them, who will bravely defend Islâm, but find nothing left. Seek therefore some plan that suits those who come first as well as those who come last." ʿUmar acted according to the suggestion of Muʿâdh.
The chief of Buṣra tells a lie regarding the tax. Al-Ḥusain ibn-ʿAli ibn-al-Aswad al-ʿIjli from Salamah-l-Juhani's uncle:—The chief of Buṣra recounted that he had capitulated to the Moslems, agreeing to offer food, oil and vinegar. ʿUmar asked that a statement be written down to that effect; but abu-ʿUbaidah showed that the chief of Buṣra was telling an untruth and said, " The fact is that we made terms by which certain things should be sent to the winter quarters of the Moslems." Then ʿUmar decreed that a poll-tax be assessed graded according to the various classes,[1] and that kharâj be imposed upon the land.
ʿUmar fixes the tax. Al-Ḥusain from Aslam, a freedman of ʿUmar:—ʿUmar wrote to the tax-collectors instructing them to levy poll-tax only on those who were adult, and he fixed it at four dînârs on those who possessed gold. He also assessed on them a subsistence tax by which each Moslem in Syria and Mesopotamia would receive two modii of wheat, and three ḳisṭs of oil, and the right to be entertained as a guest for three days.
The tithe-lands of Syria. Abu-Ḥafṣ ash-Shâmi from Makḥûl[2]:—Every piece of "tithe-land" in Syria is one whose people had evacuated it, and which had been given as fief to the Moslems, who, by the permission of the governors, cultivated it after it had lain as waste land claimed by no one.
