A.H. 15
a worn-out mantle of camel's hair. It is said that his own subjects, rendered less unsophisticated by what they had seen of the world, were scandalized and begged him to change his dress and to mount a horse.ʿOmar's simple habits. ʿOmar yielded as to the last point, but kept the halter of his camel in his hand. Not liking the pace of the horse, however, he remounted his camel. Theophanes thus describes the impression which ʿOmar made upon the Christians. "He entered the Holy City clad in a worn mantle of camel's hair and showing a diabolical expression of piety. He demanded to be shown the temple of the Jews, which Solomon had caused to be built, that there he might adore his own blasphemies. Sophronius, the archbishop, seeing him, cried: "See the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place." And this champion of piety wept over the Christian people with many tears. Arrived in the town, ʿOmar was offered by the patriarch a vestment of linen and a shirt, but the most he could be prevailed upon to do was to wear them until his own were washed, when he returned them to Sophronius.
Such tales from a Christian source confirm similar legends of the Muslims. One narrator mentions that ʿOmar on the way to Al-Jābiya, on coming to a ford, dismounted, undressed, and waded across, leading his camel. Abu ʿObeida remonstrated: "To-day you have done a scandalous thing in the eyes of the people of the land." ʿOmar's feelings were hurt. "O Abu ʿObeida, would that another than you had said that to me! Just think! We were the most obscure and despised of men and the feeblest, and God has glorified us by Islām. If you seek to glorify it in another way, God will humble you." Another account states that it was Abu ʿObeida who appeared in public in a coarse woollen dress, and was reproved: "See, you are commander-in-chief of the armies in Syria, and we are surrounded by enemies. Change your attire and put on a better;" to which he replied: "I will not alter the state in which I was when the Apostle of God lived."
Eutychius and the authors of the histories of Jerusalem devote several pages to the discovery of the Temple of Solomon by ʿOmar.
That, however, the object of ʿOmar's journey to Syria
