His History

(1) After tracing the chains of these reports, he concluded: “Whoever wishes to investigate the matter should consult his book al-Tārīkh. Allah is the One who guides to what is correct.”

Al-Tirmidhī and al-Nasā’ī have likewise transmitted—(2) through the route of Shuʿbah—from ʿAmr ibn Murrah, from Ṭalḥah ibn Yazīd (3), from Zayd ibn Arqam, who said: “The first person to embrace Islam was ʿAli.” Al-Tirmidhī remarked, “Ḥasan, ṣaḥīḥ.”

ʿAli kept company with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ throughout the Prophet’s stay in Mecca. He lived with him in the same house (4) and remained under his care while his father, Abū Ṭālib, was still alive, for poverty had overtaken his father, who had many dependents. He continued under the Prophet’s support until the time of the Hijrah. The Messenger of Allah ﷺ left him behind to return the people’s trusts that were in his keeping, for he was known among his folk as al-Amīn, “the Trustworthy”; they would therefore deposit with him their money and precious belongings. ʿAli later emigrated after the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and accompanied (5) the Prophet until the latter passed away, pleased with him. He was present at all the Prophet’s campaigns and distinguished himself with honorable feats before him on the battlefields—as we have detailed in the Sīrah, making repetition here unnecessary—on the days of Badr, Uḥud, al-Aḥzāb, and others, as well as at Khaybar. When the Prophet appointed him in the year of Tabūk as deputy over his family in Madinah, he said to him,

“Are you not pleased that you stand in relation to me as Hārūn stood to Mūsā, except that there is no prophet after me?” (6)

We have already mentioned his marriage to Fāṭimah, the daughter of the Messenger of Allah, and his consummation of that marriage after the Battle of Badr, so there is no need to repeat it here.

When the Prophet ﷺ returned from the Farewell Pilgrimage, he halted between Mecca and Madinah at a place called Ghadīr Khumm. On the twelfth of Dhū al-Ḥijjah he addressed the people, saying in his sermon:

“Whoever regards me as his mawla, ʿAli is his mawla.” (7)

In some narrations he added: “O Allah, befriend whoever befriends him, show enmity to whoever shows enmity to him, grant victory to whoever supports him, and forsake whoever forsakes him.” The wording that is soundly preserved is the first one. The reason for this sermon and for highlighting ʿAli’s virtue was, as Ibn Isḥāq relates, that when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ sent ʿAli to Yemen as commander alongside Khālid ibn al-Walīd, ʿAli returned and met the Prophet in Mecca during the Farewell Pilgrimage. By then much talk had arisen about him (8); some of those who had been with him complained because he had reclaimed from them certain garments that his deputy had distributed when he hastened ahead to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. Once the Prophet had completed the rites of the Farewell Pilgrimage, he wished to clear ʿAli’s name of the baseless remarks attributed to him. The Rāfiḍah have taken that day as a festival, so they beat drums