and let him discharge the trust with which he has been entrusted. Beware lest your inclination lean toward anything other than the truth, for nothing is hidden from Allah. Never seek to evade Him, for there is no refuge from Allah except in Him.
[He wrote many similar admonitions to the governors. Al-Bukhari says in his Sahih (1): ʿUmar wrote to ʿAdi ibn ʿAdi, “Faith has obligatory duties, regulations, limits, and sunnahs. Whoever completes them has perfected faith, and whoever fails to complete them has not perfected faith. If I remain alive, I shall set them out for you so that you may act upon them; but if I die, then I feel no great concern about your company.”] (2)
[In this same year the Abbasid daʿwah began.]
Muhammad ibn ʿAli ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn al-ʿAbbas—who was living in the district of al-Sharaʾ (3)—sent a man called Maysarah to Iraq, and he dispatched another group—Muhammad ibn Khunays, Abu ʿIkramah al-Sarraj (who is Abu Muhammad (4) al-Sadiq), and Hayyan the perfumer, the maternal uncle of Ibrahim ibn Salamah—to Khurasan, which at that time was governed by al-Jarrah ibn ʿAbd Allah al-Hakami before his dismissal in Ramadan. He ordered them to call people to him and to his Household. They met those they could reach, then returned with letters from those who had responded. The letters were delivered to Maysarah in Iraq, who forwarded them to Muhammad ibn ʿAli. Muhammad rejoiced and took heart, viewing this as the first stirrings of a cause whose completion Allah had decreed and the first plan whose conclusion Allah had secured. The Umayyad state now bore unmistakable signs of weakness and decline, especially after the death of ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAziz, as will be detailed.
Abu Muhammad al-Sadiq selected for Muhammad ibn ʿAli twelve captains (nuqabāʾ):
- Sulayman ibn Kathir al-Khuzaʿi, 2) Walahiz ibn Qurayz al-Tamimi, 3) Qaḥṭabah ibn Shabib al-Taʾi, 4) Musa ibn Kaʿb al-Tamimi, 5) Khalid ibn Ibrahim—Abu Dawud—of the clan of ʿAmr ibn Shayban ibn Dhuhl, 6) al-Qasim ibn Mujashiʿ al-Tamimi, 7) ʿImran ibn Ismaʿil—Abu al-Nujm, a client of the family of Abu Muʿayṭ, 8) Malik ibn al-Haytham al-Khuzaʿi, 9) Talhah ibn Zurayq al-Khuzaʿi, 10) ʿAmr ibn Aʿyan—Abu Hamzah, a client of Khuzaʿah, 11) Shibl ibn Tahman—Abu ʿAli al-Harawi, a client of Banu Hanifah, and 12) ʿIsa ibn Aʿyan, also a client of Khuzaʿah. He chose seventy other men as well, and Muhammad ibn ʿAli wrote them a document to serve as a model and guide for them to follow (5).
That year the pilgrimage was led on behalf of the people by Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn ʿAmr ibn Hazm, the deputy governor of Medina. The provincial deputies remained those listed for the preceding year, except for the officials we have mentioned as having been dismissed and replaced—Allah knows best. The Caliph himself did not perform the Hajj.