Good and evil are fastened together in one tether:
follow the good, and beware the evil.”
When ʿAbd al-Masīḥ reached Kisrā he conveyed Satiḥ’s words. Kisrā said, “For how long will fourteen of our kings rule and such affairs unfold?” Ten of them reigned a total of four years, and the rest ruled until the end of the caliphate of ʿUthmān—may Allah be pleased with him. This report is odd and unfamiliar.
Through my chain of transmission to al-Bakkāʾī, from Ibn Isḥāq: Rabiʿah ibn Naṣr, one of the kings of Yemen who reigned amid the line of the Tubbaʿ kings, saw a dream that horrified him. He summoned every soothsayer, sorcerer, augur, and astrologer in his realm and said, “I have seen a dream that has filled me with dread; tell me both what I saw and its interpretation.”
They answered, “Recount the dream to us and we will give you its interpretation.” He replied, “If I tell you the dream, I shall never be satisfied with your explanation, for only the one who already knows the dream can interpret it.”
It was suggested to him, “If the king desires this, let him send for Satiḥ and Shaqq; no one is more knowledgeable than they.” He sent for them, and Satiḥ arrived before Shaqq. The king said to him, “I saw a coal-black mass emerge from darkness, fall upon the land of Tihāmah, and consume every creature that possessed a skull.” Satiḥ replied, “You have omitted nothing. What, then, is its meaning?”
He said, “I swear by the One between the two lava fields—by Ḥanash—that the Abyssinians shall surely descend upon your land.”