Ali ibn Abi Talib ibn Abd al-Muttalib ibn Hashim was the cousin of the Prophet and the husband of his daughter Fatima 1. He was raised in the Prophet ﷺ's house before Islam and was one of the first to embrace it, and the reports in Ibn al-Athir differ on who was first: Ali, Khadija or Abu Bakr 2. When the Prophet emigrated, Ali stayed in Mecca to return the trusts and slept in his bed on the night of departure, then joined him in Medina 3. He was present at Badr, Uhud, the Trench and the other campaigns except Tabuk, when the Prophet left him in charge of his family, and Khaybar was taken at his hands 1 4. The Prophet sent him to Yemen as a judge, and Ali related much from the Prophet 5.
He was the fourth of the Rashidun caliphs, given allegiance in the Prophet's mosque in Medina in Dhu al-Hijja 35 AH, after the killing of Uthman 6. Ibn al-Athir reports that some Companions held back from the pledge without his compelling them, and that the people of Syria, with Mu'awiya, did not pledge and fought him 7 8. Three Kharijites then swore to kill him, Mu'awiya and Amr ibn al-As, and Abd al-Rahman ibn Muljam struck him in Kufa as he went out to the dawn prayer in Ramadan 40 AH 9. He died on the night of Sunday, with eleven nights of Ramadan remaining; his age is disputed, and al-Waqidi held sixty-three the soundest report; his son al-Hasan prayed over him 10 11.
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