In the name of God the all-powerful, the merciful, the compassionate, the incomprehensible; he who raises beggars up and lays sultans low; he who shattered the peaks and flattened the steppes; the architect of oceans and anthills, whose blessing is sunshine and honey sweet dew, and whose scorn is earthquake and plague, I speak.
O Kings of the North, my spies relate that clumsy, creaking vessels full of what pass for soldiers in the lands of the unbelievers creep towards our shores. Woe betide them!
Their masters have told them that the lands of the Faithful are rightly theirs, and that they should board their rickety ships and take them by force. Can they believe it?
Know that these lands are peopled by men who love Truth, Heaven, and the Book. Know ye also that these men would gladly die to defend this truth, and feel no fear when they look upon your bristling spears. Know ye that the men of the South have spears of their own, yea, and sharp swords, and quivers of arrows, and stout mail, and swift horses and camels.
Although you are apostates and heathens, we feel some compassion for you as our fellow men and creations of God. Therefore we beseech you: Turn your lumbering barques and return to your freezing lands. Or come and stay briefly, as our guests. Let us teach you our ways: mathematics, poetry, bathing; and then return to your homes, richer not in looted treasure, but in knowledge and culture.
If you thirst for war, consider this: you will die in this holy war. The sands will drink up your blood, jackals will gnaw your bones, and scorpions will make their homes in your eye sockets. Is that what you desire? The yellow haired, immodest, painted harlots that you love so well will mourn you briefly, and then take other men to bed. You will not pass down your swords to your sons. Consider it.
If you are still committed to war, ask yourselves this: are you prepared to face a nation of warriors favored by God? Has there ever been a battle in which God has favored the wicked over the righteous? Or does not the God of the Prophet strike down every vainglorious king who ever dared stand against Him, and all of their lackeys besides?
I see now that there is no sense in you, that still you come. It saddens me -- but soon my sadness will turn to anger, for the anger of the righteous is like the sirocco, the desert wind that will sour the heathen, the idolator, the infidel from our lands.
