And he went on feeding its people
with the meat of fleet young camels and full-grown beasts;
he gave them to drink clarified honey,
and a thin gruel brewed from barley.

The Elephant—its army was destroyed,
pelted there with stones;
sovereignty is in the farthest reaches of the earth,
among the foreigners and the Khuzayr.

So listen when you are told, and understand
how all affairs come to their end.

Ibn Isḥāq said:

Tubbaʿ then set out for Yemen with the soldiers who were with him and with the two rabbis. When he entered Yemen he invited his people to embrace what he himself had embraced, but they refused and insisted that the matter be referred for judgment to the Fire that existed in Yemen.

Ibn Isḥāq said:

Abū Mālik ibn Thaʿlaba ibn Abī Mālik al-Quraẓī told me—he said: I heard Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad ibn Ṭalḥa ibn ʿUbayd Allāh relate—that when Tubbaʿ drew near Yemen intending to enter it, the Himyarites interposed themselves and said, “You shall not enter against us now that you have abandoned our religion.” He invited them to his faith, saying, “It is better than your faith.” They replied, “Shall we not bring the matter before the Fire?” He said, “Yes.”

There was, so the people of Yemen claim, a Fire that judged between them in their disputes: it consumed the wrong-doer but did no harm to the innocent. So his people came out with their idols and everything by which they sought nearness in their religion, while the two rabbis came out with their scriptures hanging from their necks. They sat down in front of the place from which the Fire emerged. The Fire came out toward them; when it advanced, the men of Himyar sidestepped it in fear. Those present reproached them and ordered them to stand firm, so they did until the Fire reached them. It consumed the idols, the offerings, and the men of Himyar who were bearing them, while the two rabbis emerged with their scriptures still hanging from their necks, the sweat streaming down their faces—the Fire had not harmed them.