does not make fighting permissible, even though the hadith states that ʿAmmār will be killed (1) by the transgressing faction. It may be (2) that the faction which directly killed him—A, N, S, W, H: “The faction is the one that directly killed him.” 1 - [they are the transgressors] (3)—because they fought without any need to fight, or for some other reason. That faction may not have been transgressing before the fighting; but when the two factions fought one another, they both transgressed, and it was then that the transgressing faction killed ʿAmmār. Thus, the hadith contains nothing to indicate that we had transgressed before the fighting. When we did transgress, ʿAlī’s army was divided and did not fight us. Hence ʿĀ’ishah—may Allah be pleased with her—said, “The people abandoned acting upon this verse.”

As for his statement, “Muʿāwiyah killed a large number of the finest Companions,” the response is that those killed [were killed] (4) from both parties: members of this side killed members of that side, and members of that side killed members of this side. Most of those in both parties who favored fighting obeyed neither ʿAlī nor Muʿāwiyah. ʿAlī and Muʿāwiyah—may Allah be pleased with them both—were more intent on preventing bloodshed than most of the combatants, but they were overwhelmed by events. Once civil strife erupts, wise men (5) are unable to extinguish its fire. Both armies contained men such as al-Ashtar al-Nakhaʿī, Hāshim ibn ʿUtbah [al-Mirqāl] (6), ʿAbd al-Rahmān ibn Khālid ibn al-Walīd, Abū al-Aʿwar al-Sulamī, and others like them who incited fighting: some championed ʿUthmān