“Come down and surrender; we guarantee and pledge that not one of you will be killed.”
ʿĀṣim ibn Thābit replied, “People, as for me, I will never place myself under the protection of a disbeliever. O Allah, convey our plight to Your Prophet ﷺ.”
The enemy thereupon showered them with arrows and killed ʿĀṣim. Three men then climbed down on the basis of that pledge and covenant—Khubayb, Zayd ibn al-Dathinnah, and another companion. Once the attackers had them in their power, they loosed the bowstrings and tied the captives with them. The third man said, “This is the first act of treachery! By Allah, I will not go with you; I have these slain men as an example (1).” He was referring to the martyrs. They dragged and wrestled with him, but he refused to accompany them, so they killed him.
They took Khubayb and Zayd away and sold the two of them in Mecca after the Battle of Badr. The sons of al-Hārith ibn ʿĀmir ibn Nawfal ibn ʿAbd Manāf purchased (2) Khubayb, for Khubayb had killed al-Hārith on the day of Badr. Khubayb remained their prisoner until they unanimously agreed to execute him.
He asked one of al-Hārith’s daughters to lend him a razor so that he might shave with it (3), and she lent it to him. While she was distracted, her little son toddled over to Khubayb; she found the boy sitting on his thigh with the razor in his hand, and she panicked—a fear Khubayb noticed. He said, “Do you fear that I would kill him? I would never do such a thing!” She later said, “By Allah, I never saw a captive better than Khubayb. By Allah, one day I found him eating a cluster of grapes in his hand while he was bound in iron chains, and there was not a single fruit in Mecca. It was sustenance Allah had provided for Khubayb.”
When they led him out of the Sanctuary to kill him in the open country, Khubayb said to them, “Let me pray two rakʿahs.” They allowed him, and he performed the two units of prayer. Then he said, “By Allah, were it not that you would think I am afraid, I would have made them longer. O Allah, count them one by one, destroy them all, and leave none of them alive.” He also recited:
I care not, so long as I am killed a Muslim,
On which side for Allah my last stand (4) will be;
All this is for the sake of the One True God, and if He so wills
He will bless the severed joints (5) of a torn-apart body.