Restatement of the History of Islam and Muslims [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

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Restatement of the History of Islam and Muslims [Electronic resources] - نسخه متنی

Sayed Ali Asghar Rizwy

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The Assassination of Ali


FROM THE SECOND HALF OF 658, MUAWIYA, the governor
of Syria, had been steadily escalating violence against the dominions of Ali. Some of his
inroads reached Ain-at-Tamar and Anbar, only 170 miles north of Kufa. The men of Kufa were
so unwilling to fight against the Syrians that Ali found it impossible to take effective
punitive action. Muawiya himself led a raid right across the Jazira from Raqqa to Mosul,
and met no resistance anywhere. At last, Ali declared in the mosque of Kufa that he would
leave the city with the few of his faithful followers in an attempt to halt the Syrian
aggression against Iraq, even if it cost him his life. This threat awakened the citizens
of Kufa to the specter of being left leaderless if Ali was killed fighting against the
Syrians. They were stung into action and they began to mobilize for defense.

The battle of Siffin had been the first trial of
strength between Ali and Muawiya. Militarily, the battle had been a near-victory for Ali,
but politically, it had become a stalemate. After some time, it began to appear that Ali
would take up the challenge of Muawiya. But just then Ali was assassinated in the mosque
of Kufa, and the second trial of strength never took place.

According to the historical accounts some of which
are quite plausible, three Kharjis met in Kufa (some say in Makkah) to hatch a conspiracy.
Each of them volunteered to kill each of the three leading political figures of the
Dar-ul-Islam – Ali, Muawiya and Amr bin Aas. By killing them, it is alleged, they
hoped to put an end to civil wars in Islam, and to restore peace to the Muslim umma.

One of the three conspirators was a certain Abdur
Rahman bin Muljam. He stayed in Kufa to kill Ali, and the other two went to Syria and
Egypt to kill Muawiya and Amr bin Aas. The plans of the would-be assassins of Muawiya and
Amr bin Aas, according to the stories in circulation, went awry, and they were captured
and were executed.

The Kharjis had been defeated at Nehrwan, and most
of them had perished in the battle but a few had escaped. Abdur Rahman bin Muljam was one
of those who had escaped. He was consumed with the desire to kill Ali, and was in quest of
an opportunity to do so. By a coincidence, he met a Kharji woman, one Qattama, whose
father and brothers had also been killed in Nehrwan, and she too had nursed an undying
hatred of Ali.

Abdur Rahman fell in love with Qattama, and proposed
marriage to her. She told him that the price of her hand was the head of Ali ibn Abi
Talib. This only strengthened Abdur Rahman in his resolution. He promised his inamorata
the moon if she asked for it, but she said that nothing was of interest to her if she
could not get the head of Ali ibn Abi Talib!

Abdur Rahman bin Muljam carefully worked out his
plans to kill Ali. A few other trusted Kharjis also volunteered their services to him, and
together they rehearsed the assassination. Abdur Rahman bin Muljam took one extra
precaution – he put his sword in deadly poison, and let it soak in it for three days.

On the morning of the 19th of Ramadan of the year 40
A.H., Ali came into the Great Mosque of Kufa, and called Adhan (the call to prayer). He
took his place in the alcove, and moments later, the worshippers began to arrive. They
stood behind him in serried ranks, and the prayer began. Standing in the front row, with
other worshippers, were Abdur Rahman bin Muljam and his confederates. They were watching
Ali's movements. In the folds of their cloaks, they were carrying swords burnished to a
high sheen, and soaked in poison.

Just when Ali touched the ground with his forehead
for sajda, Abdur Rahman bin Muljam stepped out of his row, and crept into the alcove. And
just when Ali lifted his head from the ground, ibn Muljam struck the fatal blow at his
forehead with such deadly force that it split open.

Blood squirted from Ali's forehead in several jets,
and he exclaimed:

"By the Lord of the Kaaba, I am
successful!"

The members of the congregation realized what had
happened, and as soon as they concluded the prayer, they surrounded him. His sons, Hasan
and Husain, carried him to his house. A physician came, and tried to dress the ghastly
wound but could not stop the bleeding. The blow of the sword was fatal anyway, but the
poison from its blade was also spreading rapidly in his body. The Arab historians say that
it was the second time that Ali was wounded in the forehead, the first time being when, in
the battle of the Trench fought in 627, the sword of Amr bin Abd Wudd cut through his
shield and helmet, and struck it. His forehead still bore the scar left by the sword of
Amr.

This is the account left by the Arab historians of
the assassination of Ali, and it has been accepted as authentic by the vast majority of
the Muslims.

Though this account has the authority of
"consensus" of the historians behind it, its authenticity, nevertheless, is
suspect on the grounds of "circumstantial evidence." There are too many
"coincidences" in it.

No one questions the fact that it was Ibn Muljam who
killed Ali. But was it his own idea to kill him? It is quite probable that the idea was
planted in his mind by someone else who used subliminal techniques for doing so. Ibn
Muljam didn't know that he was only a cat's paw, and he went ahead and killed Ali.

At this time no one in Dar-ul-Islam was more
interested in the assassination of Ali than Muawiya. The plot to kill Ali, the skill
displayed in its execution, and its success, show the touch of consummate subtlety and a
high degree of professionalism which were characteristic of Muawiya alone, whereas Ibn
Muljam was nothing more than a bumpkin. Muawiya employed the same "skill" in
removing from the scene, real or fancied threats to his own security and power, on
numerous other occasions in later times, with the same results.

Muawiya's spies had informed him that Ali was making
preparations for the invasion of Syria. In the battle of Siffin, Muawiya had not responded
to chivalrous treatment by Ali. This time, therefore, Ali had decided, not to fight a
lingering action but a swift one that would quell Muawiya's rebellion, and would restore
peace to the embattled empire of the Muslims. Muawiya also knew that Ali had, this time,
both the ability and the resolution, to bring the conflict to a speedy and successful
conclusion. His only hope, therefore, for his safety in future, as in the past, lay in the
succor that he could get from his old and trusted "allies" – treachery and
intrigue. He, therefore, mobilized them, and they didn't disappoint him.

Muawiya made the act of the assassination of Ali
look absolutely spontaneous and convincing by making himself and his crony, Amr bin Aas,
the potential and intended "victims" of the conspiracy and fanaticism of the
Kharji anarchists. But both of them "escaped" assassination by a rare
"stroke of good luck." One of them "fell ill" on the day he was to be
"assassinated," and did not go into the mosque; the other did not fall ill, but
went into the mosque wearing his armor under his cloak. He was "attacked" by his
"assassin" but was "saved" by his armor. "Falling ill" would
have been an indiscreet act, and would have exposed both "victims." In this
manner, "illness" and the armor "saved" both Muawiya and Amr bin Aas
from the daggers of their Kharji "assassins."

But Ali was not so "lucky." He did not
fall ill, and he did not put on his armor when entering the mosque. In the mosque, Ibn
Muljam was awaiting him with a sword soaked in poison. When Ali rose from sajda, he struck
at his forehead, and cleft it. The blow proved to be fatal.

Most of the Arab historians wrote histories which
were "inspired" by Muawiya and his successors. He was of course free to inject
any account into those histories. He, therefore, managed to save himself and Amr bin Aas
from the indictment of history, and it was Ibn Muljam alone who went down in history books
as the real and the only villain of the crime.

By a coincidence, the assassination of Ali took
place on the eve of his invasion of Syria.

Though the Kharji anarchists had aimed their daggers
at all three of the leading political figures of the Muslim world, viz., Ali, Muawiya and
Amr bin Aas, by a coincidence, the latter two escaped the attempts on their lives, and Ali
alone was killed.

By still another coincidence, the two men who
escaped, i.e., Muawiya and Amr bin Aas, were intimate friends of each other, and both of
them were – coincidence again – the mortal enemies of the third, i.e., Ali, who
was the only one to be killed.

There are too many mysterious coincidences that
saved the lives of Muawiya and Amr bin Aas but took the life of Ali.

Ali spent the time still left to him in prayer and
devotions; in dictating his will; in giving instructions to his sons, ministers and
generals regarding the conduct of the government; and in urging them all never to forget
the old, the sick, the poor, the widows and the orphans at any time.

Ali declared that his elder son, Hasan, would
succeed him as the head of the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth, and as the sovereign of all
Muslims.

Though Ali was steadily weakening from the loss of
blood and from the action of poison, all his faculties were sharp and clear right to the
last moment. To all those people who came to see him, he said that they ought to be aware,
at all times, of the presence of their Creator in their lives, to love Him, to serve Him,
and to serve His Creation.

The poison had done its work, and on the morning of
the 21st of Ramadan of 40 A.H., Ali ibn Abi Talib left this world to go into the presence
of his Creator whom he had loved and served all his life. He was
"God-intoxicated." His greatest ambition in life was to wait upon his Creator,
every moment of his existence, and he realized it, and this is the meaning of his
exclamation in the alcove of the mosque when he felt the edge of the sword at his
forehead: "By the Lord of the Kaaba, I am successful."

Hasan and Husain washed the body of their father,
draped it in a shroud, offered the funeral prayers for it, and then buried it silently at
midnight at Najaf Ashraf, at some distance from Kufa. No markings were placed on the
grave, and the grave-site was kept a secret, as desired by Ali himself.

Ali, Islam's greatest saint, hero, statesman,
philosopher and martyr, had left this world, and the world was not to find a man sublime
like him to all eternity.

Many among the Muslims were the mourners of Ali's
death but none mourned him more dolorously than the Dhimmis (the Jews, the Christians, and
the Magians). They were utterly heart-broken. And when the sick, the disabled, the
cripples, the orphans and the widows in the empire heard that he had died, they felt that
their world had collapsed. He had been a father to them all. He had taken them all by the
hand. He had taken them all into his prayers. Many among them did not know until after his
death that it was he who had fed them and had taken care of them. He had taken all mankind
into his grasp.

Whereas Ali was accessible at all times to the poor
and the weak, his own greatest anxiety and fear were lest any of them be inaccessible to
him. It was only in his dominion that the Dhimmis (non-Muslims), the powerless and the
defenseless enjoyed complete security. No one could terrorize them or exploit them. With
his death, their security was gone forever!

It is a truism that exercise of power cannot be
combined with saintly purity, since once a man assumes responsibility for public affairs,
the moral simplicities within which it is just possible, with luck, to be able to lead a
private life, are soon hideously complicated to an extent that precludes all clear
distinctions between right and wrong. This truism, however, has its own exception –
in Ali. He upheld principle, in public life as in private, regardless of cost. He
invariably put the right thing ahead of the smart thing, regardless of cost. The source of
the principles which guided his private and public life, was Al-Qur’an al-Majid as it
was also the source of his political philosophy.

Ali has many critics and enemies but they cannot
point out a single instance when he deviated from a principle. They cannot point out any
conflict between his thought and speech on the one hand, or between his speech and deed on
the other. He was consistently consistent in thought, speech and action.

Ali represented the ultimate triumph of character
and ideology. He was a rare combination of love of God, devotion to duty, strength
tempered with tenderness, symmetry of disposition, and inflexible integrity. His greatest
legacy to the world of Islam will remain forever his sublime character.

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