Some jurists have attributed this statement to al-ʿAbbās ibn ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, yet the sound view is that it goes back to ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib himself, for he was the one who re-excavated the well of Zamzam, as noted earlier—Allah knows best.

Al-Umawī relates in his Maghāzī: “Abū ʿUbayd narrated to us; Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd told me, from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Ḥarmalah: I heard Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyib report that when ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib ibn Hāshim reopened Zamzam he declared: ‘I do not permit its water for bathing; it is lawful and satisfying only for the drinker (ḥillun wa billun).’ He had set up two troughs—one for drinking and one for ablution—whereupon he said, ‘I do not allow it for bathing,’ so as to preserve the sanctity of the Mosque and prevent people from washing themselves in it.

Abū ʿUbayd added: al-Aṣmaʿī said that the phrase ‘billun’ here is an instance of ittibāʿ (the pairing of near-synonyms). Abū ʿUbayd further remarked: ‘Ittibāʿ is normally expressed without the conjunction wāw; however, Muʿtamir ibn Sulaymān explained that bill, in the Himyarite dialect, means “permitted.”’

He then said: ‘Abū Bakr ibn ʿAyyāsh narrated to us, from ʿĀṣim ibn Abī al-Nujūd, that he heard Zirr (ibn Ḥubaysh) say that he heard al-ʿAbbās declare: “I do not permit its water for bathing; it is lawful and satisfying only for the drinker.” ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī likewise told us—Sufyān from ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAlqamah—that he heard Ibn ʿAbbās say the same thing.’ Both chains are sound. It seems that al-ʿAbbās and Ibn ʿAbbās were simply transmitting and publicizing the condition laid down by ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib when he re-dug the well; thus this does not contradict what was mentioned earlier. Allah knows best.

During his lifetime the responsibility for watering the pilgrims (siqāyah) belonged to ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib; after him it passed for a time to his son Abū Ṭālib. One year Abū Ṭālib fell into hardship, so he borrowed ten thousand (dirhams) from his brother al-ʿAbbās, to be repaid by the next pilgrimage season, and spent the sum that year on the siqāyah. When the following year arrived Abū Ṭālib had nothing, so he said to al-ʿAbbās, ‘Advance me fourteen thousand more until next year and I will repay your entire debt.’ Al-ʿAbbās replied, ‘On condition that if you fail to pay, you relinquish the siqāyah to me and I will take charge of it.’ Abū Ṭālib agreed, but when the year came round he still had no means to reimburse al-ʿAbbās, so he ceded the siqāyah to him.

Thereafter it remained with al-ʿAbbās, then with his son ʿAbd Allāh, after him with ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-ʿAbbās, then with Dāwūd ibn ʿAlī, followed by Sulaymān ibn ʿAlī, then ʿĪsā ibn ʿAlī, until the caliph al-Manṣūr assumed control of it and appointed his freedman Abū Razīn to oversee it. Al-Umawī is the source for this account.

The Vow of ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib to Sacrifice One of His Sons (4)

Ibn Isḥāq said: According to what they allege, when ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib suffered what he suffered at the hands of Quraysh, he vowed