127 – ʿAbdullāh narrated to us, saying: Fudayl ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb narrated to us; he said: Muḥammad ibn Yazīd narrated to us, from Juwaybir, who said: Abū Dāwūd narrated to me that he heard Ibn ʿAbbās, regarding the Almighty’s words, “When they perceived it as a cloud advancing toward their valleys…” (al-Aḥqāf 24). They said, “It is a cloud bringing us rain.” Hud, peace be upon him, replied, “No; it is what you were impatient for—a wind wherein is a painful chastisement.”

When they saw whatever was outside their encampments and livestock lifted between heaven and earth like feathers, they hurried into their houses and bolted their doors. The wind came, forced their doors open, and drove sand against them, so that they lay buried beneath it for seven nights and eight days, continuously, while all that could be heard from them was a faint groaning. Then He commanded the wind, so it cleared the sand away from them; He then commanded it again, and it cast them into the sea. This is the meaning of His saying, Exalted is He: “And thus they became such that nothing could be seen except their dwellings” (al-Aḥqāf 25).