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Strangely enough, most
of her mother's clan accepted her as prophetess and pledged to obey
her. They had been Christians! She mustered many armed followers
and came down into Arabia, where her father's tribe also flocked
to her standard. No doubt many that followed her, elders and clansmen,
were led by the temptation of plunder and the desire to settle old
scores with some of the tribes in north-eastern Arabia which had
old feuds with them.
Elated by her success in gathering followers,
she arrived at Al Hazn with a fair-sized force and exchanged envoys
with her kinsman, Malik bin Nuwaira. 1 She
proposed a pact: they would operate jointly against the tribes that
were their mutual feudal enemies and would thereafter war against
the Muslim power at Madinah. In order to assure Malik that she had
no aggressive designs upon the lands of the Bani Yarbu', she declared,
"I am only a woman of the Bani Yarbu'. The land is yours."
2
Malik accepted Sajjah's proposal and entered
into a pact with her. However, he cooled her martial ardour somewhat
and dissuaded her from warring against the Muslims. This happened
in June 632.
The combined forces of Malik and Sajjah
now turned upon the hapless tribes that had offended the Bani Tamim
and the Taghlib. There was nothing religious in this operation,
the underlying motives were revenge and the lust for loot. Any tribe
that resisted was fought, subdued and plundered. Malik was joined
to the impostress by the pact and his followers fought alongside
hers in these raids. It appears, however, that he did not personally
take part in these depredations.
Then Sajjah came to Nibbaj and began plundering
the neighbourhood. 3 And here she suffered
a serious setback. The local clans, driven by their common fear
of the terrible lady, united in opposition to her and this resistance
resulted in a battle. It was not by any means a decisive battle,
but she got the worst of it; a few of her important officers were
captured by her opponents, who refused to release them unless she
pledged to depart from their area. To this she agreed.
The elders of the tribes which made up her
following now gathered around their impostress. "Where now?"
they asked.
"To Yamamah," she replied.
"But the people of Yamamah are mighty",
they pointed out, "and their Chief, Musailima, is a very
powerful man."
"To Yamamah", repeated
Sajjah and then broke into verse:
Onward to Yamamah!
With the flight of soaring pigeons;
Where the fighting is the fiercest;
And no blame shall fall upon you.
Onward to Yamamah! 4
1. The location of Hazn is not certain,
but according to local information in Hail, it is the same as the
area of Hazm which lies between Samira and Butah. This seems to
fit in with Yaqut's statement (Vol. 1. p. 661) that it was near
Butah.
2. Tabari: Vol. 2, p. 496.
3. Nabbaj is the present Nabqiya (also called
Nabjiya by the inhabitants) 25 miles north-east of Buraida. Now
it is a village; then it was a sizeable town.
4. Tabari: Vol. 2, p. 498.
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