Selected Narrations about the Twelfth Imam volume 2

Section Fifty-One

The traditions that indicate the second black flags that are different from the first black flags

Comprised of five traditions

  1. Al-Fitan[^1]: Informed us Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. `Abd-Allah b. Aḥmad b. Rabadha, from Abū l-Qāsim Sulaimān b. Aḥmad al-Ṭabarānī, from Abū Zaid `Abd al-Raḥmān b. Ḥātim al-Murādī in Egypt in the year 280 AH, from Nu`aim b. Ḥammād, from al-Walīd and Rushdain, from ibn Lahī`a, from Abū Qubail, from Abū Rūmān from `Alī, may Allah be satisfied with him, who said:

The Sufyānī and the black flags will meet. Amongst them will be a youth from the Banī-Hāshim and on his left palm will be a mole. His commander will be a person from Banī Tamīm called Shu`ayb b. Ṣāliḥ, at the gateway if Iṣṭakhr. There will be a terrible bloodshed between these two armies. The black flags will be victorious while the cavalry of Sufyānī will take to their heels. It is then that the people will desire for the Mahdī and will seek him.

  1. Al-Fitan[^2]: Narrated to us Sa`īd b. `Uthmān, from Jābir, from (Imam) Abū Ja`far who said:

The black flags from Khurāsān [in Iran] will reach Kūfa. When the Mahdī appears at Mecca, they will be sent to pledge allegiance to the Mahdī.

  1. Al-Fitan[^3]: Narrated to us al-Walīd b. Muslim, from Abū `Abd-Allah, from `Abd al-Karīm (meaning Umayya), from Muḥammad b. al-Ḥanafiyya who said:

Black flags will emerge [in support of] the Abbasids. Then, from Khurāsān, other black flags will appear; their hoods will be black and their dresses will be white. A person called Shu`ayb b. Ṣāliḥ or Ṣāliḥ b. Shu`ayb, from [Banī] Tamīm, will be their commander. They will destroy al-Sufyānī’s Army until they reach Bait al-Maqdas. They will prepare for the Mahdī his government and Three hundred people from Syria will come to his aid. The time between his emergence and the handing over of the affairs to the Mahdī will be seventy-two months.

  1. Al-Fitan[^4]: `Abd-Allah b. Marwān narrated to us, from al-`Alā b. `Utba, from al-Ḥasan that “the Messenger of Allah, Allah's blessings be on him [and his family], mentioned a calamity that his Ahl al-Bait would encounter [which would continue] until Allah will send a black flag from the East. Whoever helps it, Allah will help him and whoever deserts it, Allah will desert him; until a man comes whose name is my name and He will rule them. Allah will support and assist him.”

  2. Al-Fitan[^5]: Muḥammad b. `Abd-Allah b. `Abd-Allah al-Taihartī narrated to us, from `Abd al-Raḥmān b. Ziyād b. An`um, from Muslim b. Yasār, from Sa`īd b. al-Musayyib, from the Messenger of Allah, Allah's blessings be on him [and his family], who said: “Black flags [in support] of the Abbasids will emerge from the East. They will halt until Allah wishes. Then, smaller black flags will emerge from the east who will fight a person from the progeny of Abū Sufyān and his followers. They will call out [to the people] to obey the Mahdī.”

[^1]: Al-Fitan, vol. 5, p. 172; al-Burhān fī `alāmāt Mahdī ākhir al-zamān, chap. 7, p. 151, no. 20 (short version).

[^2]: Al-Fitan, vol. 5, p. 173; al-Burhān fī `alāmāt Mahdī ākhir al-zamān, chap. 7, p. 150, no. 12; Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 52, p. 217, no. 77.

[^3]: Al-Fitan, vol. 5, chap. “al-Rayāt al-sūd lil-Mahdī ba`d rāyāt Banī l-`Abbās,” p. 165.

[^4]: Al-Fitan, vol. 5, chap. “al-Rayāt al-sūd lil-Mahdī ba`d rāyāt Banī l-`Abbās,” p. 167.

[^5]: Al-Fitan, vol. 5, chap. “al-Rayāt al-sūd lil-Mahdī ba`d rāyāt Banī l-`Abbās,” p. 168.