Ayyūb narrated—from Ibn Sīrīn—from ʿUbayda—who said: ʿAlī (may Allah be pleased with him) once spoke about the people of Nahrawān and said, “Among them is a man whose hand is mawdan—or mathdūn—or makhdaj (i.e., deformed). Were it not that you might become boastful, I would inform you of what Allah has promised those who fight them, as conveyed by the tongue of Muhammad ﷺ.” I asked, “Did you hear that yourself?” He replied, “Yes, by the Lord of the Kaʿbah.” Muslim recorded this report.

Hammād ibn Zayd narrated—from Jamīl ibn Murrah—from Abū al-Waḍīʿ al-Suhaimī—who said: We were with ʿAlī at Nahrawān when he told us, “Search for the makhdaj (the maimed man).” They searched but did not find him, so they returned. He said, “Go back and look for the makhdaj, for by Allah I have neither lied nor been lied to,” and he repeated that several times. They went back and said, “We have found him among the slain, half-buried in the mud. It is as though I can still see him now: a man of Ethiopian complexion, with a breast like a woman’s, on which were little hairs like the hairs on a jerboa’s tail.” ʿAlī was delighted at this. Abū Dāwūd al-Ṭayālisī related it in his Musnad.

Shurayk narrated—from ʿUthmān ibn al-Mughīrah—from Zayd ibn Wahb—who said: The leader of the Khārijites came to ʿAlī and said, “Fear Allah, for you are a dead man.” ʿAlī replied, “No—by Him who split the grain and created life—I shall be killed, not die naturally; it will be a single blow here that will dye this”—and he pointed to his beard—“with the blood from this,” pointing to his head. “It is a promise already given and a decree already decided, and ruined indeed is the one who invents a lie.”

Abū al-Naḍr reported: Muḥammad ibn Rāshid related to us, from ʿAbdullāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAqīl, from Faḍālah ibn Abī Faḍālah al-Anṣārī—whose father had fought at Badr—who said: I went out with my father to visit ʿAlī (may Allah be pleased with him) after an illness that had greatly weakened him. My father said to him, “What keeps you in this dwelling? If your appointed time were to come, only the Bedouins of Juhaynah would attend to you. Travel to Medina; if death reaches you there, your Companions will take charge of you and will perform the prayer…"