He asked, “Why have you sprouted?”
She replied, “I have sprouted for the ruin of this Mosque.”

Solomon said, “God would never allow it to be ruined while I am alive. You yourself are the sign of my death and the destruction of Jerusalem’s Temple.” He therefore uprooted the tree and replanted it in one of his orchards (1).

He then entered the sanctuary, stood in prayer, and leaned upon his staff. There he died, while the devils remained unaware; they kept on working for him, fearing that he might come out and punish them. The jinn would gather around the sanctuary, which had small openings in its front and rear.

Any devil who looked directly at Solomon while he was in that chamber would be consumed by fire. One of them, wanting to prove his daring, would say, “Am I not bold if I can enter and come out on the other side?” So he would go in from one opening and emerge from the other.

On one occasion a devil entered and passed by—yet he heard no sound from Solomon. He returned, still hearing nothing. He went in a third time, stepped fully inside, and was not burned. There he saw Solomon, peace be upon him, lying dead. He rushed out and informed the people that Solomon had died.

They opened the chamber, brought him out, and found that his staff—called a minsaʾah in the Abyssinian tongue—had been eaten away by a termite. Unsure how long he had been dead, they placed a termite on the staff and it consumed in one day and one night what was left. By calculating proportionally, they concluded that he had died a year earlier.

This agrees with Ibn Masʿūd’s recitation:

“Thus they continued to toil for him after his death for a full year” (2).

People then realized that the jinn had been lying; had they possessed knowledge of the unseen, they would have known of Solomon’s death, and they would not have remained a whole year in that humiliating labor. This is what God, Exalted is He, means by His words:

‘Nothing disclosed his death to them except a creature of the earth that gnawed away his staff; and when he fell down the jinn realized that, had they known the unseen, they would not have remained in the degrading torment.’ (Q 34:14)

That is to say, their true condition became evident to the people: the jinn had been deceiving them.

The devils then said to the termite, “If you ate food, we would bring you the finest food; if you drank, we would give you the finest drink. As it is, we shall keep bringing you water and clay.” So they convey those things to it wherever it may be. He added, “Have you not seen the clay that forms inside pieces of wood? That is what the devils bring it in gratitude” (3).

These are Israelite reports (isrāʾīliyyāt) that are neither affirmed nor denied.

Abū Dāwūd said in his Book of Predestination (4): ʿUthmān ibn Abī Shaybah related to us—Qabīṣah—from Sufyān—from al-Aʿmash—from Khaythamah, who said: Solomon son of David, peace be upon him, said to the Angel of Death, “When you intend to take my soul, inform me.” He replied, “I know no more about that than you; scrolls are handed to me containing the names of those who are to die.”

Aṣbagh ibn al-Faraj and ʿAbd Allāh ibn Wahb transmitted—on the authority of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd ibn Aslam—that Solomon said to the Angel of Death, “When you receive the order concerning me, inform me.” The angel later came and said, “O Solomon, the decree has been issued regarding you; only a brief moment remains.” So he called