his wife Fākhitah bint Farzah on a sweltering summer day; he sat up saying, “Indeed we belong to Allah and to Him we shall return,” and began to weep. Fākhitah said, “Only yesterday you were assailing him, and today you are weeping for him!” He answered, “Shame on you! I am weeping for what people have lost of his forbearance, knowledge, nobility, precedence, and goodness.

Ibn Abī al-Dunyā relates—in the book Makāʾid al-Shayṭān (1)—that a man from Syria (2), one of Muʿāwiyah’s commanders [and his companions], once became angry with his son at night and expelled him from the house. The boy went out not knowing where to go, sat outside the door, and fell asleep for a while. When he awoke, he saw a wild black tomcat scratching at the door. The household cat came out, and the wild cat said to him, “Woe to you! Open up.” The domestic cat replied, “I cannot.” The wild one said, “Woe to you! Bring me something to sustain myself, for I am hungry and exhausted. I have just arrived from Kūfah, and tonight a tremendous event has occurred: ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib has been killed.” The house-cat replied, “By Allah, nothing here is free of food over which the name of Allah has been mentioned, except for a spit on which they used to roast meat.” “Bring it to me,” said the wild cat. So he brought it, and the wild cat kept licking it until he had taken what he needed and then went away— all of this within the boy’s sight and hearing.

The boy rose and knocked at the door. His father came out and asked, “Who is it?” He said, “Open up.” The father replied, “Woe to you, what is the matter?” The boy insisted, “Open.” When he had opened the door, the son told him what he had seen. The father said, “Woe to you, was that a dream?” “No, by Allah,” he replied. “Woe to you—have you gone mad in my absence?” The boy answered, “By Allah, what I have told you is just as it happened. Go now to Muʿāwiyah and use what I have told you to your advantage.” The man went, asked leave to see Muʿāwiyah, and informed him of what his son had said. They dated the report before the couriers (al-burud) arrived; when the dispatches came, they found them in complete accord with what the boy’s father had related. This is a summary of the account.

Abū al-Qāsim said: Ḥaddathanā ʿAlī ibn al-Jaʿd; ḥaddathanā Zuhayr ibn Muʿāwiyah, from Abū Isḥāq, from ʿAmr ibn al-Aṣamm, who said: I said to al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī, “These shīʿah claim that ʿAlī will be sent back before the Day of Resurrection.” He replied, “By Allah, they have lied; such people are not the shīʿah. Had we believed that he would return, we would not have married off his widows nor divided his estate.” Asbāṭ ibn Muḥammad also transmitted it from Muṭarrif, from Isḥāq, from ʿAmr ibn al-Aṣamm, from al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī in similar words. Allah, exalted is He, knows best (3).