from within their own ranks. Khalid warned the Commander of the Faithful about them; when the caliph pressed him to name them he refused, so the caliph punished him severely, then sent him on to Yusuf ibn ʿUmar, who tortured him until he died the vilest and most wretched of deaths. This took place in Muharram of that same year—that is, 126 AH.
Qadi Ibn Khallikan mentions him in Wafayāt and says (1): “He was suspected in matters of faith; he even built a church for his mother inside his house, and some poets lampooned him for that” (2).
The author of al-Aʿyān states (3): “There were Jews in his lineage who later claimed Arab descent, and he was related to Shiqq and Satih.” Qadi Ibn Khallikan adds (4): “Those two were maternal cousins; each lived six hundred years and they were born on the same day—the very day when Tarifah bint al-Khayr died, after spitting into the mouth of each of them and declaring, ‘He will take my place in soothsaying.’ She then died that same day.”
Among those who passed away in this year were:
Jabalah ibn Suhaym (5);
Darraj Abu al-Samḥ (6);
Saʿid ibn Masrūq (7), according to one report; and
Sulaymān ibn Ḥabīb al-Maḥāribī, the judge of Damascus (8).
(1) Wafāyāt al-Aʿyān, vol. 2, p. 228.
(2) This refers to al-Farazdaq in the lines: “How shameful that the Merciful One appeared as a mount… he brought us gracefully from Damascus with Khalid! And how can he lead the people whose mother professes that God is not One? He established there an allegiance bearing a cross for his mother… and, out of animosity, demolished the mosque’s minaret.” See Wafāyāt al-Aʿyān, vol. 2, pp. 228–229; see also Dīwān al-Farazdaq, p. 26 (variant reading: “wa haddama min baġḍ al-ṣalāti al-masājid”).
(3) He is Ibn Khallikān, previously mentioned in Wafāyāt al-Aʿyān, vol. 2, p. 230.
(4) Wafāyāt al-Aʿyān, vol. 2, p. 230.
(5) His biography appears in al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr, vol. 2, p. 219; al-Jarḥ wa al-Taʿdīl, vol. 1, p. 136; Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ, vol. 5, p. 315.
(6) He is Ibn Simaʿān; his biography is in al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr, vol. 3, p. 256; al-Jarḥ wa al-Taʿdīl, vol. 3, p. 441; Mashhūr ʿUlamāʾ al-Amṣār, p. 189; Tahḏīb al-Kamāl, vol. 8, p. 477; Taqrīb al-Tahḏīb, p. 201.
(7) His biography is in al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr, vol. 3, p. 513; al-Jarḥ wa al-Taʿdīl, vol. 4, p. 66; Mashhūr ʿUlamāʾ al-Amṣār, p. 167.
(8) His biography is in al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr, vol. 4, p. 6; al-Jarḥ wa al-Taʿdīl, vol. 4, p. 105; Mashhūr ʿUlamāʾ al-Amṣār, p. 116; Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ, vol. 5, p. 309.