Age and death of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him)

Abu Uthman al-Nahdi said: Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred on the middle day of the Days of Tashriq.

Al-Zubayr bin Bakkar said: Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred on a Friday, the 18th of Dhu al-Hijjah, in the year 36 AH, after Asr. He was eighty-two years old at the time, and he was fasting that day.

Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Aqil said: Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred in the year 35 AH.

Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Aqil said: Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred in the year 35 AH.

Qatadah said: When Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, he was ninety or eighty-eight years old.

Abu Bakr bin Abi Shaybah said: Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred in the year 35 AH.

Sayyiduna al-Miswar bin Makhramah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: The caliphate of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) lasted twelve years.

Yahya bin Bukayr said: The Shura (consultation) took place, and the people agreed upon Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) (for the caliphate) when three days remained of Dhu al-Hijjah in the year 23 AH. Then Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred on a Friday, when eighteen (18) days of Dhu al-Hijjah had passed, at the close of the year 35 AH. He was eighty-eight (88) years old, and he used to dye his beard yellow. The caliphate of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) lasted twelve years.

Qatadah said that when Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, he was ninety or eighty-eight years old.

Imam Malik said: When Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, his body lay for three days on the refuse heap of such-and-such a tribe. Then twelve men came to him, among them my grandfather Malik bin Abi Amir, Huwaytib bin Abd al-Uzza, Hakim bin Hizam, Abdullah bin al-Zubayr, and Aishah bint Uthman was also with them, carrying a lamp in a small box. They carried his body upon a door, and his head was knocking "tak tak" against the door (panel), until they brought him to al-Baqi'. Then they differed over leading his funeral prayer, so Hakim bin Hizam or Huwaytib bin Abd al-Uzza led his funeral prayer (Abd al-Rahman was in doubt about this). Then they intended to bury him, whereupon a man from Banu Mazin stood up and said: By Allah! If you bury him alongside the Muslims, I will inform the people of it. So they carried him and brought him to Hashsh Kawkab. When they lowered him into his grave, Aishah bint Uthman cried out, and Ibn al-Zubayr said to her: Be quiet! By Allah, if you do it again, I will strike the place where your eyes are. When they had buried him and levelled the earth over him, Ibn al-Zubayr said to her: Now cry out as much as you wish.
Imam Malik said: Before that, Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) used to pass by Hashsh Kawkab and say: A righteous man will surely be buried here.
Imam al-Tabarani (may Allah have mercy on him) said: "Al-Hashsh" means a garden.

Sahm bin Hubaysh, who was present at the killing of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him), said: When evening came upon us, I said: If you leave your companion ('s body) like this until morning, the people will mutilate him. So take him to Baqi' al-Gharqad. So we prepared a place (for the grave) for him in the middle of the night. Then we carried him, and a dark mass (a crowd of people) appeared behind us. We became afraid of them, until we were about to scatter, but a caller called out: Have no fear, stand firm; we have only come to take part in this burial with you. Ibn Hubaysh used to say: By Allah! They were the angels.

Abdullah bin Sa'id narrates from his father, who said: We were sitting with Sayyiduna Ali bin Abi Talib (may Allah be pleased with him), with Ammar bin Yasir on his right and Muhammad bin Abi Bakr on his left, when Ghurab bin so-and-so al-Saydani came and said: O Commander of the Believers! What do you say about Uthman? The two of them (Ammar and Muhammad) answered him before Ali could, saying: Whom are you asking about? About a man who disbelieved in Allah after his faith and became a hypocrite? The man said to the two of them: I am not asking you, nor have I come to you. Thereupon Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) said to him: "I do not say what these two have said." The two of them together said to him: Then why did we kill him? He said: "He was given authority over you, and he governed badly in his last days; and you grew impatient, and you were impatient in a wicked way. By Allah! I hope that Uthman and I will be as Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, has said: 'And We will remove whatever rancour is in their breasts; (they will be) brothers, on thrones facing one another' [al-Hijr: 47]."

Umayr bin Zawdi said: Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) addressed the people and said: "O people! By Allah, if none were to enter Hell except the one who killed Uthman, I would not enter it; and if none were to enter Paradise except the one who killed Uthman, I would not enter it." The narrator said: When he came down from the pulpit, it was said to him: You have said something by which your companions have split away from you. So he addressed them again and said: "O people! Listen, Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, killed Uthman and I am with him." Hammad said: And Habib bin al-Shahid narrated to us from Muhammad bin Sirin, who said: It is a Qurayshi expression that has two meanings. Abu al-Qasim (Imam al-Tabarani, may Allah have mercy on him) said: It is as if he meant that Allah Almighty caused him to be killed and I too will be killed along with him, may Allah be pleased with them both.

Umayr bin Zawdi said: Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) addressed them, and they interrupted his sermon, so he said: "I was only weakened on the day Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred." And he gave them a parable: the parable of three bulls and a lion who were together in a thicket: one black, one red and one white. Whenever the lion wanted one of them, they would all gather together against him and hold him off. So the lion said to the black and the red: This white (bull) is the one who disgraces us and makes us conspicuous in our thicket; hand him over to me so that I may eat him, and then your colour will be like my colour and my colour like your colour. So the lion attacked him and before long killed him. Then he said to the black: This red (bull) is the one who disgraces us and makes us conspicuous in the thicket; leave him to me so that I may eat him, and then my colour will be like your colour and your colour like my colour. So he attacked him and killed him. Then he said to the black: Now I will eat you. He said: Let me call out three times. Then he said: Beware! I was eaten on the day the white one was eaten. Beware! I was eaten on the day the white one was eaten. Beware! I was eaten on the day the white one was eaten. Beware! I was only weakened on the day Uthman was killed."

Al-Sha'bi said: Masruq met al-Ashtar, and Masruq said to al-Ashtar: "Did you kill Uthman?" He said: Yes. Masruq said: "Listen, by Allah! You killed him while he was one who fasted much and stood much in prayer." The narrator said: Al-Ashtar went and informed Sayyiduna Ammar (may Allah be pleased with him), so Ammar came to Masruq and said: By Allah! Ammar was to be flogged, Abu Dharr was to be exiled, and the hima (reserved pasture) was to be guarded, and you say that we killed him while he fasted much and prayed much! Masruq said to him: "By Allah! You did neither of two things: you did not punish with the like of what you were punished with, nor did you show patience, though patience is indeed better for those who are patient." The narrator said: It was as though Masruq had stuffed a stone into Ammar's mouth. Al-Sha'bi further said: "No woman of Hamdan (tribe) ever gave birth to anyone like Masruq."

Alqamah bin Waqqas said: After Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, we gathered in the house of Makhramah intending to give the pledge of allegiance. Sayyiduna Abu Jahm bin Hudhayfah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: Whichever of you we give allegiance to, we will not stand in the way of retribution (qisas). Thereupon Sayyiduna Ammar bin Yasir (may Allah be pleased with him) said: As for the blood of Uthman, certainly not. Abu Jahm said: O son of Sumayyah! By Allah! Are you to be given retribution for the lashes you were struck with, while no retribution is taken for the blood of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him)? So that day they departed without giving any pledge of allegiance.

Al-Hasan (al-Basri) said: Waththab told me (he was one of those whom Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) had freed, and he used to stand in attendance before Uthman). He said: Uthman sent me, and I called al-Ashtar for him (Ibn Awn said: I think he also said: I placed a cushion for the Commander of the Believers, and there was a cushion for him (al-Ashtar) too). Uthman said: "O Ashtar! What do the people want from me?" He said: Three things, one of which is unavoidable. He said: "What are they?" He said: They give you the choice either to hand over their affair (the caliphate) to them and say: This is your affair, so choose for it whomever you wish; or to allow retribution to be taken from yourself; and if you refuse both of these, then these people will kill you. He said: "Is one of them unavoidable?" He said: One of them is unavoidable. He said: "As for handing over their affair to them, I am not one to take off a shirt that I have been clothed with." The narrator said: And al-Hasan (al-Basri) said: He said: "By Allah! That I be brought forward and my neck be struck is dearer to me than that I divide the affair of the Ummah of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) among themselves" (Ibn Awn said: This is closer to the speech of Uthman) "and as for allowing retribution to be taken from myself, then by Allah! I know that my two predecessors (Abu Bakr and Umar) also used to impose punishments, and my body cannot bear retribution. And as for your killing me, then by Allah! If you kill me, you will never love one another after me, nor will you ever fight an enemy together after me." The narrator said: Al-Ashtar stood up and left, and we waited. We said: Perhaps the people (will hold back). Just then a man came as if he were a wolf; he peered in through a door, then went back. Then Muhammad bin Abi Bakr came with thirteen men until they reached Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him). He seized his beard and pulled it this way and that, until I heard the grinding of his teeth, and he said: What use was Mu'awiyah to you? What use was Ibn Amir to you? What use were your letters to you? He said: "O my nephew! Let go of my beard. O my nephew! Let go of my beard." The narrator said: I saw him summon a man from the people with a signal of his eye, and he advanced towards him with a broad-bladed arrowhead until he drove it into his head. I asked: Then what happened? He said: Then they all fell upon him together, by Allah, until they killed him.

It is narrated from Muhammad bin Sirin (may Allah have mercy on him) that Muhammad bin Abi Hudhayfah bin Utbah bin Rabi'ah and Ka'b (al-Ahbar) boarded a boat, and Muhammad said: O Ka'b! Do you find in the Torah how this boat of ours will sail? Ka'b said: "No, but I find in it that the most wretched man among the young men of Quraysh will leap into the tribulation just as a donkey leaps; take care that you are not he." Ibn Sirin said: The people held that he (Muhammad) was that man.

The sword-bearer (guard) of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) said: A man from the Ansar came in to Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him), and he said: O nephew! Go back, you are not my killer. He said: How did you know that? He said: Because on the seventh day after your birth you were brought to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and he (peace and blessings be upon him) performed tahnik for you (softened a date and rubbed it on your palate) and prayed for blessing for you. Then another man from the Ansar came in to him, and he said: O nephew! Go back, you are not my killer. He said: How do you know this? He said: Because on the seventh day after your birth you were brought to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and he (peace and blessings be upon him) performed tahnik for you and prayed for blessing for you. The narrator said: Then Muhammad bin Abi Bakr came in to him, and he said: You are my killer. He said: And how do you know that, O Na'thal? He said: Because on the seventh day after your birth you were brought to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) so that he (peace and blessings be upon him) might perform tahnik for you and pray for blessing for you, and you soiled the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). The narrator said: Then he leapt onto his chest and seized his beard, and he said: If you do this, it would grieve your father that you should hurt him. The narrator said: Then he stabbed him in the throat with the pointed blades that were in his hand.

Abu Salamah bin Abd al-Rahman said: When the man struck Uthman's hand, he said: This is the first hand that wrote the Mufassal (the final portion of the Qur'an).

Umayr bin Rabi'ah said that Sayyiduna Umar bin al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) sent for Ka'b al-Ahbar and said: O Ka'b! What description of me do you find (in the scriptures)? He said: I find your description to be a horn of iron. He asked: What is a horn of iron? He said: A sound and upright ruler who, in the matter of Allah, pays no heed to the blame of any blamer. He asked: Then what? He said: Then after you there will be a caliph whom a wrongdoing group will kill. He asked: Then what? He said: Then there will be tribulation (and trial).

Qays said: I heard Sayyiduna Sa'id bin Zayd (may Allah be pleased with him) say: "By Allah! If anyone were to collapse (in grief) over what you did to Ibn Affan, he would have every right to collapse."

Zahdam al-Jarmi said: Sayyiduna Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with them both) addressed us and said: "Had the people not demanded (retribution) for the blood of Uthman, they would have been pelted with stones from the sky."

Qurrah bin Khalid said: I heard al-Hasan (al-Basri) say: "The sinner Muhammad bin Abi Bakr was seized in one of the ravines of Egypt; then he was put inside the belly of a donkey and burnt."

Yazid bin Amr al-Ma'afiri said: I heard Abu Thawr al-Fahmi narrate that Sayyiduna Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "I have stored up ten things with my Lord: I am the fourth of four in Islam; I have never burdened myself with affectation, nor have I wished for anything unlawful; and since I gave my pledge of allegiance to the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) I have never placed my right hand on my private parts. Since I became Muslim, no Friday has passed over me in which I did not free a slave, unless I had no slave, in which case I would free one afterwards. And I never committed fornication, neither in the Jahiliyyah nor in Islam."

Habib bin Abi Mulaykah (may Allah have mercy on him), whose kunyah was Abu Thawr, said: I was sitting with Sayyiduna Ibn Umar (may Allah be pleased with them both) when a man came to him and asked: Tell me, did Uthman take part in Badr? He said: No. But on the day of Badr the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "O Allah! Uthman is occupied with Your errand and the errand of Your Messenger." So the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) allotted him a share of the spoils as well.

Urwah (may Allah have mercy on him) states concerning Sayyiduna Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) that he stayed behind in Madinah to nurse his wife, the daughter of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), who was gravely ill, so the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) allotted him a share as well. He said: And will I have the reward too, O Messenger of Allah? He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "And the reward too."

The mother of Abdullah bin Rafi' said: Al-Sa'bah bint al-Hadrami came out, and we heard her say to her son Talhah bin Ubaydullah: The siege of Uthman has become severe; if only you would speak about him so that he may be given some relief. She said: At that time Talhah (may Allah be pleased with him) was washing one side of his head, and he did not answer her. So she put her hands into her sleeve, brought out her breasts and said: I adjure you by the right I have over you for carrying you in my womb and nursing you, that you do this. So he stood up, twisted the hair of the washed side of his head and tied it, then went out until he came to Sayyiduna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him), who was sitting in a corner of his house. Sayyiduna Talhah (may Allah be pleased with him), who had with him his mother and the mother of Abdullah bin Rafi', said: If only you would grant some relief to this man (Uthman); his siege has become severe. The narrator said: He tapped a cup in his hand three times, then raised his head and said: "By Allah! I do not like anything in this (matter) that you dislike." The narrator said: And Abu Khalifah recited to us; he said: Al-Abbas bin al-Faraj al-Riyashi recited to us these verses of Layla al-Akhyaliyyah: "After Uthman, does his Ummah hope for good? Yet he was the best of all who walk upon the earth. The caliph of Allah, who gave them and made them owners of fine gold and silver. So do not deny the promise of Allah, and fear Him, and do not remain anxious about anything. And do not say of anything, 'I will do it later'; Allah has decreed what every person is to meet."

Abu Khalifah recited to us; he said: Abu Muhammad al-Tawwazi recited to us. Abu Khalifah said: I asked al-Riyashi about it, and he said: It is a poem of Sayyiduna Hassan bin Thabit (may Allah be pleased with him):
"You abandoned fighting on the frontiers and came to fight a people beside the grave of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him).
This is not the way of the righteous by which you were guided, nor is it the deed of the devout worshipper who keeps the night vigil."

It is narrated from Qatadah that whenever someone came to Sayyiduna Uthman bin Affan (may Allah be pleased with him) to call him to prayer, he would say: "Welcome to those who speak with justice, and welcome and greetings to the prayer."

Muhammad bin Sirin said: When the people surrounded Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) intending to kill him, his wife said: "Whether you kill him or leave him, he used to spend the whole night in a single rak'ah, reciting the entire Qur'an in it."

Al-Mubarak bin Fadalah said: I heard al-Hasan (al-Basri) say: I lived in the time of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him), and I was then close to puberty. I heard him deliver a sermon, and I witnessed him saying: "O people! What do you find fault with in me?" The narrator said: And there was no day on which the people were not distributing good things (wealth), and he would say: "O people! Come early in the morning for your stipends," and they would come in the morning and take them in abundance. Then it would be said: "O Muslims! Come early in the morning for your clothing," and garments would be brought and distributed among them. Al-Hasan said: "The enemy was kept away, the stipends were flowing, relations among people were good, and good was plentiful. There was no believer on earth who feared another believer; whoever he met, from whatever tribe, was his brother, his friend and his helper. And the only tribulation was that someone might draw a sword against another."

Abu al-Aswad said: I heard Sayyiduna Abu Bakrah (may Allah be pleased with him) say: "That I should fall from the sky and be torn to pieces is dearer to me than that I should have had a share in the blood of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him)."

Taliq bin Khashshaf (may Allah have mercy on him) said: We came to Madinah to see for what reason Uthman had been killed. When we arrived, some of us went to Sayyiduna Ali, some to al-Husayn bin Ali (may Allah be pleased with them both), and some to the Mothers of the Believers (may Allah be pleased with them). I went until I reached Sayyidah Aishah (may Allah be pleased with her) and greeted her with salam. She returned the greeting and asked: Who are you? I said: One of the people of Basrah. She asked: From which of the people of Basrah? I said: From Bakr bin Wa'il. She asked: From which part of Bakr bin Wa'il? I said: From Banu Qays bin Tha'labah. She asked: Are you from the family of so-and-so? Then I said to her: O Mother of the Believers! For what reason was the Commander of the Believers Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) killed? She said: "By Allah! He was killed wrongfully. May Allah curse his killers. May Allah exact retribution for him from Ibn Abi Bakr, may Allah bring humiliation upon A'yan of Banu Tamim in his own house, may Allah shed the blood of Banu Budayl in misguidance, and may Allah send to al-Ashtar one of His arrows." The narrator said: By Allah! There was not a man among those people whom her supplication did not strike.

It is narrated from Yazid bin Abi Habib that most of the riders of the caravan who set out against Uthman (to attack him) went mad.

Shaqiq bin Salamah (may Allah have mercy on him) said: Sayyiduna Abd al-Rahman bin Awf (may Allah be pleased with him) met al-Walid bin Uqbah, and he (al-Walid) said: Why is it that I see you have turned away from the Commander of the Believers, Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him)? Sayyiduna Abd al-Rahman bin Awf (may Allah be pleased with him) said: Convey to him that I did not stay behind from Badr. When this was conveyed to Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him), he said: "As for his saying, 'I did not stay behind from Badr,' I was nursing Ruqayyah, the daughter of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), until she passed away." And the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) allotted me a share of the spoils as well, and whoever the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) allotted a share to is as though he himself was present (in that battle).

Sa'id bin Jumhan narrates from Sayyiduna Safinah (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "The caliphate in my Ummah after me will last thirty years." The narrator said: We counted and found: the caliphate of Abu Bakr was two years, of Umar ten years, of Uthman twelve years, and of Ali six years (may Allah be pleased with them).

Sayyiduna Abu al-Darda' (may Allah be pleased with him) narrates from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him); he said: I said: O Messenger of Allah! People claim that you said: "Some people will disbelieve after their faith." He (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Yes, and you are not one of them." The narrator said: Abu al-Darda' (may Allah be pleased with him) passed away before the killing of Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him).

Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Amr (may Allah be pleased with them both) said: "Uthman Dhu al-Nurayn was killed wrongfully."

Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Amr (may Allah be pleased with them both) said: "Abu Bakr al-Siddiq: you have hit upon his name correctly. Umar was a horn of iron. Uthman Dhu al-Nurayn: you have hit upon his name correctly; he was killed wrongfully, and he was given a double reward for it."