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Al-Madînah
23

Ḥima ar-Rabadhah. Bakr ibn-al-Haitham from Zaid ibn-Aslam's father who said:—"I heard ʿUmar ibn-al-Khaṭṭâb say to one[1] whom he placed in charge of Ḥima[2] ar-Rabadhah and whose name Bakr forgot, 'Stretch not thy wing[3] to any Moslem. Beware the cry of the oppressed, for it is answered. Admit [to the Ḥima] the owner of the small herd of camels and sheep but keep off the cattle of ibn-ʿAffân and ibn-ʿAuf; for if their cattle should perish they resort to sowing, whereas if the cattle of this poor man perish, he comes to me crying, "O, commander of the believers! O, commander of the believers!" To offer grass is easier for the Moslems than to offer money in gold and silver.[4] By Allah, this is their land for which they fought in pre-Islamic time and which was included in their terms when they became Moslem. They would, therefore, certainly feel that I oppress them; and had it not been for the cattle [secured by declaring a place Ḥima] to be used in the cause of Allah, I would never make a part of a people's land Ḥimaʾ."

Ḥima an-Naḳîʿ. Al-Ḳâsim ibn-Sallâm abu-ʿUbaid from ibn-ʿUmar:—The Prophet declared an-Naḳîʿ ḥima and reserved it for the Moslem cavalry.[5] Abu-ʿUbaid told me that it is an an-Naḳîʿ [and not al-Baḳîʿ, as some have it] and that the ḥandaḳûḳ plant [sweet trefoil] grows in it.

Musʿab ibn-ʿAbdallah az-Zubairi from Saʿd ibn-abi-

  1. Whose name was Hunai; Bukhâri, vol. ii, p. 263.
  2. Reservation, pasture land reserved for the public use of a community or tribe to the exclusion of everyone else. Rabadhah was a district and a village 5 miles from al-Madînah.
  3. Treat leniently, see ibn-al-Athîr, an-Nihâyah, vol. iii, p. 26.
  4. i. e., it is easier to let the owner of the little herd feed his flock on the Ḥima than to give him money for sustaining his children.
  5. Geschichte der Stadt Medina, p. 155; Wâḳidi, Kitâb al-Maghâzi, pp. 183–184. Naḳîʿ lay 20 parasangs from Madînah.