Shame on you! I have even grown weary of rebuking you. Is worldly life in exchange for the hereafter and humiliation in exchange for honour acceptable to you? When I call you to fight the enemies, your eyes begin to roll as if you are in the whirlpool of death, and the heedlessness and intoxication of the agony of death have overcome you. My words seem not to enter your understanding, so you remain bewildered. It appears as if the effect of madness is on your hearts and minds, so you cannot act with any intelligence. You have lost your trust in me forever. You are not a strong support that I can rely on to turn toward the enemies, nor are you a means of honour and success that your need is felt. Your example is like those camels whose shepherds have been lost—if they are gathered from one side, they scatter from the other. By Allah, you have proven very bad for kindling the flames of war. All plans work against you, and you make no plans against the enemies. Your (cities') boundaries are decreasing day by day, yet you do not become angry. They are never heedless of you, while you are heedless, having forgotten everything. By Allah, those who pass things to each other always lose. By Allah, I have this suspicion about you that if war intensifies and death becomes hot in the market, you will cut off from Ibn Abi Talib like the head from the body (so that returning is not possible). Whoever gives his enemy such control over himself that he strips the flesh from his bones, breaks the bones, and tears the skin to pieces, his helplessness has reached its limit, and the (heart) enclosed in the ribs of the chest is weak and feeble. If you want it to be so, then let it be. But I will not let it be so until I wield the (sharp-edged) swords of the place of Masharif, from which the fragments of the skull's bones fly, and arms and feet fall cut and severed. After that, let Allah do what He wills. O people! I have a right over you, and you have a right over me: that I keep your welfare in view, give you your full share from the treasury, teach you so that you do not remain ignorant, and train you in culture so that you act upon it. And my right over you is that you fulfill the responsibilities of allegiance, show goodwill in front and behind, respond to my call when I call you, and obey when I give a command.