2652 – ʿAlī ibn ʿUmar informed us; Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar al-Muqriʾ narrated to us; he said: Aḥmad ibn Saʿīd narrated to us; he said: al-Qāsim ibn al-Ḥakam narrated to us; he said: Abū Ḥamzah Thābit ibn Abī Ṣafiyyah, from Sālim ibn Abī al-Jaʿd, from Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥanafiyyah, who said:

When ʿUthmān was killed, ʿAlī went into hiding in a house belonging to Abū ʿUmar ibn Miḥṣan al-Anṣārī. The people gathered, entered the house, and crowded in on his hand to pledge their allegiance to him, thronging the way parched camels jostle around a watering place. They said, “We want to pledge our loyalty to you.” He replied, “I have no need of that; go to Ṭalḥah and al-Zubayr.”

They said, “Then come with us.” Abū Arwā al-Sadūsī said to me, “I am relating only what my own eyes saw and my own ears heard.” ʿAlī came out—and I was with him—in the company of a group of people until we reached Ṭalḥah ibn ʿUbayd Allāh. ʿAlī said to him, “The people have assembled to pledge allegiance to me, yet I have no need of their pledge. Stretch out your hand so that I may pledge allegiance to you on the Book of Allah and the sunnah of His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him).”

Ṭalḥah replied, “You are worthier and more entitled to it than I—because of your precedence and your kinship—and those who deserted me have now gathered around you.” ʿAlī said, “I fear you might break my pledge and betray me.” Ṭalḥah said, “Do not fear that. By Allah, you will never see anything from my side that you would dislike.” ʿAlī said, “Swear by Allah that you stand surety for that.” Ṭalḥah answered, “By Allah, I stand surety for it.”

Then ʿAlī went to al-Zubayr ibn al-ʿAwwām—and we were with him—and spoke to him in the same way he had spoken to Ṭalḥah, and al-Zubayr gave him the very same reply that Ṭalḥah ⦗1466⦘ had given. Ṭalḥah, however, had already taken some of ʿUthmān’s she-camels and the keys to the Treasury; people had gathered around him intending to pledge allegiance to him, but they had not yet done so. Riders carried news of this to ʿĀʾishah while she was at Sarif, and she said, “It is as though I can see his finger pledging in haste and deception!”

Sālim said: Ibn al-Ḥanafiyyah also said: When the people converged upon ʿAlī they told him, “This man has been slain, the community must have an imam, and we find no one more entitled to this matter than you—no one whose precedence is earlier or whose kinship to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) is closer.” He said, “Do not do this, for I would be a better adviser to you than I would be a ruler over you.” They said, “By Allah, we will never desist until we give you our pledge,” and they crowded in on his hand. When he saw that, he said, “My pledge may not be taken in private; it must be in the mosque, openly.” He ordered a herald, who proclaimed, “To the mosque, to the mosque!”

He went out and the people went out with him. He ascended the pulpit, praised Allah and extolled Him, and then said:

“There is truth and there is falsehood, and each has its followers. If falsehood has become abundant, it has only grown through what has been done; and if truth has diminished—yet time and again something retreats only to return. If your affair were restored to you, you would indeed be fortunate. I fear, however, that you may be living in an interval, and my duty is only to exert my utmost.

“The two men have led the way, and the third has stood for three; and there are two with whom there is no sixth: an angel who is near, one with whom Allah took a covenant, a truthful devotee who was saved, a striving diligent worker, and a seeker hoping to follow the track of the sixth. Ruined is the one who makes a false claim, and frustrated is the one who fabricates lies.

“The right and the left are paths of misguidance; the middle way is the straight roadway—one treads it in accordance with what is in the Book and the traces of Prophethood. Allah has disciplined this community with the whip and the sword; for neither of them do we show leniency to anyone. So conceal your private faults, repair the relations between yourselves, and deal in truth with one another. Whoever bares his neck in stubborn defiance of the truth will perish—yet repentance lies before you. I say these words of mine and ask Allah’s forgiveness for me and for you.”

That was the first sermon he delivered after he was invested with the caliphate.