the commanders of the forces—Abu ʿUbaydah, Yazid ibn Abi Sufyan, and Khalid ibn al-Walid—at Sargh. They informed him that a plague had struck Syria, so ʿUmar consulted the Muhajirun and the Ansar, and their opinions diverged.
Some said,
“You have come for a purpose; do not turn back from it.”
Others said,
“We do not think you should advance, taking the foremost Companions of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ into the midst of this plague.”
It is related that ʿUmar then ordered the people to return the next morning (1).

Abu ʿUbaydah remarked, “Are we fleeing from Allah’s decree (qadar)?”
ʿUmar replied, “Yes! We flee from Allah’s decree to Allah’s decree. Tell me: if you descended into a valley with two slopes, one fertile and the other barren, and you grazed your animals on the fertile side, would you not be grazing by Allah’s decree? And if you grazed on the barren side, would that not also be by Allah’s decree?” He then added, “If anyone but you had said that, O Abu ʿUbaydah!”

Ibn Ishaq said in his version—recorded in Sahih al-Bukhari (2)—that ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn ʿAwf had been away attending to some business. When he arrived he said, “I possess knowledge on this matter. I heard the Messenger of Allah ﷺ say:

‘If you hear of it (the plague) in a land, do not enter it; and if it falls upon a land while you are in it, do not leave it, fleeing from it.’”

ʿUmar praised Allah—because his decision agreed with the prophetic instruction—and returned with the people.

Imam Ahmad (3) narrated: Wakiʿ told us, Sufyan told us, from Habib (4) ibn Abi Thabit, from Ibrahim ibn Saʿd, from Saʿd ibn Malik ibn Abi Waqqas, Khuzaymah ibn Thabit, and Usamah ibn Zayd, who said that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said:

“This plague is a punishment (rajz) and a remnant of the chastisement with which peoples before you were afflicted. If it breaks out in a land where you are present (5), do not leave it fleeing from it; and if you hear of it in a land, do not enter it.”

Imam Ahmad (6) also related the same report through Saʿid ibn al-Musayyib and Yahya ibn Saʿd (7), from Saʿd ibn Abi Waqqas.

Sayf ibn ʿUmar (8) stated that the plague appeared in Syria during Muharram of this year and then subsided. Sayf seems to have regarded this outbreak as the Plague of ʿAmwas, in which many commanders and notable Muslims perished. This, however, is not correct; the Plague of ʿAmwas belongs to the following year, as we shall explain, if Allah wills.

Sayf ibn ʿUmar further related that the Commander of the Faithful, ʿUmar, had resolved to tour the provinces, visit the governors, and inspect