Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS) – Paragon of Piety and Patience
Apr 11, 2019 02:32 UTC
Felicitations to you all on the 3rd successive day of rejoicing. Today on the 5th of Sha’ban we are celebrating the blessed birth anniversary of the Survivor of the heartrending tragedy of Karbala. He is none other than the son and successor of Imam Husain (AS).
Named Ali at birth in honour of his grandfather, the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS), this virtuous grandson of the Immaculate Lady, Hazrat Fatema Zahra (SA), became famous as Zain al-Abedin or Ornament of the Worshippers of God. Born in Medina in the year 38 AH, his mother was the pious Iranian princess, Shahrbano, and he was destined to be the 4th Infallible Heir of his great-grandfather Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). Stay with us for an interesting feature on the 4th Imam, whose day of birth is marked in the Islamic Republic of Iran as Day of the Freed Prisoners of War, as a tribute to Iran’s captured Muslim combatants, who returned home with dignity from the prisons of the repressive Ba’th minority regime of Saddam.
Before we present you a special programme on this blessed occasion, please listen to a moving supplication in the Divine Court.
"O Allah, bless Muhammad and the Progeny of Muhammad, the tree of prophethood, the locus of apostlehood, the descent of the angels, the repository of divine knowledge, of the notables of the house of revelation!
"O Allah, bless Muhammad and the Progeny of Muhammad, the Ark faring through deep oceans; those who embark it obtain safety and those who forsake it are drowned. Those who try to get ahead of them leave the bounds of faith, and those who lag behind them perish, and those who attach themselves to them join their fold…
"O Allah, bless Muhammad and the Progeny of Muhammad, the secure sanctuary, the aid of the distressed and the oppressed, the shelter of the refugees, and the asylum of those seeking haven…
"This is the month of Your Prophet, the chief of Your apostles—Sha'ban, which You have enveloped in Your mercy and Your approval, the month wherein it was the practice of the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and his progeny, to observe, until his death, its fast and to perform devotions during its nights and days, in order to do it honour and reverence out of humility before You!
"O Allah, so help us in following his example with regard to it and to win his intercession!"
The passages which you listened to are part of the famous supplication for the month of Sha'ban that believers are recommended to recite daily. The words and phrases are self-explanatory and unravel for us the keys of faith for a life of virtue in this transient world and salvation in afterlife.
The dynamic wordings that open up the floodgates of Divine Mercy were taught to us by the person whose birthday we are celebrating today.
It would be repetitive to say that Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS) was the son of Imam Husain (AS), was the grandson of Hazrat Fatema Zahra (SA) and Imam Ali (AS), and thus the great-grandson of Prophet Muhammad (SAWA).
As we said earlier, his peerless pedigree is crystal clear including the fact that his mother was the Iranian princess, Shahrbano (SA).
Born on the 5th of Sha'ban in the Prophet's city Medina in the year 38 AH, and named Ali (AS) in honour of his celebrated grandfather, he was two years old when the one and only Commander of the Faithful (Amir al-Mu'minin) was martyred in Iraq on the 21st of Ramadhan 40 AH, as a result of the fatal sword blow struck on his blessed head by the renegade Abdur-Rahman bin Muljim on 19th Ramadhan while engrossed in the Morning Prayer in the Mosque of Kufa.
In his late teens he married his first cousin, Fatema (SA) – daughter of his uncle Imam Hasan (AS) – who soon became the mother of his son and successor, Imam Muhammad al-Baqer (AS).
Those were the days of the 19-year long misrule by the Omayyad usurper Mu'awiyya bin Abu Sufyan, whose placing of his equally abominable son, Yazid, as caliph, in violation of the treaty signed with Imam Hasan (AS), brought about the tragedy of Karbala, and the subsequent captivity of members of the Prophet's Household including the 23-year old sick and bedridden son and heir of Imam Husain (AS).
He and his aunt Zainab's (SA) electrifying sermons in Yazid's court that led to the release of the Ahl al-Bayt from imprisonment in Damascus and return home to Medina, need not be recounted here.
It would also be tedious to focus on the often cited details of his 34-year imamate during which, in addition to bequeathing to humanity the unique set of supplications called Sahifat as-Sajjadiyya and the dynamic code of detailed rights known as Risalat al-Hoqouq, he groomed a core of scholars, thereby laying foundations of the academy of Medina that would flower in the days of his grandson, Imam Ja'far as-Sadeq (AS).
The 4th Imam of the Prophet's Ahl al-Bayt who was neither sick all his life, as some conjecture, nor kept himself aloof from public affairs, as others allege, was quite active in various domains, as is borne out by events of his life, despite the huge political pressures he had to endure.
For instance, during the initial years of his spiritual leadership of the ummah – 12 years to be exact – the Islamic state was torn between two imposters claiming to be caliphs and wantonly shedding Muslim blood.
One was Abdullah bin Zubair in the Hejaz and the other was Abdul-Malik bin Marwan in Syria. The latter finally triumphed and killed the former in 73 AH after blasphemously ordering the storming of the holy Ka'ba and destroying it, and that too in Zilhijja, the month of pilgrimage.
In between their tussles for power, these two criminals brutally massacred followers of the Prophet's Ahl al-Bayt, especially the Tawwabin (Penitents) who had risen to avenge the martyrdom of Imam Husain (AS), and Mukhtar bin Abu Obaidah Thaqafi, who succeeded in bringing to justice almost all those involved in the Karbala tragedy.
These were indeed critical times for Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS) who never had respite even after the fall of the Zubairis, for the tyrannical Ommayyad governor of Iraq, Hajjaj bin Yusuf al-Thaqafi, continued to slaughter the followers of the Prophet's Ahl al-Bayt for the next 20-odd years, to the tune of 100,000.
He proved admirably worthy of his name, to the extent that his piety and worship in the mode of his illustrious grandfather earned him the epithets of Zain al-Abedin (Ornament of the Worshippers) and Seyyed as-Sajedin (Chief of those Prostrating to God).
However, when people felt amazed at these unique characteristics of his, the Survivor of history's most heartrending tragedy used to say that these are nothing when compared to the peerless piety, patience, prostrations and other acts of worship of his revered grandfather, Imam Ali (AS).
As the 4th Infallible Successor of the Prophet, on many an instance during his 34-year mission, he demonstrated his God-given prowess – in the manner of his redoubtable grandfather –to remove any doubt that real authority belonged to him, and not to any pretender (like Abdullah bin Zubair) and neither to any of those tyrannical Omayyad rulers such as Yazid, Marwan, Abdul-Malik bin Marwan, Waleed… who masqueraded as caliphs.
His famous statement, while captive and still a youth of 23 years in the immediate aftermath of his father's martyrdom, exposed hypocrisy in the court in Damascus when he called the pulpit "mere planks of wood" because it had lost its sanctity under the Godless Omayyads and then mounting it stunned the whole audience by the words:
"O Yazid! This Muhammad (SAWA), whose name is being recited in the Azaan, was my (great) grandfather or yours; and if mine, how could you slay the Prophet’s grandson and still call yourself a Muslim?"
The tyrant had no choice but to soon free the Prophet's blessed family from imprisonment.
Another famous instance of his spiritual powers that were beyond the ken and control of any usurper was his effortless access to the sacred Black Stone at the Ka'ba when pilgrims were jostling to reach it and when the Omayyad governor of Mecca, Hesham bin Abdul-Malek, unable to near that holy spot, tried to deride him with the words: Who's is this?
Prompt came the reply from the great Arabic poet, Farazdaq, who was happened to be nearby and who composed a beautiful ode saying: He is the one who is recognized by the Ka'ba and the sanctuary; He is the most eminent person of the age and the (great grand)son of the Best of God's creation (the Prophet); He is the Appointee of God, and that very faith in Islam if from the House of this man.
Still on another occasion when his uncle Muhammad al-Hanafiyya, in order to disprove the dubious claims of a group of people who wrongly revered him as the Imam, approached the sacred Black Stone for answer, and got no reply, Imam Zain al-Abedin (AS) smiling stepped forward and saluted the seemingly inanimate object, which to the amazement of the audience responded by greeting him as the Emissary of God.
Yet despite the animosity of the Omayyads, the 4th Imam never hesitated when the progress and prosperity of the ummah was at stake. This is evident by his sending of his son, Imam Baqer (AS) to Damascus for setting up of the first mint in Islamic history – a move that saved the drain of bullion to the Byzrantine Empire for coins that were designed to insult and undermine Islamic beliefs.
No wonder we celebrate his birthday with more fervour every year and look forward to the day when his desecrated tomb in the Baqie Cemetery of Medina will be restored to its former glory.
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