Today is Monday; 28th of the Iranian month of Aban 1397 solar hijri; corresponding to 11th of the Islamic month of Rabi al-Awwal 1440 lunar hijri; and November 19, 2018, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1382 solar years ago, on this day in 636 AD, the decisive Battle of Qadesiya, fought near al-Hirah around Kufa in present-day Iraq, resulted in the victory of Muslim forces over the powerful and numerically superior Sassanid army which was equipped with the dreaded war elephant corps that many times during the 4-day battle panicked the Arab cavalry. On the eve of the battle, in order to check the rapid advance of Muslims in Syria and Iraq, an alliance was formed between Iran’s Emperor Yazdegerd III and Emperor Heraclius of Byzantine (or Eastern Roman Empire), who married his granddaughter Manyanh to the Iranian monarch. The death of Iranian general Rustom Farrokhzad in the see-saw battle demoralized the Sassanid forces and their Arab Christian allies, resulting in defeat of the Persian Empire and start of the Islamization of Iraq and Iran. Qadisiyya was a small town on the west bank of the River Ateeq, a branch of the Euphrates near Hira, the ancient capital of the Lakhmid Arab Dynasty – a client state of the Sassanid Empire. The Muslims gained a large amount of spoils, including the famed jewel-encrusted royal standard, called “Derafsh-e Kaviyani” (Flag of Kaveh).

926 solar years ago, on this day in 1092 AD, Malik Shah I, Sultan of the Iran-based Seljuq Empire that including Iraq and parts of Syria, Anatolia, Afghanistan, Central Asia, and the Caucasus, died in Baghdad at the age of 39 after a 20-year reign, and was buried in his capital Isfahan. During his youth, he participated in the campaigns of his father Alp Arslan, along with the latter's able and efficient Iranian vizier, Nizam al-Mulk Tusi, including the decisive Battle of Manzikert in what is now Turkey, where the Byzantine Army was routed and Emperor Romanov IV taken prisoner, but later released. In 1066 at the age of 13, Alp Arsalan proclaimed him heir in a lavish ceremony in Marv and six years later in 1072 on the death of his father, he formally became sultan of the empire, but his accession was not peaceful, as he had to fight his uncle Qavurt, who claimed the throne. Nizam al-Mulk ably managed the vast empire, while Malik-Shah waged wars against the Qarakhanids Turks in the northeast, the Ghaznavids in the east and established order in the Caucasus. Malik-Shah's death, a month after the death of Nizam ul-Mulk, remains a mystery to this day. He is believed to have been poisoned by the Abbasid Caliph of Baghdad – some months after a debate between Sunni and Shi'a scholars which convinced Malik Shah and Nizam ul-Mulk of the rationality of the School of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).

868 lunar years ago, on this day in 572 AH, Qilij Arslan II, the Seljuqid Sultan of Roum defeated Byzantine Emperor Manuel Komnenos at the Battle of Myriokephalon. The defeat marked the end of Byzantine attempts to recover the Anatolian plateau, which was now lost to the Turks forever and today forms the center of the Republic of Turkey. Qilij Arslan died in 1192 after a reign of 36 years. He promoted Persian culture and was succeeded by Kaykhosrow.

307 solar years ago, on this day in 1711 AD, Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov, Russian polymath, scientist and writer, was born. He made important contributions to literature, education, and science. Among his discoveries were the atmosphere of Venus and the Law of Mass Conservation in chemical reactions. His spheres of science were natural science, chemistry, physics, mineralogy, history, art, philology, optical devices and others. Lomonosov was also a poet and influenced the formation of the modern Russian literary language.

212 solar years ago, on this day in 1806 AD, the blinded Moghal Emperor, Shah Alam II died at the age of 78 after a 45-year reign that saw his fortunes fluctuate in northern India until his authority was reduced to Delhi and its suburbs – till what is now the Indian capital’s Palam Airport. A famous Persian couplet of those days mockingly says: “Saltanat-e Shah-e Alam; Az-Dilli ta Palam” (King of the World’s Realm; from Delhi to Palam). Named Ali Gauhar, he was 11 years old when Iran’s Nader Shah Afshar invaded India. In 1759, on the murder of his father, Emperor Alamgir II by the treacherous vizier, Feroze Jung III Imad ul-Mulk, he managed to escape the Red Fort. In 1761 he was nominated as Emperor by Ahmad Shah Abdali – Nader Shah Afshar’s Afghan general and victor of the Battle of Panipat against the Marathas. In 1764, aided by the joint armies of Nawab Mir Qassim of Bengal and Nawab Shuja od-Dowla of Awadh, he fought the unsuccessful Battle of Buxar against the British, and was forced to sign the Treaty of Allahabad the next year that legitimized British control of the revenues of Bengal and Bihar. On his return to Delhi, he set about reforming the administration and the army, under his efficient vizier, Mirza Najaf Khan – an Iranian migrant and scion of the erstwhile Safavid Dynasty. He managed to defeat the Sikhs, the Jats, and the Pashtun Rohillas to assert his authority, but over a decade later, after the death of the able vizier, his fortunes reversed and the Red Fort was occupied by the Afghan rebel Abdul-Qader Rohilla, who blinded him in 1788. After restoration to the throne, he sought British protection as a titular ruler. An accomplished poet in Persian he wrote under the penname “Aftab”. He was succeeded by his son, Akbar Shah II – father of Bahadur Shah Zafar, whom the British deposed in 1857 to end the empire founded in 1526 by the Timurid prince, Zaheer od-Din Babar.

190 solar years ago, on this day in 1828 AD, the acclaimed Austrian song composer, Franz Schubert, died. He was born in a poor family in the vicinity of Vienna. Although he composed more than 600 songs, his ingenuity in classical music, and multiplicity of his works did not rescue him from poverty. His songs were welcomed after his death.

147 lunar years ago, on this day in 1293 AH, the great scholar and bibliographer, Grand Ayatollah Sheikh Mohammad Mohsin, popular as Aqa Bozorg Tehrani, was born in Tehran. His father Haji Ali was active in the tobacco boycott campaign of 1891 and later wrote a book on the history of the movement to thwart British exploitation of Iran’s economy, thanks to the historic fatwa of Ayatollah Mirza Hassan Shirazi. After preliminary education in his hometown Tehran, at the age of 26 he migrated to Holy Najaf for higher studies, and spent the rest of his life in Iraq, with the exception of four brief return visits to Iran and two short journeys to Syria, Egypt, and the Hejaz – for the Hajj pilgrimage. Among his teachers were Akhund Mullah Mohammad Kazem Ḵhorasani, Seyyed Mohammad Kazem Yazdi, Sheikh ash-Shari’a Isfahani and Mohaddith Mirza Hussain Noori. In turn he groomed several outstanding ulema including Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Hussaini Sistani – the current marja’ in Najaf. At the age of 40, he went to Samarra to join the circle of the revolutionary scholar Mirza Mohammad-Taqi Golshan Shirazi. During his 24-year stay in this city, before returning to Najaf, he conceived, and began to execute, the plan of a comprehensive bibliographical survey of all classes of literature produced by Shi’a Muslim authors. His original intention was to refute a statement by the Christian Arab litterateur, Jorji Zaydan, belittling the Shi’a contribution to Arabic literature. However, the masterpiece that Aqa Bozorg produced in almost 30 volumes, titled “adh-Dhari’a ila Tasaneef ash-Shi’a”, became a major contribution to Islamic scholarship. In this encyclopedic work, the titles of all books written by Shi’a authors are listed alphabetically, together with a brief indication of authorship and content, as well as place and date of publication in the case of printed works, and location in the case of manuscripts. He also compiled a biographical encyclopedia of Shi’a Muslim scholars as a companion to “adh-Dhari’a”, titled “Tabaqaat A’laam ash-Shi’a”, but each section, pertaining to the scholars of a given century, also has a separate title. Aqa Bozorg Tehrani’s influence was not limited to the admiration elicited by his decades of industrious scholarship. He exchanged numerous “ijazaat” (permissions of transmission) with the scholars of Hadith, both Shi’a and Sunni, whom he met in the course of his travels – a practice he consciously sought to revive as vital to the cultivation of Islamic scholarship. He was also widely regarded for his piety and asceticism: He regularly led congregational prayer at several mosques in Najaf, and on Tuesday afternoons, used to walk from Najaf to Kufa to pray at Masjid Sahla which was the house of Prophet Idris (Enoch) and will be headquarters of the Prophet’s 12th and Last Infallible Heir, Imam Mahdi (AS) during his global government of peace, prosperity and justice. He passed away in Najaf in 1389 AH at the age of 96 and was laid to rest in his own library.

135 solar years ago, on this day in in 1883 AD, German born engineer Carl Wilhelm Siemens, died in Britain at the age of 60.

167 solar years ago, on this day in 1851 AD, following court intrigues by local agents of foreign powers, on loss of their illegal interests, the highly efficient Iranian Prime Minister, Mirza Taqi Khan Amir Kabir, was deposed by the Qajarid king, Nasser od-Din Shah, for whom he had been guardian since his ascension to the throne as a boy and had saved Iran from the colonial designs of Britain and Russia. Within a couple of months, this statesman was killed in the “hammam” (bathhouse) of the famous garden-pavilion of Feen in the city of Kashan, where he was exiled. With Amir Kabir died the prospects of an independent Iran led by meritocracy. He had risen from lower rungs of the society through hard work, honesty, and voracious appetite for knowledge and eagerness to learn new techniques. He became prime minister of Mohammad Shah and within three years carried out important reforms. His achievements include the vaccination of Iranians against smallpox; economic development of the fertile Khuzestan Province; foundation in Tehran of the Dar ol-Fonoun Academy (for teaching medicine, surgery, pharmacology, natural history, mathematics, geology, and natural sciences to train the civilian and military staff); cancellation of the one-sided treaties with the Russians and the British; launching of a newspaper; crackdown on the seditious Babi-Bahai plot against Islam and the country; and execution of the heretic Mohammad Ali Bab.   

86 lunar years ago, on this day in 1354 AH, the prominent scholar and one of the renowned lecturers of the Najaf seminary, Ayatollah Seyyed Hassan Sadr passed away. He was an outstanding jurisprudent who had attained the status of Ijtehad while quite young. At the age of 16 he went to holy Najaf to study under the leading ulema and nine years later moved to holy Samarra to study under the celebrated scholar, Ayatollah Mirza Hassan Shirazi (famous for his fatwa against tobacco consumption in Iran). He returned to Kazemain seventeen years later and soon became the leading mujtahed. He groomed many scholars, and wrote several books, including "Ta'sees ash-Shi'a", “Role of Shi’a Scholars in Development of Islamic Sciences”, “The Shi’a Muslims and Promotion of Islamic Arts”, and a refutation of the absurd viewpoints of the pseudo Syrian scholar Ibn Taimiyya.

41 solar years ago, on this day in 1977 AD, Egyptian president, Anwar Sadaat, humiliated himself and betrayed the Palestinian cause with his official visit to the illegal Zionist entity called Israel. The visit enraged world Muslims, including Arabs, and especially Palestinians. A year later, Sadaat further betrayed the Palestinian cause by signing the scandalous Camp David Treaty in the US with the usurper Zionist entity. Most Muslim states severed ties with Egypt in protest, and finally Sadaat paid dearly for his treason when in October 1981 while inspecting a military parade he was executed in a revolutionary manner by Major Khaled Islambouli.

39 solar years ago, on this day in 1979 AD, as a humanitarian gesture to expose the colour, and gender discrimination in US society, the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA), ordered the release of 13 female and black Americans from among the scores of spies captured by Iranian revolutionary students on the seizure of the US espionage den in Tehran.

28 solar years ago, on this day in 1990 AD, the leaders of NATO and Warsaw Pact signed an agreement in Paris ending the Cold War between the Eastern and Western blocs. It was also agreed to end psychological warfare and reduce the weapons of these two military organizations. Soon, following the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the end of socialist rule in eastern European states, Warsaw Pact was dissolved, but in violation of the agreement, NATO not only did not disband but has continued to expand towards the east, stirring sedition and creating instability in world countries.

13 solar years ago, on this day in 2005 AD, a US-Saudi backed terrorist detonated an explosive rigged car in a crowd of Shi’ite Muslim mourners north of Baghdad, martyring over 50 people and causing injury to over a hundred others.

7 solar years ago, on this day in 2011 AD, a police vehicle of Bahrain’s repressive Aal-e Khalifa minority regime, deliberately crushed to death 16-year old Yousuf Ali Baghdar in the Juffair area of Manama, and when the funeral procession was held for the martyred teenager, the police forces brutally attacked the ceremony and injured scores of men, women, and children. The Persian Gulf island state of Bahrain is in the grip of popular revolution which the US and British-backed regime is trying to crush.   

5 solar years ago, on this day in 2013 AD, a double terrorist bombing at the Iranian embassy in Beirut martyred 23 people and injured 160 others. The damage to the Iranian embassy was slight and only one staffer suffered some wounds. The bombing was carried out by terrorists on the payroll of the Saudi Arabia and Israeli, trying to destabilize Syria and Lebanon.

AS/SS