al-Bakkaʾī (1) narrated to us; Muhammad ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn Sulaymān al-Ḥaḍramī (2) narrated to us; Yaḥyā ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd al-Ḥimmanī (3) narrated to us; Khālid ibn ʿUbayd Allah narrated to us, from ʿAṭāʾ ibn al-Sāʾib, from Maysarah, who said that Abū Juḥayfah reported:

ʿAlī said: “When we had finished with the Ḥarūriyyah (4), there was among them a man whose upper arm contained no bone; his arm was like the nipple of a breast, with several long, curled hairs growing on it. Search for him.” They could not find him, and I never saw ʿAlī more distressed than he was that day.

They said, “Commander of the Believers, we cannot locate him.”

He asked, “Woe to you! What is the name of this place?”

They replied, “al-Nahrawān.”

He said, “You are mistaken—he is certainly among them.”

So we stirred (5) the slain but did not find him. We returned to ʿAlī and said, “Commander of the Believers, we still cannot find him.”

He asked again, “What is the name of this place?”

We answered, “al-Nahrawān.”

He said, “Allah and His Messenger have spoken the truth, and you have erred; he is definitely among them. Search for him.” We searched and finally discovered him in a waterway. We brought him, and I looked at his upper arm: it had no bone, and upon it was a nipple like that of a woman’s breast with several long, curled hairs (7).

Another chain

Imām Aḥmad (8) said: Abū Saʿīd, the client of Banū Hāshim, narrated to us; Ismāʿīl ibn Muslim al-ʿAbdī narrated to us; Abū Kathīr, the client of the Anṣār, narrated to us. He said:

I was with my master ʿAlī (ibn Abī Ṭālib) when he slew the people of al-Nahrawān, and the people felt uneasy about their killing. ʿAlī said:

“O people, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ informed us of a folk who will shoot out of the religion as an arrow passes clean through its target, and they will never return to it until the arrow returns to its string. The sign of this is that among them is a black man with a mutilated hand; one of his hands is like a woman’s breast, with a nipple like the nipple of a woman’s breast, around which are seven coarse hairs. Search for him, for I believe he is among them.”

They searched and found him on the riverbank beneath the dead. They brought him out, and ʿAlī exclaimed, “Allāhu akbar! Allah and His Messenger have spoken the truth!” The man had slung across him an Arab bow; ʿAlī took it in his hand and began prodding the mutilated part (9) with it, saying, “Allah and His Messenger have spoken the truth.” The people likewise exclaimed “Allāhu akbar!” when they saw him, rejoiced, and all the misgivings they had felt disappeared.

This report is unique to Aḥmad.