had turned back once they heard of the death of Bishr ibn Marwān, as mentioned earlier—I shall spill his blood and seize his wealth; then I will enter his house and do no more than that.
It is related that when al-Ḥajjāj mounted the pulpit and the people gathered beneath him, he kept silent for so long that Muḥammad ibn ʿUmayr scooped up a handful of pebbles, intending to pelt him, saying, “May Allah disfigure him—how slow and tongue-tied he is!” But when al-Ḥajjāj finally rose and spoke as he did, the pebbles slipped from Muḥammad’s hand without his even noticing, so struck was he by the man’s eloquence and fluency.
It is also said that in this same sermon he declared, “May faces be disgraced! Allah has set forth the parable of
‘a town that was secure and at ease; its provision came to it freely from every place, yet it denied the favors of Allah, so Allah made it taste the garment of hunger and fear because of what they used to do’ (Qur’an, 16:112).
You are that very town—so straighten up and stand firm. By Allah, I shall make you taste humiliation until you abandon your ways; I shall twist you as the salmah branch is twisted (1) until you submit. I swear by Allah that you will embrace justice and give up rumor-mongering—the endless ‘he said, she said,’ ‘So-and-so told me about So-and-so,’ ‘the report and what report’—otherwise I will hew you with the sword, a hewing that will leave women widowed and children orphaned, until you traverse the barren summāhā plain (2) and quit its abyss.” This was part of a long, powerful, and startling address filled with severe threats [there was in it no promise of good].
On the third day he heard a takbīr (the cry “Allāhu akbar”) in the marketplace. He went out, sat on the pulpit, and said, “People of Iraq—people of schism and hypocrisy and vile manners! I have heard a takbīr in the markets that is not meant to encourage but to terrify. I know (3) the storm whose underside crackles with thunder. O sons of cowards, slaves of the staff, offspring of bondwomen and widows, let every one of you steady himself upon his side, guard his blood, and watch where he sets his foot. I swear by Allah, I am on the verge of striking you a blow that will serve as a deterrent to what came before it and a lesson to what comes after it.”
ʿUmayr ibn Ḍābiʿ al-Tamīmī, of the clan of Ḥanẓala, then rose and said, “May Allah set the governor aright. We are part of this expedition, yet I am an old, ailing man; this son of mine is younger and stronger.”
Al-Ḥajjāj asked, “And who are you?” He replied, “ʿUmayr ibn Ḍābiʿ al-Tamīmī.”
Al-Ḥajjāj said, “Did you hear what we said yesterday?”
“Yes,” he answered.
Al-Ḥajjāj said, “Are you not the one who attacked ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān?”
“Yes, indeed.”
“What drove you to do that?”
“He had imprisoned my father, who was an old man.”
Al-Ḥajjāj said, “Is he not the one who recites:
‘I resolved, yet did not act; I very nearly did—would that I had!
Had I acted, I would have left their wives weeping, widowed.’ (4)"