ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf and the Two Young Men

Some scenes from the battlefield: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf said he was flanked by two young men in the rank, in the line, in the battle — he was flanked by two young men. Now, as soldiers know, you want to have good soldiers on your right and your left, you want to have good fighting companions by your side. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf wasn't happy that he has these two kids next to him — ʿAbd al-Raḥmān was a mature man, and he had these young men next to him, so he preferred to have someone else flanking him. And then the one to his right whispered to him and said: O uncle, show me which one is Abū Jahl. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf said: O my son, what do you want with Abū Jahl? This young man said: I swore to Allah that if I saw him, I would kill him or die in front of him — either I kill him, or I die right there. So now ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf started changing his mind about who's flanking him — you shouldn't base your opinion on looks, you shouldn't make a judgement based on looks; this man right next to him wants to kill Abū Jahl, the leader of the army of the mushrikīn. And then he points out Abū Jahl to this young man to his right. Now the young man to his left whispers in the ear of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf and asks him the same question — and the reason why they're whispering is these two brothers were competing with each other, so they were whispering to ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf so that the other one doesn't hear. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf said: when I showed Abū Jahl to them — and he pointed out, and he said, see that man whom — you know, it was like a crowd around Abū Jahl, all of them protecting him — so he pointed out Abū Jahl and said: that's Abū Jahl. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf said: they flew at him like falcons. This was in al-Bukhārī. They flew at him as falcons, and they struck him down — they struck Abū Jahl down, two young men from among the Anṣār. These two young men, according to one narration, are Muʿādh ibn ʿAmr ibn al-Jamūḥ and Muʿawwidh ibn ʿAfrāʾ; in another narration, they are two brothers, ʿAwf and Muʿawwidh ibn al-Ḥārith, whose mother was ʿAfrāʾ. In another narration, it says that when they attacked Abū Jahl and they reached next to him, one of them struck the foot of Abū Jahl, so it flew off like a kernel of nut would fly off from a nutcracker — and it made that sound of a crack, and then it flew off. But then Ikrimah saw that, and he struck Muʿādh on his shoulder, and he tore off his arm; however, the arm remained hanging to his body by the flesh of his side, of his chest — the joint itself is torn away, is cut, but the arm is still just dangling by his side. And Muʿādh said: I carried on fighting, dragging my arm behind me, until it started bothering me and distracting me from fighting, so I placed it under my foot and stepped over it and tore it off.