“Go—woe to you!”

So he went, made his way to Jaʿfar and was greeted with, “O Yāsir, your arrival pleases me, yet you have vexed me by coming in without permission.”

Yāsir replied, “The matter is graver than that, Jaʿfar. I have been ordered to do a certain thing.”

The poor man—drawing near and kissing his foot—said, “Let me go inside and dictate my last wishes.”

Yāsir answered, “That is impossible; make your bequests here.”

Jaʿfar said to me, “You are indebted to me. Go back to the Commander of the Faithful and say, ‘I have killed him.’ If he regrets the order, my life will be saved through you.”

Yāsir said, “I cannot do that.”

Jaʿfar continued, “Then take me with you to his encampment so that I may hear his words and what you say to him.”

“That I can do,” Yāsir replied, and he took him along. When Yāsir entered, the Caliph asked, “What news do you bring?”

Yāsir repeated Jaʿfar’s request. The Caliph cursed him and said, “If you consult me again about this, I shall have you executed before him.” Yāsir went out, struck off Jaʿfar’s head, and brought it in.

The Caliph said, “Yāsir, bring me So-and-so and So-and-so.” When the two men arrived, he told them, “Strike off his head, for I cannot bear the sight of the man who killed Jaʿfar.”(1)

Abū al-ʿAtāhiyah said:

Tell anyone who longs for endless days—
Is there no lesson in Jaʿfar and in Yaḥyā?
They were the twin viziers of God’s caliph Hārūn—
What viziers they were, his trusted pair!
There lies that Jaʿfar, whole a while ago—
Head severed, body cleft upon the gallows.
And Yaḥyā, the elder minister, awoke to find
Himself cast off, kept far from court.
Their once-united house was torn apart;
They wandered, scattered through the lands.
So fares the one who angers God
To win the favor of a fellow slave—God pays him back.
Glory be to Him before whom kings submit;
We bear witness: there is no god but He.
Blessed is he who turns in repentance before he slips—
Who repents before death—blessed indeed is he.(2)