Today is Sunday; 23rd of the Iranian month of Aban 1395 solar hijri; corresponding to 13th of the Islamic month of Safar 1438 lunar hijri; and November 13, 2016, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1135 lunar years ago, on this day in 303 AH, the well-known Iranian Sunni Muslim compiler of Hadith, Ahmad ibn Shu’aib ibn Ali an-Nasa’i, passed away at the age of 89. He was born in a village near the ancient Parthian capital of Nasa in Khorasan, northeastern Iran (presently in Turkmenistan). When he was 20 years old, he started his journey in pursuit of knowledge and covered Transoxiana, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Hijaz, and Egypt, where he settled. He is the author of "Sunnan an-Nasa’i", one of the six canonical hadith collections of Sunni Muslims. Towards the end of his life he wrote a book on the unrivalled virtues and merits of Prophet Mohammad's (SAWA) divinely-decreed vicegerent, Imam Ali (AS), titled "Khasa’es Amir al-Mominin Ali". When he recited this excellent book from the pulpit of the main mosque of Damascus, he was attacked by enemies of the Ahl al-Bayt and was severely beaten. He left Syria and while on his way to Egypt, succumbed to his wounds in Palestine.

1068 lunar years ago, on this day in 370 AH, the prominent Iranian philologist of the Arabic language and exegete of the Holy Qur’an, Mohammad Ibn Ahmad al-Azhari al-Harawi, passed away at the age of 88 in his hometown Herat, in what is now Afghanistan, but which is historically part of Iran’s Khorasan. While on the Hajj pilgrimage at the age of 30, he was captured by Arab tribes and learned their accent in captivity, using this accent and dialect in his book. He attended the classes of prominent Ulema in Baghdad before returning to Herat. His most important book is "Tahdhib al-Lugha", spread over 15 volumes on philology in which he has frequently cited the unmatched eloquence of Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS) and quoted some of the sermons of the Imam, decades before Seyyed Radhi compiled the “Nahj al-Balaghah”. He has compiled exegesis of Holy Qur’an and Hadith.

1014 solar years ago, on this day in 1002 AD, English king Æthelred II ordered the killing of all Danish men in England. Known till this day as the St. Brice's Day Massacre, it resulted in the killing of thousands of people, including Danish women. Among those slain were Gunhilde, the sister of King Sweyn I of Denmark, along with her husband Pallig Tokesen, the Danish Ealdorman of Devonshire.

873 solar years ago, on this day in 1143 AD, King Fulk of the usurper Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, established in Palestine by the Crusader occupiers from Europe, died a horrible death while hunting when his horse stumbled. He fell and his skull was crushed by the saddle, while his brain gushed forth from both ears and nostrils. Born in France, he was Count of Anjou for twenty years before coming to Palestine to marry Melisende, the eldest daughter of Baldwin II, whom he succeeded in 1131. His 12-year reign was marked by battles with the Fatemids of Egypt and the rising power of the Zangids of Syria, who decisively defeated him in 1137 in the Battle of Baarin. The usurper Latin Kingdom ended in 1187 after 88 years of occupation when a united Muslim army of Arabs, Kurds, Iranians and Turks liberated Bayt al-Moqaddas.

392 solar years ago, on this day in 1624 AD, Dutch Orientalist, Thomas van Erpe (Erpenius), died at the age of 40 in Leiden, while preparing an edition of the Holy Qur’an with a Latin translation and notes. Born in Gorinchem, Holland, he travelled to France and Italy, learning and perfecting Arabic, Turkish, Persian and Ethiopic languages. After a long absence, he returned to Holland in 1612, and in February 1613 was appointed professor of Arabic and other Oriental languages. Among his works are “Grammatica Arabica”, “Grammatica Ebraea generalis” (Hebrew), “Grammatica Chaldaica et Syria” (Chaldean & Syriac) and an edition of Elmacin's “History of the Saracens”.

245 lunar years ago, on this day in 1193 AH, Mohammad Karim Khan Zand, the founder of the Zand Dynasty of Iran, died in his capital Shiraz at the age of 74 after a reign of 29 years, during which he restored stability to the country in the chaotic aftermath of Nader Shah Afshar’s assassination in 1747, by establishing his rule almost all over Iran, along with Basra and parts of the Caucasus, except for Greater Khorasan. To legitimize his rule, he placed the Safavid prince, Ismail III, as a figurehead, and never took the title of Shah, contenting himself with the honourary epithet “Wakil ar-Re’aya” (Representative of the People). As a general of Nader Shah, he had taken active part in most of the military campaigns, and on assuming rule of the country, he devoted himself to the rebuilding of the economy and administration based on social justice. He built the famous Wakil Mosque, Wakil Bazaar and Wakil Bath in Shiraz. To this day, Karim Khan Zand has a reputation as one of the most just and able rulers in Iranian history. On his death, civil war broke out once more, his sons died in mysterious circumstances, and none of his successors were able to rule the country as effectively as he had. The last of his heirs, Lotf Ali Khan Zand, was treacherously killed by Agha Mohammad Khan, who founded the Qajar dynasty in 1794.

236 solar years ago, on this day in 1780 AD, Founder of the Sikh kingdom in the northwest parts of the Subcontinent, Maharaja Ranjit Singh, was born in Gujranwala, Punjab. Acquainted with the Persian language, he began as a young soldier in the service of the Afghan king, Zamaan Shah Durrani, who made him governor of a part of Punjab. He then assembled his Sikh army and began war with his Afghan benefactors by seizing Lahore and ending their rule in Punjab. He desecrated the grand Badshahi Mosque of Lahore by turning it into a stable. In 1818, he occupied Multan and advanced upon Peshawar. His dreams of invading Afghanistan did not materialize, but when Shah Shuja sought asylum with the Sikhs, Ranjit Singh forced him to give up the fabulous Koh-e Noor diamond which Nader Shah of Iran had taken from the Mughal Emperor Mohammad Shah of Delhi and which after him had fallen to the share of the Afghan general, Ahmad Shah Abdali Durrani. In 1849, when the British defeated the Sikhs, they seized Koh-e Noor which is Persian for Mountain of Light and which is currently in the crown of the British queen. He died in 1839 after a reign of nearly forty years and within ten years the empire he had built up by conquering Punjab, Kashmir, and the Pashtu areas up to the frontier of Afghanistan, was annexed by the British.

175 solar years ago, on this day in 1841 AD, James Braid first saw a demonstration of animal magnetism that led to his study of the subject he eventually called hypnotism.

166 solar years ago, on this day in 1850 AD, English author, Robert Louis Stevenson, was born in Edinburgh, in Scotland. He wrote several books including the famous work “Treasure Island”. He died in 1894.

102 solar years ago, on this day in 1914 AD, Berber Muslim tribesmen inflicted the heaviest defeat on French forces in Morocco at the Battle of El-Herri. The cause of the battle was the opposition of the confederation of Zaian tribes continued French expansion into the interior of Morocco. Almost the entire French garrison was wiped out, including around a thousand Frenchmen, in addition to an equal number of mercenaries made up of Algerians, Tunisians, and Senegalese.

95 solar years ago, on this day in 1921 AD, Orientalist, Ignaz Goldziher, a Hungarian Jewish scholar of Islam, died at the age of 71 in Budapest. Along with the German Theodor Noldeke and the Dutch Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje, he is considered the founder of modern Islamic studies in Europe. In 1873, he began a journey through Syria, Palestine and Egypt, and took the opportunity of attending lectures of Muslim sheiks in the mosque of al-Azhar in Cairo. In 1890 he published the book “Muhammedanische Studien” in which he showed the Hadith works of Sunni compilers, reflected the legal and doctrinal controversies of the two centuries after the passing away of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) rather than the exact words of the Prophet of Islam himself.

46 solar years ago, on this day in 1970 AD, a major cyclone, named Bhola, struck Bangladesh, concurrent with the peak of the independence struggle of the people against Pakistan. Some 500,000 people were killed and over a million others wounded. Furthermore, hundreds of thousands lost their homes and hearths while heavy losses and damages were inflicted upon residential areas, farms, factories, and economic installations. Every year storms and floods wreak havoc on Bangladesh.

8 solar years ago, on this day in 2008 AD, in Peshawar in northwestern Pakistan gunmen kidnapped Iranian diplomat Hashmatullah Attarzadeh, and killed his local guard. Iranian intelligence agents freed Attarzadeh in late March, 2010.

AS/ME