The Messenger of Allah ﷺ dismounted from his mule, scooped up a handful of earth, faced the enemy with it and declared, “shāhat al-wujūh (may those faces be disgraced)!” There was not a single person among them, by Allah’s creation, whose eyes were not filled with dust from that very handful, so they turned and fled. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ then distributed their booty among the Muslims. Muslim recorded this report.

Abū Dāwūd said in his Musnad: Ḥammād ibn Salamah narrated to us, from Yaʿlā ibn ʿAṭāʾ, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yasār, from Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Fahrī, who said, “We were with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ at Ḥunayn…” He related the incident and in it: “The one who was nearer to him than I told me that he picked up a handful of dust, cast it into the people’s faces and said, ‘shāhadat al-wujūh (the faces have been confounded).’” Yaʿlā ibn ʿAṭāʾ added, “Their children later told us from their fathers that none of them remained without his eyes and mouth being filled with dust. We then heard a metallic clatter from the sky like iron striking a basin, and Allah routed them.”

ʿAbd al-Wāḥid ibn Ziyād said: al-Hārith ibn Ḥuṣayrah narrated to us, from al-Qāsim ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, from his father, who said: Ibn Masʿūd recounted, “I was with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ on the day of Ḥunayn. The people turned away from him, and only eighty men of the Emigrants and the Helpers remained—those upon whom Allah sent down tranquillity. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ was pressing forward on his mule; it suddenly balked and he slipped from the saddle. I hurried to him and said, ‘Mount higher, may Allah raise you!’ He replied, ‘Hand me a handful of dust.’ I gave it to him and he struck it against their faces so that their eyes were filled with dust. He then said, ‘Where are the Emigrants and the Helpers?’ I answered, ‘They are here.’ He said, ‘Call them.’ I called them, and they came with their swords in their right hands flashing like meteors, and the idolaters fled.”