It is narrated from Sayyiduna Anas (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) sent the brother of Sayyida Umm Sulaym (may Allah be pleased with her), my maternal uncle Haram, with a group of seventy men, and these people were killed on the day of Bi’r Ma‘unah. In those days, the leader of the polytheists was ‘Amir bin Tufayl bin Malik al-‘Amiri. He came to the service of the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) and made an offer that you accept one of three things from me: (1) The rural areas be yours and the urban areas be mine, or (2) After you, the caliphate be given to me, or (3) I will join the Banu Ghatafan and fight you with a thousand camels and a thousand she-camels. (On this occasion, you prayed: O Allah, help me against ‘Amir.) So, he was in a household of Banu Sulayl when he was afflicted with plague. He said: This is just like the swelling of camels in the house of such-and-such woman of Banu so-and-so. Bring my horse to me. His horse was brought to him, he mounted it, and he died right on its back.

The brother of Sayyida Umm Sulaym (may Allah be pleased with her), Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him), along with two men—one of whom was from Banu Umayyah and the other was lame (a‘raj)—set out together. He said to the two of them: Stay close to me until I reach them. If they do not do anything to me, that is better, but if something else happens, you will be near me, and if they kill me, at least you will be able to inform your companions behind. So, Haram (may Allah be pleased with him) approached them and said: Will you allow me to convey the message of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) to you? They said: Yes. He began to speak to them, and they signaled to one of their men from behind him, who struck him with a spear that passed through his body. Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him) at that moment said: Allahu Akbar! By the Lord of the Ka‘bah, I have succeeded! Then they killed the other two except for the lame one, who was on the top of the mountain, so he was saved.

Sayyiduna Anas (may Allah be pleased with him) says: In connection with this incident, this verse was revealed to us, and it used to be recited regularly, but it was later abrogated: بَلِّغُوا قَوْمَنَا أَنَّا لَقِینَا رَبَّنَا فَرَضِیَ عَنَّا وَأَرْضَانَا. (Convey to our people that we have met our Lord, and He is pleased with us and has made us pleased.) The Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him and his family) invoked curses for forty days upon Ri‘l, Dhakwan, Banu Lihyan, and Banu ‘Usayyah, who had disobeyed Allah and His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him and his family).

It is narrated from Thabit, who says: We were in the service of Sayyiduna Anas bin Malik (may Allah be pleased with him). He sat among his family and wrote a letter, and said: O group of reciters! Come forth. Thabit says: I did not like this word much, so I said: O Abu Hamzah! It would have been better if you had called these people by their names. Sayyiduna Anas (may Allah be pleased with him) said: There is no harm in my calling you reciters. Shall I not tell you about those brothers of yours whom we used to call reciters in the time of the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him)? Then he narrated that they were seventy individuals. Their condition was such that when night fell, they would go to their teacher in Madinah and spend the whole night until morning learning the Qur’an. And when morning came, whoever was able would bring sweet water (and sell it), and someone would bring firewood and sell it, and whoever was able, they would together buy a goat, prepare it well, slaughter it, and hang it near the chambers of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). When Sayyiduna Khubaib (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) sent these reciters on an expedition. They went to a tribe of Banu Sulaym, and with them was my maternal uncle, Sayyiduna Haram bin Milhan (may Allah be pleased with him). Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him) requested his leader to allow him to go and inform those people that we have not come to fight them, so that they would not block our way. So Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him) went and said to them: We have not come to fight you, so do not block our way. A man came forward with a spear and struck Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him) with it, and the spear passed through his body. When he felt the blow of the spear on his stomach, he cried out loudly: Allahu Akbar! By the Lord of the Ka’bah, I have succeeded! Then those people turned towards the rest of the caravan and not one of them was left alive. Sayyiduna Anas (may Allah be pleased with him) says: I never saw the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) as grieved on any occasion as he was by this incident. I saw that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) would raise his hands in the Fajr prayer and supplicate against those oppressors. Sayyiduna Abu Talhah Ansari (may Allah be pleased with him) used to say to me: Shall I tell you about the killer of your uncle, Sayyiduna Haram (may Allah be pleased with him)? I said: Allah has done with him what He willed. He said: He has accepted Islam. In the narration of ‘Affan, it is mentioned that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) raised both his hands and supplicated against them. And Abu al-Nadr said that he raised both his hands.