When Rabia bin Nasr died the whole kingdom of the Yemen fell into the hands of Hassan b. Tiban As'ad Abu Karib.
His father Tub'an As'ad went his way from the East to Madinah (Yathrib) but he did not attack its people. However he left behind there one of his sons who was treacherously slain. Thereupon he returned with the intention of destroying the town and exterminating its people and cutting down its palms. So this tribe of the Ansar gathered together under the leadership of 'Amr b. Tallah and they fought each other in Madinah. Indeed the Ansar assert that they used to fight them by day and treat them as guests by night. Tubba' was amazed at this and used to say: ‘By God our people are generous!’
While Tub'an As'ad (also called as Tubba' ) was occupied in this fighting there came two Jewish rabbis from Bani Qurayza learned men well grounded in tradition. They had heard about the king’s intention to destroy the town and its people and they said to him: ‘O King, do not do it, for if you persist in your intention something will happen to prevent your carrying it out and we fear that you will incur speedy retribution.’ When the king asked the reason for this they told him that Yathrib was the place to which a Prophet from the Quraysh would migrate in time to come, and it would be his home and settlement.
Seeing that these men had hidden knowledge the king took their words in good part and gave up his design, departed from Medina and embraced the rabbis’ religion.
Tubba' and his people were idol worshippers. He set out for Mecca which was on his way to the Yemen, and
when he was between ‘Usfan and Amaj ( a town between Makkah and Madinah) some men of the Hudhayl bin
Mudrika came to him saying, ‘O King, may we not lead you to an ancient treasury which former kings have
overlooked . It contains pearls, topaz, rubies, gold, and silver?’
Tubba' said : Certainly,
and they added that: "A house in Mecca which its people worshipped and where they prayed."
But the real intention of the Hudhaylis was to cause his destruction, for they knew that any king that treated it with disrespect was sure to die. Having agreed to their proposal he sent to the two rabbis and asked their opinion.
They told him that: The sole object of the tribe was to destroy him and his army. ‘We know of no other house in the land which Allah has chosen for Himself, said they, and if you do what they suggest you and all your men will perish.’
The king asked them: what should I do when I get there ?
and they told him : 'Do what the people of Mecca did: circumambulate around it, venerate and honour it, shave your head, and to behave with all humility until you leave its precincts.
The king asked : What prevents you both from that?
They replied: By Allah indeed it is the House our father Ibrahim(as), but its people interposed between us and the House by the idols they had set up round it, and the blood which they shed there. They are polytheists, impure people associating others with Allah.
Recognizing the soundness and truth of their words the king summoned the men from the Hudhayl and cut off their hands and feet, and continued his journey to Mecca. He went round the Ka'ba, sacrificed, and shaved his head, staying there six days sacrificing animals which he distributed to the people and giving them honey to drink. It was revealed to him in a dream that he should cover the temple, so he covered it with woven palm branches; a later vision showed him that he must do better so he covered it with Yemeni cloth; a third vision induced him to clothe it with fine striped Yemeni cloth.
It is said that the Tubba' was the first man to cover the House in this way. He ordered its Jurhumi guardians to keep it clean and not to allow blood, dead bodies, or menstruous cloths to come near it, and he made a door and a key for it.
Afterwards he set forth for the Yemen with his army and the two rabbis, and when he reached his own country he invited his people to adopt his new religion, but they refused until the matter could be tested by the ordeal of fire which was there.
When Tubba drew near to the Yemen the Himyarites blocked his path, refusing to let him pass because he had abandoned their religion. When he invited them to accept his religion on the ground that it was better than theirs, they proposed that the matter should be subject to the ordeal by fire. The Yemenites say that a fire used to settle matters in dispute among them by consuming the guilty and letting the innocent go scatheless. So his people went forth with their idols and sacred objects, and the two rabbis went forth with their sacred books hanging like necklaces from their necks until they halted at the place where the fire used to blaze out. On this occasion when it came out the Yemenites withdrew in terror, but their followers encouraged them and urged them to stand fast, so they held their ground until the fire covered them and consumed their idols and sacred objects and the men who bore them. But the two rabbis came out with their sacred books, sweating profusely but otherwise unharmed. There upon the Himyarites accepted the king’s religion and that was the origin of Judaism in the Yemen.
When his son Hassan b. Tiban As’ad Abu Karib came to the throne he set out with the Yemenites to conquer the land of the Arabs and Persians. However when they reached the land of Bahrain, the Himyarite and Yemenite tribes were unwilling to go farther and wanted to return to thier families, so they approached one of his brothers called 'Amr who was with him in the army and said that if he would kill his brother they would make him king so that he might lead them home again. He said that he would do so, and they all agreed to join in the plot except Dhu Ru'ayn the Himyarite. He forbade him to do this, but he would not heed, so Dhu Ru'ayn wrote the following verses:
Oh who would buy sleeplessness for sleep ?
Happy is he who passes the night in peace
Though Himyar have been treacherous
God will hold Dhu Ru'ayn blameless
He sealed the document and brought it to 'Amr saying : Keep this with you for me and he did so. Then `Amr killed his brother Hassan and returned to Yemen with his army.
When Amr b. Tiban returned to the Yemen he could not sleep and became overwhelmed with insomnia. He asked the physicians and those of the soothsayers and diviners who were seers about his trouble. One of them said: ‘No man has ever killed his brother or kinsman treacherously as you killed your brother without losing his sleep and becoming a prey to insomnia.’ At this he began to kill all the nobles who had urged him to murder his brother Hassan, till finally he came to Dhu Ru'ayn who claimed that 'Amr held the proof of his innocence, namely the paper which he had given him. He had it brought to him and when he had read the two verses he let him go, recognizing that he had given him good counsel. When 'Amr died the Himyarite kingdom fell into disorder and the people split up into parties.
Then a man who was not from the royal household emerged. He name was Lakhni'a Yanuf Dhu Shanatir. He killed off their leading men and put the royal family to open shame.
Lakhni'a was a most evil man a sodomite. He sent for Zur'a Dhu Nuwas son of Tiban As'ad brother of Hassan. He was a little boy when Hassan was murdered and had become a fine handsome young man of character and intelligence. When the messenger came he perceived what was intended and took a fine sharp knife and hid it under the sole of his foot and went to Lakhni'a. As soon as they were alone he attacked him and Dhu Nuwas rushed upon him and stabbed him to death.The people said: ‘You must be our king and no one else, seeing that you avenged us of this disgusting man.’
They made him king and all the tribes of Himyar joined him. He was the last of the Yemeni kings and the man who had the ditch made. In Najran there were some people who held the religion of Isa ibn Maryam, a virtuous and upright people who followed the Gospel. Their head was named ‘Abdullah bin al-Thamir.
Dhu Nuwas went to them with his armies and invited them to accept Judaism, giving them the choice between that or death, they chose death. So he dug trenches for them; burnt some in fire, slew some with the sword, and mutilated them until he had killed nearly twenty thousand of them, including their leader Abdullah bin al-Thamir. The Quran refers to this event: