347 – ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us; he said: Abū Kurayb narrated to us; he said: Muḥammad ibn Fuḍayl narrated to us, from Dāwūd ibn Abī Hind, from Abū al-Munīb al-Ḥimṣī, from Abū al-ʿAṭāʾ al-Yaḥbūrī, who said:

ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit said to me, “Abū ʿAṭāʾ, what will your condition be when your Qurʾān reciters and scholars are forced to flee—so far that they end up on mountain-tops living among the wild beasts?”

I replied, “Glory be to Allah! Why would they do that, Abū Muḥammad?”

He answered, “They will fear being killed.”

I said, “Even though the Book of Allah is still among us?”

He exclaimed, “May your mother be bereaved of you, Abū ʿAṭāʾ! Did the Jews not inherit the Torah and yet stray from it? Did the Christians not inherit the Gospel and yet deviate from it and abandon it? These are recurring patterns, each following the other, and by Allah, whatever took place among those before you will surely appear among you.”

He (the narrator) continued, “I met him two days later and said, ‘Among the communities like ours before us there were people who were turned into apes and swine.’ He replied, ‘So-and-so has related to me that the days and nights will not come to an end before a group from this ummah is likewise transformed.’”