The personal name of Kinda was Thawr ibn ʿUfayr ibn ʿAdī ibn al-Ḥārith ibn Murrah ibn Udad ibn Zayd ibn Yashjub ibn ʿArīb ibn Zayd ibn Kahlan ibn Sabaʾ ibn Yashjub ibn Yaʿrub ibn Qaḥṭān. Ibn Saʿd records this lineage and adds:

He was called “Kinda” because he kanada (renounced) his father’s favor—that is, he was ungrateful for it.

Al-Ashʿath’s given name was Maʿdī Karib. His hair was always disheveled, and the nickname “al-Ashʿath” (the unkempt) prevailed over his proper name.

He was a Companion and a transmitter of hadith. Among those who narrated from him are al-Shaʿbī, Qays ibn Abī Ḥāzim, and Abū Wāʾil, while Ibrāhīm al-Nakhaʿī related from him in mursal form.

His eye was wounded on the day of Yarmūk, and at Ṣiffīn he was the senior-most of ʿAlī’s commanders.

Mansūr and al-Aʿmash, on the authority of Abū Wāʾil, reported:

Al-Ashʿath told us, “Concerning me the verse was revealed: ‘Indeed, those who exchange Allah’s covenant and their oaths for a small price…’ (Āl ʿImrān 3:77). I took a man to court before the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, who asked, ‘Do you have any proof?’ I said, ‘No.’ He replied, ‘Then he must swear an oath.’ I said, ‘Then he will swear.’ The Prophet ﷺ then declared, ‘Whoever swears a false oath in order to seize wealth thereby will meet Allah while He is angry with him.’” (1)

Ibn al-Kalbī states that al-Ashʿath came to the Prophet ﷺ at the head of a delegation of seventy men from Kinda.

Mujālid, citing al-Shaʿbī from al-Ashʿath, said: “I arrived before the Messenger of Allah ﷺ…”