المجالس العاشورية في المآتم الحسينية

He turned his face toward them, praised God and extolled Him, then said: Now then, O people, if you fear God and recognize the right of those who hold it, that will be more pleasing to God concerning you. We are the Household of Muhammad (peace be upon him and his family), more entitled to authority over this affair concerning you than these who claim what is not theirs and conduct themselves among you with injustice and aggression. But if you refuse all but aversion to us and ignorance of our right, and your view now differs from what your letters brought to me and what your messengers delivered to me, I will turn away from you.

Al-Hurr said to him: By God, I do not know anything of these letters and messengers you mention. So Hussein (peace be upon him) said to one of his companions: O Uqba ibn Sam'an, bring out the two saddlebags that contain their letters to me. He brought out two saddlebags filled with scrolls and scattered them before him. Al-Hurr said to him: We are not among those who wrote to you. We have been commanded that when we meet you, we are not to part from you until we bring you to Kufa, before Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad.

Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: Death is nearer to you than that. Then he said to his companions: Rise and mount. So they mounted, and he waited until his womenfolk had mounted. Then he said to his companions: Turn back. But when they went to turn back, the people came between them and their departure. So Hussein (peace be upon him) said to al-Hurr: May your mother be bereaved of you, what do you want? Al-Hurr said to him: Were anyone else among the Arabs to say this to me, while in the same circumstance you are in, I would not leave off mentioning his mother with bereavement, whoever he might be. But by God, I have no way of mentioning your mother except in the best manner I am able.

Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: Then what do you want? He said: I want to take you to the governor Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad. He said: Then by God, I will not follow you. He said: Then by God, I will not let you go. They went back and forth in this exchange three times. When the words between them grew many, al-Hurr said to him: I was not commanded to fight you. I was only commanded not to part from you until I bring you to Kufa. So if you refuse, take a road that neither leads you into Kufa nor returns you to Medina, that I may have a way out between you and me, until I write to the governor Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad. Perhaps God may grant me deliverance from being tested with anything concerning your affair. So take this way here.

So Hussein (peace be upon him) turned to the left of the road of al-Udhayb and al-Qadisiyya, and he proceeded while al-Hurr proceeded with his companions alongside him, saying to him: O Hussein, I remind you of God concerning your own life, for I bear witness that if you fight you will be killed. Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: Do you frighten me with death? And can the worst befall you beyond killing me? I will say as the man of the Aws said to his cousin, when he intended to support the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family) and his cousin frightened him and said: Where are you going, for you will surely be killed? He said:

He said: Then Hussein (peace be upon him) turned to his companions and said: Is there among you anyone who knows the road off the main path? Al-Tirimmah said: Yes, O son of the Messenger of God, I know the road well. Hussein (peace be upon him) said: Go ahead of us. So al-Tirimmah went on, and Hussein (peace be upon him) and his companions followed him, and al-Tirimmah began to chant in rajaz, saying:

May God grant him life for the length of time.

Sheikh al-Mufid, may God's mercy be upon him, said: When al-Hurr heard that, he withdrew from him,

leading his companions on one side while Hussein (peace be upon him) was on another side, until they reached Udhayb al-Hijanat. Then Hussein (peace be upon him) went on until he reached the castle of Banu Maqatil and alighted there, and there he saw a pitched tent. He said: To whom does this belong? It was said: To Ubaydullah ibn al-Hurr al-Ju'fi. He said: Call him to me. When the messenger came to him, he said: This is Hussein ibn Ali (peace be upon them both) calling you. Ubaydullah said: Surely we belong to God, and to Him we return. By God, I did not leave Kufa except out of aversion to Hussein entering it while I was there. By God, I do not wish to see him nor for him to see me.

The messenger came to him and informed him. So Hussein (peace be upon him) rose and came until he entered upon him, greeted him, and sat down. Then he called him to go out with him. But Ubaydullah ibn al-Hurr repeated that statement and begged to be excused from what he had called him to. So Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: If you will not support us, then fear God lest you be among those who fight us. For by God, no one hears our cry and then does not aid us but is destroyed. He said to him: As for that, it shall never be, God willing.

Then Hussein (peace be upon him) rose from his presence and entered his quarters. And in the last part of the night, he ordered his young men to draw water. Then he ordered the departure, and he set out from the castle of Banu Maqatil(1).

And in the narration of Sheikh al-Saduq, may God's mercy be upon him, in al-Amali, he met him at al-Qatqataniyya. He, may God's mercy be upon him, said: When Hussein (peace be upon him) alighted at al-Qatqataniyya during his march to Kufa, he called Ubaydullah ibn al-Hurr al-Ju'fi to support him, but Ubaydullah refused to respond, and offered Hussein (peace be upon him) his horse. Hussein (peace be upon him) said: We have no need of you nor of your horse, and I am not one to take the misleaders as a support(2).

It is narrated that Ubaydullah ibn al-Hurr regretted after the killing of Hussein (peace be upon him), and remorse and sorrow seized him for having abandoned the support of Hussein (peace be upon him). He said:

Uqba ibn Sam'an said: We traveled with him for an hour, then he (peace be upon him) dozed off while on the back of his horse, then he awoke saying: Surely we belong to God, and to Him we return, and praise be to God, Lord of the Worlds. He did this twice or three times. So his son Ali ibn al-Hussein (peace be upon him) came to him and said: Why did you praise God and recite the return? He said: O my son, I dozed off, and a horseman on a horse appeared to me, saying: The people are traveling, and the fates are traveling toward them. So I knew that our deaths had been announced to us. He said to him: O father, may God not show you evil—are we not upon the truth? He said: Indeed, by God, to Whom the return of the servants is. He said: Then we do not care, that we should die rightfully. So Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: May God reward you, as a son, with the best of what He rewards a son on behalf of his father.

When morning came, he alighted and led them in the dawn prayer, then hastened to mount and began turning to the left with his companions, intending to scatter them. But al-Hurr ibn Yazid would come and turn him and his companions back. So whenever al-Hurr turned them hard toward Kufa, they resisted him and pulled away. They continued traveling together in this manner until they reached Nineveh—the place where Hussein (peace be upon him) alighted. Then there was a rider on a swift mount, bearing arms, with a bow slung over his shoulder, coming from Kufa. They all halted, waiting for him. When he reached them, he greeted al-Hurr and his companions, but did not greet Hussein (peace be upon him) and his companions, and he handed al-Hurr a letter from

Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad, may God curse him, in which was: Now then, hem Hussein in when this letter of mine reaches you and my messenger comes to you. Do not let him alight except in open desert, with no greenery and no water. I have ordered my messenger to keep close to you and not part from you until he brings me word of your carrying out my command. And peace.

When he read the letter, al-Hurr said to them: This is the letter of the governor Ubaydullah, ordering me to hem you in at the place where his letter reaches me, and this is his messenger, who has been ordered not to part from me until I carry out his command concerning you. Then Yazid ibn al-Muhajir al-Kindi—who was with Hussein (peace be upon him)—looked at the messenger of Ibn Ziyad and recognized him, and said to him: May your mother be bereaved of you, what have you come with? He said: I obeyed my imam and fulfilled my pledge of allegiance. Ibn al-Muhajir said to him: Rather, you disobeyed your Lord and obeyed your imam to the destruction of your own soul, and you have earned disgrace and the Fire. What an evil imam is your imam! God Almighty has said: "And We made them imams inviting to the Fire, and on the Day of Resurrection they will not be helped"(1). Your imam is among them. And al-Hurr pressed them to alight at that place where there was no water and no village. Hussein (peace be upon him) said to him: Let us—woe to you—alight at this village or that—meaning Nineveh and al-Ghadiriyya—or this—meaning Shafiyya. He said: No, by God, I cannot do that. This man has been sent as a spy over me. So Zuhayr ibn al-Qayn said to him: By God, I do not see that anything beyond what you see will come except something worse than what you see. O son of the Messenger of God, fighting these people now is easier for us than fighting those who will come after them. For by my life, after them will come upon us those we have no power to face. Hussein (peace be upon him) said: I would not be the one to begin fighting them. Then he alighted, and that day was Thursday, the second day of Muharram, in the year sixty-one(2).

Sayyid Ibn Tawus, may God have mercy on him, said: Hussein (peace be upon him) stood among his companions to deliver a speech. He praised God and extolled Him, then said: Indeed, there has befallen us of this affair what you see, and the world has changed and turned hostile, and its good has retreated, and nothing remains of it but the dregs, like the dregs in a vessel, and a base life

like an unwholesome pasture. Do you not see that the truth is not acted upon, and that falsehood is not forbidden? Let the believer truly desire to meet his Lord, for I see death as nothing but happiness, and life with the oppressors as nothing but weariness.

Then Zuhayr ibn al-Qayn rose and said: We have heard—may God guide you, O son of the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family)—your words. Were the world to remain ours forever, and were we to live in it eternally, we would still prefer rising up with you over remaining in it.

He said: Then Hilal ibn Nafi' al-Bajali leapt up and said: By God, we do not dislike meeting our Lord, and we are upon our intentions and our insight; we are loyal to whoever is loyal to you, and we are enemies to whoever is your enemy.

He said: Then Burayr ibn Khudhayr rose and said: By God, O son of the Messenger of God, God has favored us through you, that we may fight before you, that our limbs may be cut to pieces for your sake, and then your grandfather will be our intercessor on the Day of Resurrection.

He said: Then Hussein (peace be upon him) rose, mounted, and set out. Whenever he wished to travel, they would prevent him at times and travel alongside him at others, until he reached Karbala, and that was on the second day of Muharram(1).

In al-Manaqib: Zuhayr said to him: Travel on with us until we alight at Karbala, for it is on the bank of the Euphrates, so we shall be there, and if they fight us we fight them, and we seek God's help against them. He said: Then Hussein's (peace be upon him) eyes filled with tears, and he said: O God, I seek refuge in You from sorrow and affliction. And Hussein (peace be upon him) alighted at that place, and al-Hurr ibn Yazid alighted facing him with a thousand horsemen. Hussein (peace be upon him) called for an inkpot and a sheet of paper, and wrote to the nobles of Kufa whom he supposed were of his view: In the name of God, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate. From Hussein ibn Ali to Sulayman ibn Surad, al-Musayyab ibn Najaba, Rifa'a ibn Shaddad, Abdullah ibn Wa'l, and the community of believers.

Now then, you know that the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family) said during his lifetime: Whoever sees a tyrannical ruler who deems lawful what God has forbidden, who breaks the covenant of God, who opposes the Sunnah of the Messenger of God, who acts among the servants of God

with sin and aggression, and then does not change it by word or deed, it is right for God to admit him into the place He admits that ruler. You know that these people have clung to the obedience of Satan, turned away from the obedience of the Merciful, made corruption manifest, suspended the divinely ordained limits, monopolized the public wealth, made lawful what God has forbidden, and forbidden what He has made lawful. And I am more entitled to this affair on account of my kinship with the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family). Your letters have come to me, and your messengers came to me with your pledge of allegiance that you would not surrender me nor abandon me. So if you fulfill your pledge to me, then you have attained your fortune and your right guidance, and my soul is with your souls, and my family and children are with your families and children, and in me you have an example. But if you do not, and you break your covenants and cast off your pledge of allegiance, then by my life, that is no surprise from you. You did it to my father, my brother, and my cousin. Deceived is he who is deceived by you. You have missed your fortune and squandered your portion, and whoever breaks his pledge breaks it only against himself, and God will make me independent of you. And peace.

Then he folded the letter, sealed it, and handed it to Qays ibn Mushir al-Saydawi—and the account proceeds as it has passed. Then he said: And when news of the killing of Qays reached Hussein (peace be upon him), he wept, his tears flowing, then said: O God, grant us and our Shia a noble station with You, and gather us and them in a resting place of Your mercy. Truly You are powerful over all things.

He said: A man of his Shia leapt up to Hussein (peace be upon him)—called Hilal ibn Nafi' al-Bajali—and said: O son of the Messenger of God, you know that your grandfather, the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family), was not able to make the people drink of his love, nor to make them return to his command as he wished. Among them were hypocrites who promised support while harboring treachery toward him, who met him with words sweeter than honey but acted behind his back more bitter than colocynth, until God took him to Himself. And your father Ali, may God's mercy be upon him, was in the like of that. A people resolved to support him and fought alongside him the breakers of the pledge, the unjust, and the renegades, until his appointed time came to him, and he passed on to God's mercy and good pleasure. And you today are with us in the like of that state. So whoever breaks his covenant and casts off his pledge of allegiance will harm none but himself, and God is independent of him. So travel on with us, rightly guided,

preserved, to the east if you wish, and if you wish to the west. For by God, we are not afraid of God's decree, nor do we dislike meeting our Lord, and we are upon our intentions and our insight; we are loyal to whoever is loyal to you, and we are enemies to whoever is your enemy.

Then Burayr ibn Khudhayr al-Hamdani leapt up to him and said: By God, O son of the Messenger of God, God has favored us through you, that we may fight before you, that our limbs may be cut to pieces in it, and then your grandfather will be our intercessor before us on the Day of Resurrection. May a people who abandoned the son of their Prophet's daughter never prosper. Woe to them tomorrow—what will they encounter? They will be calling out with woe and destruction in the Fire of Hell.

He said: Then Hussein (peace be upon him) gathered his children, his brothers, and his Household, then looked at them and wept for a while, then said: O God, we are the progeny of Your Prophet Muhammad, and we have been driven out, expelled, and displaced from the sanctuary of our grandfather, and the Banu Umayya have transgressed against us. O God, take our right for us, and grant us victory over the oppressing people.

He said: Then he set out from his place until he alighted on Wednesday or Thursday at Karbala, and that was on the second of Muharram in the year sixty-one.

Then he turned to his companions and said (peace be upon him): People are slaves of this world, and religion is but a lick upon their tongues. They guard it as long as their livelihoods flow; but when they are tested with affliction, the truly religious are few. Then he said: Is this Karbala? They said: Yes, O son of the Messenger of God. He said: This is the place of sorrow (karb) and affliction (bala). Here our mounts shall kneel, and here our baggage shall be set down, and here our men shall be killed, and here our blood shall be shed.

He said: The people alighted, and al-Hurr advanced until he alighted facing Hussein (peace be upon him) with a thousand horsemen. Then he wrote to Ibn Ziyad informing him of Hussein's alighting at Karbala(1).

In another narration: Hussein (peace be upon him) said: And what is the name of this place? They said to him: Karbala. He said: A place of sorrow and affliction. My father passed by this place during his march to Siffin, and I was with him. He stopped and asked about it, and was told its name. He said: Here is the place where their mounts will be set down, and here is where their blood

will be spilled. He was asked about that, and he said: A burden of the Household of Muhammad will alight here(1).

He took a handful of it, smelled it, and said: This, by God, is the land of which Gabriel informed the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family) that I would be killed there. Umm Salama told me(2).

In a narration from Abu Mikhnaf in his Maqtal, by his chain from al-Kalbi, he said: They all traveled until they came to the land of Karbala, and that was on Wednesday. Hussein's (peace be upon him) horse stopped beneath him, so he dismounted from it and mounted another, but it would not stir a single step beneath him. He kept mounting one horse after another until he had mounted seven horses, all in this state. When the Imam saw this strange thing, he said (peace be upon him): What is this land called? They said: The land of al-Ghadiriyya. He said: Does it have a name other than this? They said: It is called Nineveh. He said: Does it have a name other than this? They said: It is called the Bank of the Euphrates. He said: Does it have a name other than this? They said: It is called Karbala.

Then he sighed deeply and said: A land of sorrow and affliction. Then he said: Halt, and do not depart from it. For here, by God, our mounts shall kneel; and here, by God, our blood shall be shed; and here, by God, our sanctity shall be violated; and here, by God, our men shall be killed; and here, by God, our children shall be slaughtered; and here, by God, our graves shall be set; and of this soil my grandfather, the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family), made me a promise, and there is no breaking of his word(3).

And how excellent are the words of the proof, Sheikh Ali al-Jishi, may God's mercy be upon him, when he says:

And how excellent are the words of the late Sheikh al-Fartusi when he says:

The Third Gathering, of the Fifth Day
The Passing of the Commander of the Faithful (peace be upon him) by Karbala
and His Weeping over Hussein (peace be upon him)
It is related in some of the visitations of the Imams of the Household (peace be upon them): O my masters, were the Chosen One to behold you, with the arrows of the nation buried deep in your livers, their lances thrust into your throats, their swords steeped in your blood, the sons of the harlots quenching the thirst of debauchery from your piety, and the rage

of disbelief from your faith—and you between one slain in the prayer-niche whose head the sword has split, and a martyr upon the bier whose shroud the arrows have pierced, and one killed in the open desert whose head is raised upon the spear-shaft, and one shackled in prison whose limbs are crushed with iron, and one poisoned whose entrails have been cut to pieces by the draughts of poison—surely we belong to God, and to Him we return, and there is no power and no strength except with God, the Most High, the Most Great. And how excellent are the words of Sheikh Abd al-Husayn al-Hayawi when he says:

Sheikh al-Saduq, may God's mercy be upon him, narrated from Ibn Abbas, who said: I was with the Commander of the Faithful (peace be upon him) on his expedition to Siffin. When he alighted at Nineveh, on the bank of the Euphrates, he said in a raised voice: O Ibn Abbas, do you know this place? I said to him: I do not know it, O Commander of the Faithful. He said (peace be upon him): Had you known it as I know it, you would not pass it without weeping as I weep.

He said: Then he wept long, until his beard was soaked and the tears flowed down upon his breast, and we wept together as he was saying: Alas, alas! What have I to do with the family of Abu Sufyan? What have I to do with the family of Harb, the party of Satan and the allies of disbelief? Patience, O Aba Abdillah, for your father has met the like of what you will meet from them.

Then he called for water and performed the ablution for prayer, and he prayed as much as God willed him to pray. Then he mentioned the like of his earlier words, except that he dozed for a moment at the conclusion of his prayer and his words, then awoke and said: O Ibn Abbas. I said: Here I am. He said: Shall I not tell you of what I saw just now in my sleep, when I dozed off? I said: Your eyes slept and you saw good, O Commander of the Faithful.

He said: I saw as if men had descended from heaven, with them white banners, having girded on

their swords, which were white and gleaming, and they had marked out a line around this land. Then I saw as if these palm trees had struck the ground with their branches, surging with fresh blood, and as if Hussein—my little one, my fledgling, my morsel, my marrow—was drowning in it, calling for help in it but unaided. And as if the white men had descended from heaven, calling out to him and saying: Patience, O Family of the Messenger, for you will be killed at the hands of the worst of people, and this is Paradise—O Aba Abdillah—longing for you. Then they consoled me and said: O Abu al-Hasan, rejoice, for God has comforted your eye through him on the day the people stand before the Lord of the Worlds.

Then I awoke thus. By Him in Whose hand is the soul of Ali, the truthful, the verified one, Abu al-Qasim (peace be upon him and his family), told me that I would see this land on my expedition against those who rebel against us. And this is the land of sorrow and affliction, in which Hussein (peace be upon him) will be buried, along with seventeen men of my offspring and the offspring of Fatima (peace be upon her). And it is indeed known in the heavens; the land of sorrow and affliction is mentioned just as the sacred spot of the two Holy Sanctuaries and the spot of Jerusalem are mentioned.

Then he said to me: O Ibn Abbas, search around it for gazelle droppings. For by God, I have not lied nor been lied to. They are yellow, their color the color of saffron. Ibn Abbas said: So I searched for them and found them gathered together. I called out to him: O Commander of the Faithful, I have found them just as you described to me. So Ali (peace be upon him) said: God and His Messenger (peace be upon him and his family) have spoken the truth.

Then he (peace be upon him) rose and hastened to them, and picked them up and smelled them, and said: It is them, the very same. Do you know, O Ibn Abbas, what these droppings are? These were smelled by Jesus, son of Mary. For he passed by here with the disciples, and he saw the gazelles gathered here, weeping. So Jesus sat down, and the disciples sat with him, and he wept, and the disciples wept, while they did not know why he sat or why he wept. They said: O Spirit of God and His Word, what makes you weep? He said: Do you know what land this is? They said: No. He said: This is a land in which the fledgling of the Messenger Ahmad (peace be upon him and his family) will be killed, the fledgling of the pure, free, chaste lady, the like of my mother. And he will be buried in it—soil more fragrant than musk, for it is the soil of the martyred fledgling.

And thus is the soil of the prophets and the children of the prophets. These gazelles speak to me and say: They graze in this land out of longing for the soil of the blessed fledgling, and they claim they are safe in this land. Then he struck his hand to these wild creatures and smelled them and said: These droppings of the gazelles are of this fragrance because of their pasture. O God, preserve them forever until his father smells them, that they may be a consolation and comfort to him.

He said: So they remained until this very day, and they have turned yellow with the length of their age. And this is the land of sorrow and affliction. Then he said in a raised voice: O Lord of Jesus, son of Mary! Bless not those who kill him, nor those who aid against him, nor those who abandon him.

Then he wept a long weeping, and we wept with him, until he fell upon his face and remained unconscious for a long while. Then he revived and took the droppings and bound them in his cloak, and ordered me to bind them likewise. Then he said: O Ibn Abbas, when you see them burst forth with fresh blood, and fresh blood flows from them, then know that Aba Abdillah has been killed there and buried.

Ibn Abbas said: By God, I guarded them more carefully than I guarded some of what God Almighty had made obligatory upon me, and I would not unfasten them from the edge of my sleeve. While I was asleep in the house, I awoke, and there they were flowing with fresh blood, and my sleeve had become filled with fresh blood. So I sat up weeping and said: By God, Hussein has been killed. By God, Ali never lied to me in anything he told me, nor did he ever inform me of anything that it would be except that it was so; for the Messenger of God (peace be upon him and his family) used to inform him of things he informed no one else of. So I took fright and went out, and that was near dawn, and by God, I saw Medina as if it were a mist in which no trace of any landmark could be made out. Then the sun rose, and I saw it as if eclipsed, and I saw the walls of Medina as if upon them was fresh blood. So I sat down weeping and said: By God, Hussein (peace be upon him) has been killed. And I heard a voice from the direction of the house, saying:

Then it wept in a raised voice, and I wept, and I fixed that hour in my memory. It was the month of Muharram, the day of Ashura, on the tenth that had passed of it. And I found that he was killed on the day whose news and date reached us thus. So I related this account to those who had been with him, and they said: By God, we heard what you heard while we were in the battle, and we did not know what it was, and we used to think it was al-Khidr (peace be upon him)(1).

And from Jarda' bint Samin, from her husband Harthama ibn Abi Muslim, who said: We waged war alongside Ali ibn Abi Talib (peace be upon him) at Siffin. When we returned, he alighted at Karbala and led us in the dawn prayer there. Then some of its soil was raised to him and he smelled it, then said: Oh, for you, O soil! From you shall be raised up peoples who will enter Paradise without reckoning.

So Harthama returned to his wife—who was a Shia of Ali (peace be upon him)—and said: Shall I not tell you about your master, Abu al-Hasan? He alighted at Karbala and prayed, then some of its soil was raised to him and he said: Oh, for you, O soil! From you shall be raised up peoples who will enter Paradise without reckoning. She said: O man, the Commander of the Faithful (peace be upon him) spoke nothing but the truth.

When Hussein (peace be upon him) arrived, Harthama said: I was among the detachment that Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad, may God curse them, had dispatched. When I saw the place and the trees, I remembered the saying. So I sat upon my camel, then went to Hussein (peace be upon him), greeted him, and informed him of what I had heard from his father at that place where Hussein had alighted. He said: Are you with us or against us? I said: Neither with you nor against you. I have left behind little children for whom I fear Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad. He said: Then go where you will not see our place of slaughter, nor hear our cry. For by Him in Whose hand is the soul of Hussein, no one hears our cry this day and does not aid us but that God casts him upon his face into the Fire of Hell(2).

And from al-Qaddah, from Ja'far ibn Muhammad, from his father (peace be upon them both), who said: Ali passed by Karbala, with

two of his companions. He said: When he passed by it, his eyes brimmed with tears, then he said: This is the place where their mounts will kneel, and this is where their baggage will be set down, and here their blood will be shed. Blessed are you, O soil, upon whom the blood of the beloved ones will be shed(1).

And how excellent are the words of Ibn al-Arandas, may God's mercy be upon him, when he says: