say: “This religion will continue to stand firm until there are twelve caliphs.” (1)

In another wording: “This community will remain upright in its affairs, plainly victorious over its enemy, until twelve caliphs have passed among them, all of them from Quraysh.” They asked, “What will come after that?” He answered, “Then there will be rampant killing (harj).” (2)

These caliphs promised in this ḥadith are not the twelve about whom the Rāfiḍah claim their fabrications and slanders—namely, that they are infallible—for most of those individuals never administered any affair of this ummah as caliphs, not even a single province or town. Only ʿAlī and his son al-Ḥasan—may Allah be pleased with them—ever ruled.

Nor are the twelve intended here those whose rule followed consecutively up to the middle of the Umayyad state, because the ḥadith of Safīnah, “The caliphate after me will last thirty years” (3), rules out that line of interpretation, even though al-Bayhaqī preferred it. We have examined the issue with him in the volume Dalāʾil al-Nubuwwah of this work, making repetition unnecessary—praise be to Allah.

Rather, among these twelve leaders are found the four rightly guided imams—Abū Bakr, then ʿUmar, then ʿUthmān, then ʿAlī—and also his son al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī; included as well is ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, according to many scholars and the majority of the ummah, praise be to Allah. A group of them also emerged from the ʿAbbāsid line, and the remainder will appear in the future, until the Mahdī foretold in the relevant reports rises among them, as will be explained later—Allah’s help is sought and on Him we rely. More than one authority has explicitly stated what we have just said, as we have already detailed.

The ḥadith of ʿUbādah concerning what will occur after one hundred years:

Aḥmad said: al-Ḥakam ibn Nāfiʿ narrated to us; Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAyyāsh narrated to us, from Yazīd ibn Saʿīd, from Abū ʿAṭāʾ Yazīd ibn ʿAṭāʾ al-Saksakī, from Muʿādh ibn Saʿd al-Saksakī (4), from Junādah ibn Abī Umayyah, who said that he heard ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit mention that a man came to the Prophet ﷺ and said, “O Messenger of Allah, how long will your ummah enjoy prosperity?” He did not answer him, and the man repeated the question three times, receiving no reply each time; then the man departed.

After that the Prophet ﷺ said, “Where is the questioner?” They brought him back, and he said, “You asked me about something [that none of my ummah has ever asked me]; the span of my ummah’s prosperity is one hundred years.” He said it twice or thrice.

The man asked, “O Messenger of Allah, is there any sign, mark, or portent of that?” He replied, “Yes: the earth’s swallowing (khasf), the quaking (rajf), and the dispatching of devils that drive people on.” (5)

In the Musnad of Abū Yaʿlā and in that of al-Bazzār there is also a report narrated by Muṣʿab ibn Muṣʿab—I know it only from al-Zuhrī—on the authority of Abū Salamah ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf, from his father, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, “The adornment of this world will be lifted…”