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The officers of the Muslim
army paced in front of the regiments, reciting verses of the Quran.
They reminded the Faithful of the promise of paradise for the martyrs
and of the threat of hell for the faint-hearted.
Early on a cold morning in the third week
of December 632 (beginning of Shawal, 11 Hijri), began the Battle
of Yamamah.
Khalid ordered a general attack, and the
entire Muslim front surged forward with cries of Allah-o-Akbar.
Khalid led the charge of the centre while Abu Hudaifa and Zaid led
the charge of the wings. The two armies clashed and the air was
rent by shouts and screams as strong men slashed and thrust at each
other. Khalid cut down every man who came before him. The Muslim
champions performed prodigies of valour and Khalid felt that his
warriors would soon break through the army of disbelief.
But the army of disbelief stood as firm
as a rock. Many fell before the onslaught of the Faithful, but there
was no break in the infidel front. The apostates fought fanatically,
preferring death to giving up an inch of ground; and the Muslims
realised with some surprise that they were making no headway. After
some time spent in hard slogging, a slight lack of order became
apparent in the Muslim ranks as a result of their forward movement
and their attempts to pierce the front of the infidels. But this
caused no concern. So long as they remained on the offensive and
the enemy on the defensive, a certain amount of disorder did not
matter.
Then Musailima, realising that if he remained
on the defensive much longer the chances of a Muslim break-through
would increase, ordered a general counter-attack all along the front.
The apostates moved forward like a vast tidal wave, and the Muslims
now found to their horror that they were being pressed back. The
fighting became more savage as they struggled desperately to stem
he advance of the apostates, who paid heavily in blood for every
yard of ground that they gained, but strengthened by their belief
in the Liar's promise that paradise awaited those who fell, they
pressed on relentlessly. Some lack of cohesion was now felt in the
Muslim regiments due to the mixture of tribal contingents which
were not yet accustomed to fighting side by side.
Gradually the numerical superiority of the
apostates began to tell. Fighting in massed, compact bodies against
the thinner Muslim ranks, they increased their pressure. The Muslims
proceeded to fall back steadily. Then the pace of withdrawal became
faster. The apostate assaults became bolder. And the Muslim withdrawal
turned into a confused retreat. Some regiments turned and fled,
others soon followed their example, causing a general exodus from
the battlefield. The officers were unable to stop the retreat and
were swept back with the tide of their men. The Muslim army passed
through its camp and went on some distance beyond it before it stopped.
As the Muslims left the plain of Aqraba,
the apostates followed in hot pursuit. This was not a planned manoeuvre,
but an instinctive reaction, like the reaction of the Muslims to
the Quraish flight in the first part of the Battle of Uhud. And
like those Muslims, the apostates stopped at their opponents' camp
and began to plunder it. Again as at Uhud, his opponents' occupation
with looting gave Khalid time to prepare and launch a riposte. But
more of that later.
In the Muslim camp stood the tent of Khalid
and in this tent sat his latest wife, Laila, and the captive chief,
Muja'a, still in irons. A few infidels, flushed with success and
excited by thoughts of the orgy of plunder that awaited them, entered
the tent of Khalid. They saw and recognised Muja'a. They saw Laila
and wanted to kill her, but were restrained by the chief. "I
am her protector", he warned them. "Go for the
men!" 1 In their haste to lay their
hands on the booty the infidels did not stop to release their chief.
1. Tabari: Vol. 2, p. 511.
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