Then he said: "Come to me! For I am the one who resurrects those in the graves, the gatherer of what is in the chests, the Master of the Psalms, the Inscribed Book, and the Outspread Parchment. I am the Spring of Life, the Mine of Prayer, and the punisher of tyrants. No knowledge surpasses me, no judgment escapes me, no doubt disturbs me, and no adversary can argue against me. I witnessed the nations of old and those of the end. I am the First and the Last, the Hidden and the Manifest, and I am Knowing of all things." Until his saying in poetry:

Turn back to me with the beauty of certainty, And with the patience of souls for what I intend. For if you do that with firm conviction, Then what a blessed allegiance, and what blessed servants. But if you remain ignorant of the truth of what I have said, Then Thamud of old was likewise ignorant of it. So I recompensed them after their rebellion With thunderbolts containing a severe punishment.

This is a long sermon from which we have summarized what we mentioned.

(163) My sheikh—may God be pleased with him—narrated to me from his men, traced back to Muhammad ibn al-Kawwa, that he said to our Master Amir Almuminin, Mighty is His Might: "I heard you saying on the pulpit: 'I destroyed 'Ad and Thamud and many generations between them,' and I heard you saying: 'I am the Beast of the Earth and the possessor of its two horns'?" Amir Almuminin, Mighty is His Might, replied: "O Ibn al-Kawwa, truly Abd Allah ibn Rawaha al-Ansari, peace be upon him, is the one whom I sent to the people of 'Ad and I destroyed them through him; they did not last for the blink of an eye after what I commanded. My command, when I intend a thing, is only that I say to it 'Be,' and it is. So, through Abd Allah ibn Rawaha, I destroyed 'Ad and Thamud, and he is the Barren Wind."