Mother of the faithful Ayesha may have tempted him with the...

Mother of the faithful Ayesha may have tempted him with the promise of caliphate because she, too, tried her best to undermine Uthman, and she had no doubt that caliphate would be the lot of her cousin Talhah. When the news of Uthman's murder reached her, and when she was told that people had sworn the oath of allegiance to Talhah, she was very delighted and said, "Away with Na`thal[^157] and may he be crushed! Congratulations to you, man of the finger, father of lion cubs!

Congratulations to you, cousin! Allah bless your father! By Allah, they have found Talhah worthy of it!" Yes, such was the way how Talhah rewarded Uthman, the man who made him wealthy. He betrayed him because of his own desire to succeed him as the caliph. He instigated people to revolt against him and was the most zealous in encouraging them to kill him, so much so that he even prohibited drinking water from reaching Uthman when the latter's house was under siege.

Ibn Abul-Hadid quotes Uthman saying the following when his house was besieged: "Woe unto me from the son of the woman of Hadramaut (meaning Talhah)! I gave him such-and-such in pure gold, and now he is seeking to shed my blood, encouraging others to kill me! O Allah!

Do not permit him to enjoy it (caliphate), and let him face the evil ends of his mischief!" Yes; such is Talhah who [first] sided with Uthman and selected him for the caliphate in order to distance Ali from it, and because Uthman had given him gold and silver, he now is instigating people against him, ordering them to kill him, prohibiting drinking water from reaching his house!

And when they brought Uthman's corpse to be buried, he forbade them from burying it at the Muslims' cemetery, so Uthman had to be buried at Hish Kawkab where the Jews used to bury their dead![^158] Yet after all of that, we see Talhah as the very first person to swear the oath of allegiance to Imam Ali following Uthman's assassination, then he reneged from his oath and joined his cousin Ayesha at Mecca and suddenly started seeking revenge for Uthman! Praise be to Allah!

Is there any calumny greater than this?! Some historians justify this conduct by saying that Ali had refused to appoint him as the governor of Kufa and surrounding areas, so he reneged from his oath of allegiance to him and went out to fight the same Imam to whom he only yesterday had sworn to follow!