Bishr ibn Marwan (1), an Umayyad and the brother of ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Marwan, was appointed by his brother as governor of the Two Iraqs. He owned a residence in Damascus near ʿAqabat al-Kattan (2). Bishr was famed for his liberality and generosity, and the monastery known as Dayr Marwan (3) by Hujayrah is attributed to him.
He was the one who slew Khalid ibn Ḥuṣayn al-Kilabi on the day of Marj Rahit. He kept no doors closed before him, saying, “Only women keep themselves hidden.” Affable of face, he would reward poets with thousands, and both al-Farazdaq and al-Akhtal composed panegyrics in his honor.
The Jahmiyyah attempt to prove that istiwaʾ over the Throne means “dominion” by citing al-Akhtal’s couplet:
qad istawā Bishrun ʿalā l-ʿIrāqi, / min ghayri sayfin wa-damin muhraqī
(“Bishr has gained mastery over Iraq / without sword or blood being spilled.”)
Yet the verse offers no proof; the argument is invalid on many grounds, and al-Akhtal himself was a Christian.
The cause of Bishr’s death was an ulcer that appeared in his right arm (4). He was advised to have the limb amputated at the joint, but he recoiled. Before he realized it, the infection reached his shoulder; by morning it had spread to his torso, and he died.
As death approached he wept, saying, “By Allah, I wish I had been a slave herding sheep in the desert for some Bedouin and had never held the office I held.” When these words were reported to Abu Hazim—some said to Saʿid ibn al-Musabbih—he remarked, “Praise be to Allah who makes them, at the moment of death, flee to us, and does not make us flee to them. We surely behold in them lessons.”
Al-Hasan said, “I entered and found him writhing upon his bed; then he descended to the courtyard while the physicians stood around him.”
He died in Basrah this year, the first governor ever to die there. When word reached ʿAbd al-Malik he grieved and ordered the poets to compose elegies for him. Allah, glorified and exalted, knows best (5).
Then came the year 75 AH (6). In that year Muḥammad ibn Marwan—the brother of ʿAbd al-Malik and father of Marwan al-Ḥimār—led the summer expedition against the Byzantines when they had advanced from the region of Marʿash.