The great martyrdom

Death is inevitable for every mortal. But the Shahadat of Imam Hussain (RA) was no ordinary demise. Allama Iqbal rightly claims: "Although all deaths are sweet for the Momin, the death of Ali's son is unique indeed, for it passes beyond the death that is content with the grave." The great Shahadat of Karbala, inspired by the most divine love -- love for Allah -- indeed showed superhuman courage and conviction and endurance, enabling the beloved grandson of the holy Prophet (pbuh) to overcome so easily the wellnigh insuperable forces of contemporary evil and untruth. It is this dying nobly for the cause of truth and justice that confers immortality on man, the immortality which the great son of Hazrat Ali (RA) won on the banks of the Furat (Euphrates). The Holy Quran eloquently testifies: "And say not of those who are slain in the Way of Allah: 'They are dead.' Nay, they are living, though ye perceive it not." (2:154).

The heroic episode of Hazrat Imam Hussain (RA) has passed into a legend. The deeds of this "Prince of Martyrs" are sung by minstrels throughout the length and breadth of the Islamic world. He reigns supreme in the hearts of thousands and millions of persons, both Muslims and non-Muslims. He has indeed passed into history, he has become a name.

With the rise of Mu'awiyah, the oligarchical rule of the heathen times displaced the democratic rule of Islam. Paganism, with all its attendant depravity, revived and vice and immorality followed everywhere. The wealth which he pitilessly extracted from his subjects, he lavished on his mercenaries, who in turn helped him to repress dissent. Before his death, Mu'awiyah convened the chief officers of his army and made them take the oath of fealty to his son Yezid, whom he had designated as his successor to the throne -- a gross and treacherous violation of the terms of peace signed between Mu'awiyah and Hazrat Imam Hassan (RA), the eldest son of Hazrat Ali bin Abu Talib (RA).

On Mu'awiyah's death, Yezid ascended the throne founded by his father on fraud and treachery. As cruel and treacherous as his father, Yezid however lacked the cunning and capacity to clothe his cruelties in the guise of policy. An out and out sadist as he was, he killed and tortured just for the sake of pleasure. Addicted to the grossest of vices, his close companions were the most abandoned of both sexes. Imam Hussain (RA), on the other hand, had inherited the chivalric nature and all the virtues of his great and illustrious father. He united in his person the right of descent from the Sher-e-Khuda Ali (RA) with the holy character of the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Great as a devout Muslim, great as an idealist, great as a patriot, great as a valiant warrior, great as a man of action, a dreamer of dreams, he was a man daring and adventurous, reckless of consequences and yet intensely practical, one who embodied the highest qualities that giants among men might desire.

Hazrat Hussain (RA) never deigned to acknowledge the title of the tyrant Yezid, whose vices he despised and whose character he regarded with abhorrence. Naturally, therefore, when the Muslims of Kufa besought his help to release them from the curse and cruelty of Ommeyade rule, he felt it his duty to respond to the Iraqis' appeal for deliverance, and with the assurance that the whole of Iraq was ready to rise to the occasion to hurl the despot from his throne, he set out for Kufa with his family. He traversed the desert of Arabia undisturbed, accompanied by his brother Abbas, a few devoted followers, and a retinue of women and children. But as he approached the confines of Iraq, he was alarmed by the solitary and hostile face of the country. He saw no signs of the Kufan army which had promised to meet him. Suspecting treachery, he encamped his small band at Karbala near the western bank of the Euphrates. The great Imam's apprehensions of betrayal only proved too true and he was overtaken by an Ommeyade army sent by the brutal and ferocious Obaidullah bin Zaid, surnamed the Butcher. For days their tents were surrounded.

The cowardly hounds dared not come within the reach of Ali's son, but they cut the victims off from the waters of the Euphrates. Three days and nights of intense agony ensued, but the indefatigable Imam and his dedicated followers endured this unflinchingly. But everything has a limit and sufferings of the poor entrapped band became too terrible to bear. As a last resource, Imam Hussain (RA) besought the cruel monsters not to wage war upon the helpless women and children, but to kill him and be done with it. But the devil was in the hearts of his enemies and the brutes knew no pity. He pressed his friends to ensure their safety by timely flight, but none would desert their beloved master. The sacrilege of warring against the holy Prophet's (pbuh) grandson struck one of the enemy's chiefs with horror and he deserted with thirty followers "to claim the partnership of the inevitable death."

On the morning of the fateful day of the tenth of Muharram, the auspicious day of Ashura, Hussain's (RA) faithful band of heroes arrayed themselves in battle formation. No hope of victory was there against the thousands of well-equipped and merciless mercenaries of Yezid. Yet they knew that they had come to fulfil their destiny not to win a battle but to achieve a moral and spiritual victory which was definitely much more glorious and lasting than a victory on the field of battle.

The valour and indomitable spirit of the Fatimides were invincible and every single combat and close fight was readily won by them. They slew many more than their own numbers. But the enemy's archers treacherously picked them off from a safe distance. One by one the defenders fell, until at last there remained but the noble and virtuous grandson of the last and greatest Prophet (pbuh). Severely wounded and dying, he dragged himself to the riverside for a last drink; the inhuman cowards turned him off with arrows. As he returned to his tent, he took his infant child in his arms but they transfixed him with a dart. Alone and weary, he seated himself at the door of his tent. One of the women handed him a cup of water to assuage his burning thirst; as he raised it to his lips he was pierced in the mouth with a dart. He lifted his hands to heaven they were full of blood and uttered a funeral prayer for the living and the dead. Not merely a grandson of the holy Prophet (pbuh) but also a devout and ideal follower of his tenets, the great Imam even in his last hours displayed the highest ideal of spiritual and moral greatness by praying for the very enemies who had killed his infant son and were ready to put him to death. Raising himself for the last desperate charge, the valiant fighter threw himself among the Ommeyade brutes, who fell back on every side. The beautiful lines from the great poet Anis gives a graphic description of the Imam's legendary sword and its strokes:

And driven by hand alone whenever it smashed,

There out a gushing pool of blood had splashed;

And changing a hundred colours it flew;

And drinking blood, it vomitting rubies flashed.

But the gruelling ordeal was too much even for the indomitable Hussain (RA), and faint with the loss of blood he sank to the ground. The murderous cowards rushed upon the dying hero like vultures; they cut off his head, trampled on the holy body and subjected it to every ignominy they knew.

Hussain (RA) indeed did not die in the ordinary sense of the term. He simply shuffled off the moral coil and set sail towards the Great Unknown through the glorious channel of Shahadat. In the memorable words of Nazrul, "Death itself was immortalised at the touch of his life." His precious life indeed was sacrificed for the salvation of the suffering humanity, testifying so eloquently to the fact that the brows of the martyr shall eternally reflect the brilliance of the elect of Allah, that those who submit to God and suffer and bleed unto death for the cause of righteousness, truth and justice, for the unfortunate millions that knock about the straits, for the sustenance and durability of their rights and privileges, never decay, never die, never perish; they live a newer life,a fresher life, a higher life, a sublimer life in the recurrent ethos of community and country.

The Great Martyrdom of Karbala indeed occupies a very significant place in the annals of history. It convinces one and all of the sincerity, dedication and resolution of the devout followers of God and testifies to their readiness to undergo any hardship and any loss to uphold the Faith of Muhammad (pbuh). That is not all. Ashoura comes back every year to rejuvenate and boost the dormant vigour, stagnated spirit and dampened morale of the misguided and oppressed Muslim all over the world. In the inimitable words of Maulana Mohammed Ali Jauhar:

Katle Hussain Asal Margaye Yezid Tha;
Islam Zinda Hota Hai har Karbale Ke Baad.
(The Martyrdom of Hussain was indeed the Death of Yezid;
Islam is rejuvenated after each and every Karbala).

Syed Ashraf Ali is former DG of Islamic Foundation Bangladesh