Today is Monday; 17th of the Iranian month of Aban 1395 solar hijri; corresponding to 7th of the Islamic month of Safar 1438 lunar hijri; and November 7, 2016, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1386 solar years ago, on this day in 630 AD, Byzantine Emperor Constans II was born to Constantine III (son of the famous Heraclius). Baptized Herakleios and called Constantine the Bearded, Constans was a diminutive nickname given to him which established itself in Byzantine texts and has become standard in modern historiography. His 27-year reign saw steady loss of territory to the rising power of the Arab Muslims. In 642, he completely withdrew Byzantine forces from Egypt and struggled to stave off numerous attacks on the islands of the Mediterranean Sea and Aegean Sea by the Arabs. A Byzantine fleet occupied Alexandria in 645, but after a Muslim victory the following year this Egyptian port was abandoned. The situation was complicated by the suppression of Monothelitism (or theory that Jesus has two natures but one will) as well as the rebellion of Gregory, the Exarch of Carthage, in what is now Tunisia, who fell in battle against the advancing Arab army in 648. The caliphate’s forces, which a year earlier had entered Armenia and Cappadocia and sacked Caesarea Mazaca, raided Phrygia in 648, and in 649 they launched their first maritime expedition against the island of Crete. A major Arab offensive into Cilicia and Isauria in 650–651 forced Constans II to enter into negotiations with Osman's governor of Syria, Mu’awiyah, who in 654 treacherously broke the truce and renewed his raids by sea, plundering Rhodes. Constans led a fleet to attack the Arab invaders at Phoinike (off Lycia) in 655 at the Battle of the Masts, but he was defeated: 500 Byzantine ships were destroyed in the battle, and the Emperor himself was almost killed. When Imam Ali (AS), the righteous heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), took over the caliphate, the senseless raids, plunders, and killing of Christians and other peoples, were halted. Constans took this respite to devote himself to European affairs in the Balkans and Italy, moving his capital to Syracuse on the island of Sicily, entrusting administration of Constantinople and the eastern provinces to his son and successor Constantine IV as co-emperor. Imam Ali (AS) believed in winning hearts through rational discourse about the dynamism of Islam rather than unnecessary wars or occupation of the lands of other nations. With the martyrdom of Imam Ali (AS) and the seizure of the caliphate by Mu’awiyah from Imam Hasan (AS), the Arabs renewed their raids against the Byzantine. On September 15, 668, Constans II was assassinated in his bath by his chamberlain.

1388 lunar years ago, on this day in 50 AH, according to a narration, Imam Hassan al-Mujtaba (AS), the elder grandson and 2nd Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), was martyred at the age of 47 through a fatal dose of poison, given on the orders of the usurper Mu'awiyyah Ibn Abu Sufyan. He was over seven years at the passing away of the Prophet, who hailed him along with his younger brother, Imam Husain (AS), as Leaders of the Youth of Paradise. At the age of 37, the mantle of Imamate came to rest on his shoulders, following the martyrdom of his father, Imam Ali Ibn Abi Taleb (AS). Some seven months later, because of the treachery of those who claimed to be his followers, but had succumbed to threats and bribes of the enemies of humanity by refusing to decisively confront them, he relinquished the caliphate and retired to his hometown Medina, after stipulating certain conditions for the next ruler. The Omayyad rebel Mu'awiyyah ibn Abu Sufyan seized the caliphate, broke all accords, violated the laws of Islam, and finally administered poison to Imam Hasan (AS). Some scholars consider the 28^th of Safar as the day of martyrdom of Imam Hasan (AS).  

1310 lunar years ago, on this day in 128 AH, Imam Musa al-Kazem (AS), the 7th Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) was born in Abwa between the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. At the age of 20, the mantle of divine leadership came to rest on his shoulders following the martyrdom of his father, Imam Ja’far Sadeq (AS), through poisoning. His period of Imamate was 35 years, during which he was subjected to hardships by the Abbasid tyrants – Mansour, Mahdi, Hadi, and Haroun. His epithet “Kazem” means Restrainer of Anger, and despite frequent bouts of imprisonment he showed profound patience and forbearance, even in the dungeons of Haroun, who eventually martyred him through poisoning in 183 AH in Baghdad. Today, his magnificent gold-plated shrine is the centre of pilgrimage in the Kazemayn suburb of Baghdad, while no traces remain of the graves of the Abbasid tormentors.

1022 solar years ago, on this day in 994 AD, the Spanish Muslim philosopher and scientist, Ali ibn Ahmad ibn Sa’eed, known popularly as Ibn Hazm al-Andalusi, was born in Cordova. His great-grandfather Hazm had embraced Islam and the family claimed to be of Iranian descent. As a theologian, he was a leading proponent in Spain of the Zaheri School of jurisprudence founded by the Iranian Sunni jurist, Dawoud az-Zaheri al-Isfahani, who opposed the “qiyas” or analogy of his compatriot Abu Hanifa. He reportedly wrote 400 works on a variety of topics, of which only 40 still survive. At a time when Christian Europe was immersed in the age of ignorance and thought the world as flat, Ibn Hazm by citing hadith and stating ayahs of the holy Qur’an proved that the earth is spherical with emphasis on ayah 5 of Surah Zumar, where God Almighty says: the night overlaps the day, and the day overlaps the night. Ibn Hazm pointed out that for this cycle of overlapping the Qur’an uses the word “kawwara” which is derived from “kurra”, meaning "ball" or "sphere". With the help of a globe he demonstrated that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth.

783 lunar years ago, on this day in 655 AH, the Sufi scholar of Punjab, Shaikh Baha od-Din Zakariyya al-Quraishi, passed away in Multan at the age of 100 years. He was a student of the famous Iranian Sufi, Shahab od-Din Suhrawardi, who initiated him in the mystical order at his hospice in Baghdad. The mausoleum of Baha od-Din Zakariyya in Pakistan, mounted by a hemispherical dome, is visited throughout the year by devotees. Almost all Sufi orders trace their spiritual lineage to Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS), the First Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).

644 lunar years ago, on this day in 794 AH, Zafar Khan, sent by the Tughlaq sultan of Delhi defeated and killed Malik Mufarrah Farhat u1-Mulk, the rebellious governor of Gujarat, at Kambhu near Nahrwala, founded the village of Jitpur on the site of the victory, and made the city of Anhilwada Patan his capital. Son of the Rajput convert to Islam Wajih ul-Mulk, whose sister was Firuz Shah Tughlaq’s wife, Zafar Khan consolidated his rule in Gujarat, and when the Tughlaq sultanate collapsed as a result of the invasion of the Central Asian conqueror, Amir Timur, he declared himself independent with the title Muzaffar Shah I. He died after a 20-year reign. His son Ahmad Shah I built the city of Ahmadabad as the new capital. The dynasty ruled for almost 200 years, until the conquest of Gujarat by the Mughal Empire. The sultanate reached its peak under Mahmoud Shah I Begara, extending east into Malwa and west to the Gulf of Kutch. During the Muzaffarid rule, Ahmadabad grew to become one of the largest and wealthiest cities in the world, and the sultans were patrons of a distinctive architecture that blended Islamic elements with Gujarat's indigenous Hindu and Jain architectural traditions. The court language was Persian and the Sultans of Gujarat maintained infrequent ambassadorial relations with Iran.

590 solar years ago, on this day in 1426 AD, the Lam Son Uprising in Vietnam led by Le Loi emerged victorious against the Ming army of China in the Battle of Tot Dong–Chuc Dong near what is now Hanoi. Two years later in 1428 China conceded defeat and it occupation forces surrendered to the Vietnamese. Le Loi, rather than putting to death the captured Ming soldiers and administrators, magnanimously provided ships and supplies to send them back to China. He ascended the throne, taking the reign name Le Thai To and establishing the Le dynasty (1428-1788).

524 solar years ago, on this day in 1492 AD, the Ensisheim meteorite, the oldest meteorite with a known date of impact, struck the earth around noon in a wheat field outside the village of Ensisheim, in Alsace, France.

514 solar years ago, on this day in 1502 AD, Shah Ismail I, was crowned as the first Safavid emperor of Iran in Tabriz at the age of 15. Born in Ardabil to the head of the Safaviyya Sufi order, Sultan Haidar, and his wife Martha, the daughter of the Aq Qoyounlu ruler, Uzun Hassan by his Greek wife Theodora (Despina Khatun), in 1500, as the direct descendant of the famous mystic, Safi od-Din Ardabeli, Ismail launched his campaign in Erzinjan (presently in Turkey). Assisted by a 7,000 force of Qizl-Bash (literally ‘Red-Heads’ from the colour of their caps) Turkic tribes of Rumlu, Shamlu, Ustajlu, Qajar, Afshar, Zul-Qadr, Tekulu, and Varsak, he then defeated the Shirvan-Shah, took control of Baku (presently in the Republic of Azerbaijan) and crowned himself as king. By 1509, he unified all of Iran, Iraq, the Caucasus, parts of Central Asia, and western Afghanistan, and took the title of Shah of Persia. After a reign of 23 years, he passed away at the age of 37. He was an adventurous personality and gave to Iran its present national and religious identity. The dynasty founded by him lasted 235 years and revived Iran's Islamic glories in science, art, architecture, philosophy, culture, Persian literature, and promotion of the teachings of the Prophet's Ahl al-Bayt. He traced his lineage to Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) through Hamza, a son of the 7th Infallible Imam, Musa al-Kazem (AS). Hence he wielded spiritual influence outside Iran as well amongst the followers of the Ahl al-Bayt in Iraq, Syria, Anatolia (modern Turkey), the Caucasus, Central Asia and Deccan in India.

389 solar years ago, on this day in 1627 AD, Noor od-Din Jahangir, the 4th Grand Mughal Emperor of Hindustan (northern subcontinent) and eastern Afghanistan, died at the age of 58 after a reign of 22 years in his capital Lahore (Pakistan), where his mausoleum and the Shalimar Gardens he built are a famous tourism site. He ruled, mostly with the assistance of his Iranian wife, Noor Jahan, and maintained excellent relations with Shah Abbas the Great of Iran. Jahangir was also a poet and writer in both Persian and his native Chaghtai Turkic. The bleak record of his rule, however, was martyrdom of the famous Iranian Islamic scholar in Agra, Qazi Seyyed Noorollah Shoushtari, the author of such famous books as “Majalis al-Momineen” and “Ahqaq al-Haq”. He was under the influence of alcohol when he signed the decree drafted by jealous court mullahs. Later he rued his decision and with the help of his wife, he executed the plotters for the murder of Qazi Shushtari, who is famous in India as "Shaheed Thalleth" (Third Martyr).

286 lunar years ago, on this day in 1152 AH, Nadir Shah Afshar of Iran left Delhi with a booty estimated between 80-to-145 million rupees, which included the famous diamond encrusted Peacock Throne of Emperor Shahjahan, the Tent of Pearls and the world’s largest diamond, Koh-e Noor (Mountain of Light). Nader Shah had invaded the Mughal Empire due to the inability of Emperor Mohammad Shah ‘Rangileh’ to stop the infiltration of the Hotaki Afghan rebels fleeing into India after the end of their occupation of Iran. He won a decisive victory in the Battle of Karnal near Lahore, and then along with the defeated Mohammad Shah, whom he treated with respect, marched into Delhi, where he stayed for several days, before returning to Iran after restoring the Mughal Emperor to power.

205 solar years ago, on this day in 1811 AD, the Battle of Tippecanoe was fought between native Amerindians and the US forces led by William Henry Harrison, who resorted to deceit and breach of treaty to defeat Shawnee chiefs, Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa, the leaders of a confederacy of native Amerindians from various tribes opposing US expansionism in North America. The natives maintained that all America is their ancestral land, which cannot be sold to the invaders from Europe. Two years later in 1813, the US occupiers killed the chiefs and carried out genocide and ethnic cleansing on a wide scale to add more states and territories to the original 13 New England colonies that had banded together as the United States of America and broke away from British rule.

193 solar years ago, on this day in 1823 AD, the Monroe Doctrine was announced by the 5th US president, James Monroe, for keeping out European powers from North and South America, so that the US could exploit the Latin American states by messing up their affairs. The US also undertook the pledge against meddling in Europe’s affairs – a pledge that has never been kept. This controversial doctrine actually was the start of US expansionism and colonization of other lands.

154 solar years ago, on this day in 1862 AD, the exiled titular Mughal Emperor, Siraj od-Din Mohammad Bahadur Shah II “Zafar”, died in prison in Rangoon (Yangon, capital of Myanmar) at the age of 87 and was buried in an unmarked grave by his British captors. In 1837, he had succeeded his father Akbar Shah II to the throne of Delhi, whose jurisdiction did not extend beyond the Red Fort. During the uprising of 1857, he became an unwilling instrument of the rebels, whose allegiance to him brought about British vengeance, resulting in his humiliating dethronement and exile to Burma in 1858, thus ending over three and a quarter centuries of the rule of the Timurid dynasty, founded by Zaheer od-Din Babar – a protege of Shah Ismail, the Founder of the Safavid Empire of Iran. His sons and grandsons were shot in cold-blood by the British, who sadistically sent their heads to the aging father as gifts on the day of Nowrouz (Spring Equinox), when traditional celebrations were in progress for the new solar hijri year. Zafar was an accomplished poet in both Persian and Urdu.

149 solar years ago, on this day in 1867 AD, Marie Sklodowska Curie, was born in the Polish Capital, Warsaw. She went to Paris to study physics, where while studying at Sorbonne University she got married to French physician, Pierre Curie, whose surname she adopted. After years of research on uranium minerals her experiments in 1898 led to discovery of two new elements. She separated polonium and then radium a few months later. The quantity of radon in radioactive equilibrium with a gram of radium was named “curie”. With Henri Becquerel and her husband, she was awarded the 1903 Nobel Prize for physics. In 1911, she was sole winner of a second Nobel Prize, this time in chemistry. Her family won five Nobel awards in two generations. She died of radiation poisoning in 1934.

137 solar years ago, on this day in 1879 AD, Russian Marxist leader, Leon Trotsky, was born. He was deported twice to Siberia for his activities against Czarist rule, and managed to escape both times. After the victory of the February Revolution in 1917, he returned home and when the Bolsheviks seized power, he was appointed as the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs. A year later, he was named the People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs. Later, he was involved in a power struggle with Joseph Stalin, who after the death of Vladimir Lenin, seized power, expelled Trotsky from the communist party, exiled him, and finally had him assassinated in 1940 in Mexico. Trotsky was one of the ideologues of the Bolshevik Revolution and had differences of opinion with Lenin. He wrote a number of books including “History of the Russian Revolution” and “The Revolution Betrayed”.

99 solar years ago, on this day in 1917 AD, with World War I raging, the Bolsheviks, led by Lenin and Trotsky, hijacked the February Revolution of the Russian people by toppling the interim government of Alexander Kerensky and seizing power in post Czarist Russia. Kerensky, empowered by the people’s discontent with the corrupt and oppressive rule of the Czars, coupled with their fragility in the face of foreign enemies, had formed the government on March 15, 1917 by forcing Nicolas II to resign. The Bolsheviks, by deceiving the people with slogans of peace, bread, and distribution of land, seized power and set up the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics (USSR) – a highly repressive system that choked the life, freedom, and religion of the people for 74 years, before collapsing in 1991.

63 solar years ago, on this day in 1953 AD, Mohammad Reza Shah of the British-installed Pahlavi regime after being restored to the Peacock Throne in Tehran by the US-engineered coup of August 19, 1953, ordered the trial of the overthrown popularly elected Prime Minister Dr. Mohammad Mosaddeq, in a military court. The charges against him were nationalization of Iranian oil industry and resistance to the US-British coup. Mosaddeq defended nationalization of the Iranian oil industry to end its exploitation by the British oil firms, and denounced the coup to topple his elected government as violation of Iran’s sovereignty. The military court sentenced him to a 3-year prison term, after the expiry of which he was kept under house arrest for eleven years until his death in 1967.

60 solar years ago, on this day in 1956 AD, the Suez War ended with the mediation of the UN. The war had started with the invasion of Sinai Peninsula by the illegal Zionist entity, and the raid on the Suez Canal region by its backers, the British and the French. The pretext for the invasion of Egypt by these three states was nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egyptian president, Jamal Abdun-Naser.

41 solar years ago, on this day 1975 AD in Bangladesh, a joint force of people and soldiers took part in an uprising led by Colonel Abu Tahir to oust and kill coup leader Brigadier Khalid Musharraf, thereby freeing the then house-arrested army chief and future president Major-General Zia ur-Rahman.

35 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, Will James Durant, American historian and philosopher, died at the age of 96. He is best known for “The Story of Civilization”, in 11 volumes which were written in collaboration with his wife Ariel Durant and published between 1935 and 1975. He acknowledged the rich contribution to world civilization of Islamic scientists, regarding whose inventions and innovations he has widely written, saying still thousands of Arabic and Persian manuscripts in libraries waiting to be discovered, in order to present a proper picture of the heyday of Islamic civilization. He also wrote “The Story of Philosophy” in 1926.

30 solar years ago, on this day in 1986 AD, prominent writer, researcher and translator, Karim Keshavarz, passed away at the age of 86. Born in Rasht, the capital of Gilan Province, he was proficient in English, French and Russian. He was also politically active and was subjected to bouts of prison by the Pahlavi regime. His famous work is “Hazar Saal Nasr Parsi” (A Thousand years of Persian Literature).

29 solar years ago, on this day in 1987, Tunisian Prime Minister Zain al-Abidine bin Ali overthrew his mentor President Habib Bourquiba and assumed dictatorial powers of the country. The openly anti-Islamic Bourquiba had seized power from the Husaynid Dynasty following independence from France in 1956 and ruled Tunisia with an iron fist for almost three decades. Zain al-Abidin bin Ali’s despotic rule ended in January 2011 when he was overthrown in a popular uprising. After elections, the Islamic party, an-Nahdha, led by Rashed Ghannoushi, has assumed power of the country. Tunisia covers an area of more than 163,000 sq km. it shares borders with Algeria and Libya and is situated south of the Mediterranean Sea.

27 solar years ago, on this day in 1411 AH, the renowned Bibliophile and Source of Emulation, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Shahab od-Din Mar’ashi Najafi, passed away in holy Qom. Son of Iranian jurisprudent, Seyyed Shams od-Din Mahmoud, he was born in holy Najaf and educated at the famous Najaf Seminary, attending the classes of the Ayatollahs, Mirza Abu’l- Hassan Meshkini, Sheikh Mohammad Hussain Shirazi, Seyyed Habib od-Din Shahrestani and Seyyed Ibrahim Shafei Rafaei Baghdadi. He studied for some years at the seminaries of Samarra and Kazemayn as well. He mastered theology, hadith, jurisprudence, exegesis of the Holy Qur'an, philosophy, ethics, and biography of narrators. After attaining the status of Ijtehad, at the request of Grand Ayatollah Sheikh Abdul-Karim Ha'eri Yazdi, the revivalist of the Qom seminary, he came to this holy city where he lectured and carried out research for six decades until he passed away at the age of 96. For over fifty years he led the daily ritual prayers at the shrine of Hazrat Fatemah al-Ma’sumah in Qom. In his youth in Najaf, he had become growingly concerned with the immense wealth of Islamic knowledge that was being lost in the displacement and destruction of Islamic texts. He took it upon himself to purchase as many rare books and manuscripts that he could on his modest student stipend in order to preserve them. When his stipend was exhausted he took a job at a rice cleaning factory in Najaf, performed Qadha prayers and fasts on behalf of others, and ate only one meal a day in order to raise enough money to purchase these books. He continued to collect these rare manuscripts after migration to Iran, eventually laying the foundation before his death of the Grand Mar’ashi Najafi Library in Qom, which today contains the world’s largest collection of manuscripts of the School of the Prophet’s Ahl al-Bayt, among its more than 300,000 books. Earlier in 1965, he had presented 278 rare Arabic and Persian manuscripts to the College of Divinity and Theology of the University of Tehran. He also donated many such books to libraries across Iran, before formal establishment of his library.

19 solar years ago, on this day in 1997 AD, the famous Iranian author, Seyyed Mohammad Ali Jamalzadeh, passed away in Geneva, Switzerland at the age of 106. He was born in a religious family in the city of Isfahan. His father, Seyyed Jamaleddin Va'ez, was an active religious leader of the Constitutional Movement, who attained martyrdom. He followed his father’s path and was active in the Constitutional Movement. He travelled to France for higher studies and graduated in Law. He returned to Iran during World War I while the country was occupied by the British and Russian troops. His activities for liberation of Iran were inconclusive and he went to Germany, and later worked in the International Labour Bureau in Geneva, Switzerland. His literary life started when he was almost 50 years of age. His writings were simple and to the point. Hence, his stories, which were about social and political developments in Iran, were warmly welcomed by the people. He acquired the epithet of Father of Iran’s Story-Writing. He was also fluent in Arabic, German, and French. Among his famous works are “Yeki Bood Yeki Nabood” (Once Upon a Time), “Farsi Shekar Ast” (Persian is Sugar), “Sahra-e Mahshar” (The Plain of Resurrection) and “Ghair az Khoda Hichkas Nabood” (None Existed Except God).

4 solar years ago, on this day in 2012 AD, the repressing Aal-e Khalifa minority regime of Bahrain illegally evoked the citizenship of 31 men, including exiled political activists and former opposition members of Parliament, as part of its measures to change the demography of this Persian Gulf island state.

AS/MG