Muṣʿab ibn Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ (1): a tābiʿī (Successor), reliable, eminent, and of great stature.

Mūsā ibn Ṭalḥah ibn ʿUbayd Allāh al-Taymī (2), nicknamed al-Mahdī because of his righteousness, was likewise a venerable tābiʿī of high standing and one of the leaders of the Muslims—may Allah have mercy on him (3).

[Then the year 104 AH began.]

In this year Saʿīd ibn ʿAmr al-Ḥarashī, the deputy governor of Khurāsān, fought the people of Soghd, besieged the inhabitants of Khujanda (4), killed a great many of them, seized enormous wealth, and captured a very large number of slaves. He reported all of this to Yazīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malik, the Commander of the Faithful. ʿUmar ibn Hubayra, the governor of Iraq, took offense because the report had not been sent to him, so he wrote to the Commander of the Faithful himself, since he had been the one who had appointed Saʿīd.

In Rabīʿ al-Awwal of that same year, the Commander of the Faithful Yazīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malik dismissed ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Ḍaḥḥāk ibn Qays from the governorship of the Two Sanctuaries. The reason was that he had proposed marriage to Fāṭimah bint al-Ḥusayn, but she refused; he then persisted and threatened her. She complained to Yazīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malik, who thereupon dispatched ʿAbd al-Wāḥid ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Naṣrī (5), the deputy governor of al-Ṭāʾif, appointing him over Madinah and instructing him to beat ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Ḍaḥḥāk so severely that the Commander of the Faithful, reclining on his couch in Damascus, could hear his screams, and to exact from him forty thousand dinars. When ʿAbd al-Raḥmān learned of this, he rode to Damascus and sought the protection of Maslamah ibn ʿAbd al-Malik.

He went in to his brother and said, “I have a request of you.” He replied, “Every request you make is granted—unless it concerns Ibn al-Ḍaḥḥāk.” He said, “By Allah, that is precisely my request.” He answered, “By Allah, I will neither receive him (6) nor pardon him.”