As Abū Umāma al-Bāhilī said:

“Lands were indeed conquered by men whose horses’ halters were made of palm fiber and whose stirrups were made of sinew.”(1) Al-Bukhārī narrated it(2).

The report of Ammār is among the fabricated reports. Likewise, the report of Suwayd ibn Ghafala is not traced back to the Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace.

As for the report concerning the garment he purchased, it is well known, and the report of Dirār ibn Damra has been narrated. Neither contains anything indicating that he was more ascetic than Abū Bakr and Umar. Rather, anyone familiar with the transmitted accounts of Umar’s life—his justice and asceticism, his keeping offices of authority away from his relatives, his assigning his son a lower stipend than his counterpart and his daughter a lower stipend than her counterpart, and his eating coarse fare even though he himself distributed the treasures of Khosrow and Caesar—as well as the fact that the wealth Alī(3) distributed was merely part of the proceeds of Umar’s conquests, and that Umar died owing eighty thousand dirhams, will find it clear in many respects that Umar was more ascetic than Alī. There is no doubt that Abū Bakr was more ascetic than Umar(4).

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The Rāfidī said(5): “In sum, no one ever matched him in asceticism, nor had he been preceded