55 — Abū Muhammad Abd Allah ibn Sālih al-Bukhārī informed us, saying: Luwayn Muhammad ibn Sulaymān narrated to us: Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr narrated to us, from Abd Allah ibn Sharīk al-Amirī, from Jundub, who said:

On the day Ali—may Allah be pleased with him—fought the Kharijites, I looked at their faces and bearing and began to have doubts about fighting them. I withdrew a short distance from the army, dismounted, planted my lance in the ground, laid my coat of mail beneath me, and hung up my hooded cloak to shelter myself from the sun. I remained apart, off to one side of the army, when the Commander of the Faithful—may Allah be pleased with him—appeared riding the mule of the Messenger of Allah—peace and blessings be upon him. I thought to myself, “What business have I with him? I am fleeing from him, yet he is coming toward me!”

He asked me, “Jundub, why are you here, away from the army?”

I replied, “Commander of the Faithful, I have been stricken by a fever, and the dust became too much for me, so I could not remain standing.”

He said, “Have you not heard of the reward a servant receives for enduring the dust raised by an army?” He then turned his mount aside and dismounted. I took hold of his mount’s head. He sat down, and I sat beside him. I held the hooded cloak in my hand and used it to shade him from the sun.

Jundub continued: By Allah, I was ⦗360⦘ sitting there when a horseman came galloping up and said, “Commander of the Faithful, the people have crossed the bridge and are making off.”

Ali replied, “The places where they will be slain are on this side of the river.”

The man who had brought him the news was still standing there when another man came and said, “Commander of the Faithful, by Allah, they have crossed, and not one of them remains!”

He replied, “Woe to you! The places where they will be slain are on this side of the river.”

Then another horseman came galloping up and said, “Commander of the Faithful, by the One who sent His Prophet Muhammad—peace and blessings be upon him—with the truth, they have indeed returned!” Then others arrived and said, “They have returned! They are even falling into the water because of the crush as they try to cross.”

Then a man came and said, “Commander of the Faithful, the people have drawn up their ranks, fired arrows at us, and wounded so-and-so.”

Ali—may Allah be pleased with him—said, “Now is the right time to fight.” He sprang up and mounted his mule. I went to my weapons, put them on, and fastened them securely around me. Then I mounted my horse, took my lance, and rode out. By Allah, O Abd Allah ibn Sharīk, I did not pray Asr—Abū Jafar Luwayn said, “Or he said, Zuhr”—until I had slain seventy men with my own hand.