Another report

Al-Ḥasan ibn ʿArafah said: ʿAbdullāh ibn Idrīs narrated to us, from Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid, from Abū Sabrah al-Nakhaʿī, who said:

A man from Yemen set out on the road, and when he was somewhere along the way his donkey died. He rose, performed wuḍūʾ, prayed two rakʿahs, and then supplicated:

“O Allah, I have come from al-Dathīnah⦗1⦘ fighting in Your cause and seeking Your good-pleasure. I bear witness that You give life to the dead and resurrect those in the graves. Do not let anyone have a favor over me today; I beg You this day to bring my donkey back to life.”

The donkey thereupon stood up and shook its ears⦗2⦘.

Al-Bayhaqī commented, “This chain of transmission is sound, and an event of this kind is a karāmah granted to a follower of the Sacred Law.”

He also said⦗3⦘: “The same narration is reported by Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā al-Dhuhalī and others, from Muḥammad ibn ʿUbayd, from Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid, from al-Shaʿbī. It appears that Ismāʿīl possessed the report through both routes. Allah knows best.”

I add: Ibn Abī Dunyā also transmitted it through Ismāʿīl, from al-Shaʿbī, and mentioned it.

Al-Shaʿbī said, “I myself saw the donkey being sold—or offered for sale—at the Kunāsah market, meaning Kūfah. Ibn Abī Dunyā recorded the story through yet another chain, stating that it occurred during the caliphate of ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb. One of the man’s tribesmen composed the following lines about it:

Among us is the one whose donkey God revived—
though every limb and joint of it had died⦗4⦘.

As for the story of Zayd ibn Khārijah, his speech after death, and his testimony to the truthfulness of the Prophet ﷺ, of Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, and ʿUthmān, it is well known and is transmitted through many sound chains.

Al-Bukhārī said in al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr: “Zayd ibn Khārijah al-Khazrajī al-Anṣārī fought at Badr, died during the caliphate of ʿUthmān, and he is the one who spoke after death⦗5⦘.”

Al-Ḥākim, in his al-Mustadrak, and al-Bayhaqī, in his Dalāʾil, both related—and the latter declared authentic, as stated earlier—through the chain of al-Qaʿnabī, from Sulaymān ibn Bilāl, from Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Anṣārī, from Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyab, that Zayd ibn Khārijah al-Anṣārī, one of Banū al-Ḥārith ibn al-Khazraj, died during the caliphate of ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān. He was wrapped in his shroud, and then they heard a rattling in his chest. He spoke, saying:

“Ahmad, Ahmad—in the first scripture—true, true. Abū Bakr, weak in himself yet strong in the affair of Allah—in the first scripture—true, true. ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb, strong in the first scripture—true…”