177 - ʿAbd Allāh narrated to us: Muḥammad ibn ʿAbbād al-ʿUklī narrated to us: Muḥammad ibn Sulaymān ibn Masmūl narrated to us, he said: I heard al-Qāsim ibn Mukhawwal al-Bahzī, then al-Sulamī, say: I heard my father—who had lived through both the pre-Islamic period of ignorance (Jāhiliyya) and Islam—say:

I set my snares at al-Abwāʾ, and a gazelle was caught in one of the ropes, but it broke away with it, so I went out in pursuit of it. I found a man who had captured it, and we disputed over it. So we brought our dispute to the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings of God be upon him. We found him halting at al-Abwāʾ under a tree, seeking shade beneath a leather mat. We brought our dispute before him, and he judged between us that it be divided into two halves. Then the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings of God be upon him, began speaking to us, saying: "A time will come upon the people when the best of wealth will be sheep between the two Mosques, eating from the trees and coming down to water. Their owner eats of their milk products, drinks their milk, and wears their hair—or he said: their wool—while tribulations plummet into the strongholds of the Arabs. By Allah, you will not be tempted into tribulation!" The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings of God be upon him, said this three times. I said: "O Messenger of Allah! Advise me." He said: "Perform the Prayer, pay the Zakat, fast the month of Ramadan, perform Hajj to the House and Minor pilgrimage ('Umra), be dutiful to your parents, maintain ties of kinship, entertain the guest, enjoin what is right, forbid what is wrong, and turn with the truth wherever it turns." (1)