Descendants of Al-Abbas
Al-Abbas had five sons; Ubaidullah, al-Fadhl, al-Hasan, al-Qasim, and Mohammed, and two daughters.
Ibn Shahrashub; the famous historian recorded that Mohammad was martyred in Karbala with his father. The mother of Ubaidullah and al-Fadhl was Lubaba daughter of Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas ibn Abd-ul-Muttalib. Genealogists have agreed unanimously that the progeny of al-Abbas ibn Ali came from his son Ubaidullah. Sheikh al-Futouni, however, added that al-Hasan ibn al-Abbas had sons and descendants, too. Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas who died in AH 155, was one of the celebrated scholars. Handsomeness, perfect morality, and personality were ascribed to him. He married three ladies.
Imam Ali ibn al-Hussein Zayn ul-Abidin (a), respected Ubaidullah greatly. He, very frequently, wept when his sight fell on Ubaidullah, excusing that this man reminded him of his father's unique situations on that day in Karbala.
Al-Hasan; son of Ubaidullah lived for sixty-seven years and had five sons; al-Fadhl, Hamza, Ibrahim, al-Abbas, and Ubaidullah. All these were honorable, virtuous authors.
Al-Fadhl was such an eloquent, religious, and courageous personality that caliphs respected him. He was named 'Ibn al-Hashimiyya -son of the Hashemite lady-'.
He had three sons; Ja'far, al-Abbas al-Akbar, and Mohammad.
Abu'l-Abbas al-Fadhl ibn Mohammed ibn al-Fadhl ibn al-Hasan ibn Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas was a famous orator and poet. He composed some poetic verses eulogizing his forefather; a-Abbas. Hamza ibn al-Hasan ibn Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas copied his forefather; Amir ul-Mu'minin. His grandson Mohammed ibn Ali-the famous poet resided in Basra and died in AH 286.
Ibrahim Jardaqa was another descendant of al-Abbas. He was jurisprudent, man of letters, and well known of his ascetics. Abdullah ibn Ali ibn Ibrahim wrote some books, such as the book titled al-Ja'fariyya. He died in Egypt in AH 312. Al-Abbas ibn al-Hasan ibn Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas was a great celebrity among the Hashemites. He visited Baghdad during the reign of Harun ar-Rashid. He was one of the most celebrated poets.
Abdullah ibn al-Abbas was also a famous personality for his virtue and celebrity. When he was informed about Abdullah's death, al-Ma'moun- the Abbasid caliph said: "All people are the same after your departure, son of al-Abbas!"
Abu't-Tayyib Mohammed ibn Hamza enjoyed a good personality. He was also well known of his regard of relatives and virtue. He had big fortunes in Jordan where he was killed in AH 291. His descendants were called 'sons of the martyr.'
Ubaidullah ibn al-Hasan was the governor and qadi of Mecca and Medina during the reign of al-Ma'moun. Abu-Ya'li al-Hamza ibn al-Qasim ibn Ali ibn Hamza ibn al-Hasan ibn Ubaidullah ibn al-Abbas ibn Ali was one of the most celebrated men of knowledge. He was great hadithist who instructed many famed scholars and wrote many books, such as Kitab ut-Tawhid, Kitab uz-Ziyaraatu wel-Menasik, and many others in various fields of knowledge, especially in Ilm ur-Rijal and Ilm ul-Hadith.
Many scholars described him with remarkable words of praise.
In a village called 'al-Hamza' and lying in al-Jazira, central Iraq, between the Euphrates and the Tigris,
there lies that handsome shrine which was built on the tomb of al-Hamza and has been incessantly visited by people.
Finally, books of history are full of names of great personalities among the descendants of al-Abbas ibn Ali.
EVENTS AND MARTYRDOM
Being neither naïve nor superficial, many events accompanied al-Abbas from his earliest youth. These events were rings in the big series of that conflict between Hashim and the Hashemites from one side and the other Koreishite descendants and clans on the other side. That conflict took different forms, passed through many stages, and, finally, took the form of the conflict between right and wrong.
MOTIVE OF RIVALRY; THE OLD ENVY
Despite their different trends, all historians have had to confess that the Hashemite branch of Koreish has been distinctive in mentality, manners, and behavior and has been excelling all others at activities and values. Hashim and his sons and descendants were highly respected by all tribes and kings. Such high rank aroused the envy of the other clans of Koreish who allied against Hashim and his sons and descendants. Despite all these allies, victory was always to the side of the Hashemites who achieved memorable, remarkable deeds that immortalized their names all over history.
The envy of the other more than twenty Koreishite clans reached its climax when the grandson of Hashim declared and promulgated his prophesy and that he was receiving revelations and instructions from the Heavens and called the Koreishites, as well all people, to follow and support him. Moreover, he was supported by Abu-Talib; chief of Koreish and some of his uncles and was followed by some of his cousins.
ACTIVITIES AGAINST THE PROPHET
Through various sorts of seductions and threats, the Koreishite chiefs spared no efforts for resisting Mohammed's prophecy and promulgation and trying to stop Abu-Talib's support for him. Yet, all their endeavors failed. They then decided with one voice to persecute, physically and mentally, every single individual who converted to Islam. Owing to the execution of this decision, most of Muslims fled to Abyssinia, and the Koreishite decision failed.
They then decided unanimously, by the participation of other clans, to blockade and boycott the Hashemites completely; therefore, they detained them in a col for three or four years. Nevertheless, this decision failed due to a divine miracle. As soon as the Hashemites lost their chief; Abu-Talib, the Koreishite clans decided to assassinate the Prophet whom God protected and instructed to move to Yathrib most of whose inhabitants embraced Islam.
By means of seductions, threats, and the Jews, the Koreishites tried to force people of Yathrib, which lied on the way of their commercial artery and threatened their trade-off with Syria with cessation, to forsake the Prophet. They failed, too. Hence, they decided to engage themselves in a war against the Hashemite Prophet. They fought against him in the battles of Badr, Uhud, and al-Khandaq… and they failed.
They used the Jews as a weapon against him… but they failed. They also sought the support of the Persians and the Romans… but they failed.
After eight years of his migration, the Prophet surprised the Koreishites when he conquered their capital; Mecca, with an irresistible army. Thus, the Koreishites had to give up and surrender to the Prophet. Afterwards, the Prophet declared public amnesty to the chiefs of the Koreishite clans and gathered them in the Holy Masjid under the swords of his soldiers to explain to them their arrogance, tyranny, denial of the Verses of God, malice towards the Prophet of God, wronging the Hashemites and Muslims, and waging wars against Islam.
He then released them, and they have been called 'the released ones.'
AFTER THE CONQUEST OF MECCA
Although their hearts were full of feelings of rage and arrogance after they had had to submit to son of Hashim and accept their having been released just like slaves, the Koreishites adopted another principle: Mohammed's state is ours. He is that 'generous brother and son of that generous brother' and that kind son of Koreish; therefore, we have to enter his state and save it from the hands of the strange ones. Hence, they dedicated all efforts to preventing the Prophet from preparing a Hashemite individual for succeeding him. In other words, they decided to prevent the Hashemites from having both prophesy and leadership.
As some of them believed that it was difficult to lay hold of Mohammad's state, they planned to assassinate him so as to stop the whole matters.
They also failed because of the will of the Heavens.
Thus, they had to find another way. They came to ask the Prophet to grant them a share in his state, but he rejected because he had already appointed somebody as his successor: During his life, the Prophet (s) named Ali ibn Abi-Talib as his successor and the coming leader of the Islamic umma (community). As a matter of fact, the source of this decision was the Heavens. It was Almighty God Who selected and appointed Ali, followed by the Immaculate Imams of his progeny, as the next leader of the Islamic umma after the Prophet. This decision was conveyed by the Prophet from the earliest stage of the march of Islam.
In almost all occasions that gathered Muslims, the Prophet confirmed that Ali would succeed him in the leadership of the Islamic umma.
The event of Ghadir Khum is a clear-cut proof on our claim. Ahead of about one hundred thousand Muslims whom were gathered in that terribly hot weather, the Prophet (s) raised Ali's hand to declare that this man must be regarded as the leader of everyone who adopted the leadership of the Prophet, and ordered the present ones to convey this decision to the absent, including the coming generations. In addition, he gave orders of holding special ceremonies on that occasion and took the pledge of all Muslims-men and women to recognize the leadership of Imam Ali. The anniversary of that occasion is still celebrated by Muslims who fulfilled their pledge to the Prophet.
As a hopeless endeavor, the Koreishite chiefs, supported by some Koreishite individuals who were among the first converts to Islam but showed loyalty to the Koreishite conspirators, came to the Prophet to suggest that he had better cancel his decision of appointing Ali as the coming leader… etc.
But the Prophet refused their demand, emphasizing that the matter was God's not anyone's desire.
The Prophet used nice policy with those defeated chiefs. For instance, he appointed their military commander; Abu-Suffian ibn Harb, as a tax collector. But, they kept on their plots and wicked intentions. They, once, demanded with autonomy, but the Prophet (s) reproached and threatened to fight them with his hero; Ali ibn Abi-Talib. He also predicted that the Koreishites would not stop plotting against Islam unless they are submitted by force.
Finally, the Koreishites despaired of the success of any plot as long as the Prophet was alive. Hence, they prepared new matters that would be done after his death.
AFTER THE PROPHET
When the Prophet (s) departed life after he had been prevented from dictating his will,
a great turning in the march of Islam occurred. On the second day of the Prophet's decease, some Koreishite persons, thinking nothing of all the Prophet's yesterday's confirmations on the leadership of Imam Ali, held a meeting to appoint the leader who would succeed the Prophet. In fact, the main reason beyond this meeting which had been prepared previously to the decease of the Prophet and which violated all the divine instructions was to take the Hashemites away from the chiefship of the Islamic nation in general and the other Koreishite clans in particular.
The Umayyads had the longest hand in the convening to that meeting during which Abu-Bakr was decided as the new leader of the Islamic umma. When Imam Ali, supported by the faithful companions of the Prophet, denied the decisions of that meeting considering the whole matter as violation to the Prophet's instructions, the head of the founding members of that meeting, namely Omar ibn al-Khattab, declared openly the main cause that made them hold such a meeting and decide such a decision. He said to Imam Ali: "We
dislike for you, the Hashemites, to have both prophecy and leadership."
Showing his limitless malice towards Islam and Prophet Mohammed (s), Abu-Suffian found through such divergence the best opportunity that must be seized for striking Islam and disuniting Muslims. He equipped his relatives with weapons and led them to the door of Imam Ali's house to tell that he, as well as that well-equipped army, was ready to support him if he would declare war against the other party who usurped his divine right of leadership. Imam Ali understood Abu-Suffian's real intention very well and rejected his suggestion.
So, the Hashemites lost their position that Almighty God selected for them. Nevertheless, this does not cancel their being the real leaders of the Islamic nation and the ones whose instructions must be followed since they have been the successors of the Prophet according to divine instructions. After many events, Abu-Bakr came to power and appointed Omar ibn al-Khattab as his successor.
Omar ibn al-Khattab, as being the caliph-the political-religious head of Muslims, appointed Muawiya; son of Abu-Suffian the mortal enemy of Islam and the leader of these armed forces against the Prophet and his companions as the governor of Damascus. It is ironic that a man who was to become the political-religious head of a province in the Islamic State was born into a clan that rejected Prophet Muhammad (s) in his home city, Mecca, and continued to oppose him on the battlefields after he had emigrated to Medina, and did not convert to Islam until the Prophet conquered Mecca and obliged its inhabitants to follow his religion. Another irony was the plan that Omar ibn al-Khattab made for choosing the next caliph who was Othman ibn Affan.
AL-ABBAS IN THE EVENTS
In the reign of Othman ibn Affan, al-Abbas ibn Ali was born. It is very natural that he understood the whole doctrinal, political, and social matter of the Islamic State through the instructions of his father and two brothers around whom all the aforementioned events occurred. Likewise, al-Abbas, from his earliest youth, recognized that he belonged to the house whom Almighty God selected for guarding and conveying His religion to the next generations in its pure, correct form, and that he had his own role to play in this sacred process. Naturally, he was informed about the events that preceded him in details and, now, it is his turn to understand the current and the coming events.
The policies of Othman ibn Affan brought about a general disorder in the intellectual and doctrinal lives of Muslims. These policies were aimed at taking the Ahl-ul-Bayt away from the political centers in the state and subjecting them to the illegitimate ruling authorities. Hence, the political and administrative positions were given to definite persons who belonged to the clans of Umayya and Aal-Maeet. The Hashemites and their partisans were prevented from holding any position.
All the offices of the Islamic State became in the hands of the Umayyads who went on creating crises among Muslims. It is indisputable that the great majority of such governors did not have any Islamic trend and were directed to work against the real Islam of Mohammed and his family (a). Moreover, they lacked familiarity with and expertise in the Islamic laws and the requirements of the Islamic Sharia.
As a result of such policy, some troops of the Islamic army left Iran and Egypt to Medina and demanded Othman with rectifying his policies and removing the Umayyads from the offices of the state. Unfortunately, he did not respond, and the revolters found no means other than assassinating Othman after they had encouraged by the most celebrated personalities who accompanied the Prophet. So, they killed Othman and could get rid of his dishonest policies of favoring his relatives to the others and spreading entrepreneurship in the Islamic world.
THE GOVERNMENT OF IMAM ALI
Al-Abbas was in the vigor of his youth watching all these events and waiting for the future. After the assassination of Othman, it was the first time that people could express their opinions freely and select the fittest-Ali ibn Abi-Talib; the selected by the Heavens for the leadership of Muslims. The armed forces and all the classes of people all over the provinces of the Islamic State selected Imam Ali for the leadership of the state, except people of Damascus and a few individuals of Medina who understood that Imam Ali would refuse their monopoly and would extend the very required social justice all over the state.
As expected, Imam Ali adopted and applied policies of constructive and comprehensive justice to everybody. He preferred the general interests to the private and dedicated all efforts to the achievement of an ideal social justice and to the eradication of poverty. He also adopted the course of extending principles of freedoms so as to create public developments and wipe out all feelings of humility and subservience. Thus, the Imam worked on extending the religious and political policies.
He also paid a good deal of attention to the propagation of religious senses and Islamic idealities among the publics. Through his unparalleled behavior and successful sermons, Imam Ali could found, at the least, a class of virtuous individuals who, later on during the reign of the Umayyads, resisted the moral collapses and promulgated the true Islamic course. Imam Ali, also, taught the society how to fulfill their responsibilities before God, watch the general situations of the Islamic State, save the society from deviation, revolt against the unjust rulers, and work purely for sake of God.
These were the principles that made al-Abbas ibn Ali stop with his brother Imam al-Hussein who revolted against the unjust rulers who violated the sanctities of the Islamic society and enslaved Muslims. In fact, al-Abbas, being the son of Imam Ali, was the worthiest of learning and applying the instructions of his father to himself and working on propagating them among people. Imam Ali (a) also used all weapons for fighting poverty and removing its ghost away from the Islamic society. He therefore supplied the needy people with residential places, eliminated unemployment, monopoly, and usury.
He finally stopped all sorts of favoritism; the distinctive feature of the reign of Othman ibn Affan who favored his relatives at the expense of the others. Thus, equality took its purest form during the reign of Imam Ali (a). All these reforms canceled out the private interests of the Koreishites, especially the Umayyads, who did their best to do away with Imam Ali and his policies. They therefore formed different opposite powers who waged wars against him. First of all, there was Aisha (the Prophet's widow and the first caliph's daughter) whose limitless malice against Imam Ali controlled her completely to the degree that she rode on that red camel against which the Prophet (s) warned her
and led an army against the legal authority of the Islamic State; namely, Imam Ali.
One can feel the big irony when he recognizes, through authentic reports, that this very Aisha was a direct reason for the assassination of Othman ibn Affan against whom she rallied people and whom she described as non-Muslim.
When she was informed of his death, she prostrated herself to God as a sign of thanks, but when she was informed that Ali held the position of leadership, her situation was converted and she cried: "Othman was killed wrongfully. I must take revenge upon his killers." She then gathered troops and directed to Basra where she faced the army of Imam Ali who overcame and could capture her. Out of his remarkable and unmatched moral standards, Imam Ali honored the mutinous lady, released her, and sent her home. In the midst of all these events, al-Abbas was watching, with heedful heart, the opposite powers and watching his father's wise treatments of the situation. In fact, his father's behaviors were the best lessons that lead him to occupy the first place in the field of heroism, sacrifice, and perseverance on principles.
Continuing the series of their enmity against the right party in general and the Hashemites in particular, the Umayyads formed an opposite power that faced and waged war against Imam Ali.
Muawiya, being the governor of Damascus since the reign of Omar ibn al-Khattab, declared armed mutiny against the legal authority of the Islamic State and could gather the ignorant ones, the hypocrites, the opportunists, and the former officials of Othman's government whose ill-gotten properties were confiscated by Imam Ali to be distributed fairly among all people, to form an army of mutineers. Muawiya's troops directed towards Iraq and camped in Siffeen on the Syrian-Iraqi borders. First, they occupied the two banks of the River Euphrates so as to prevent Imam Ali's army from water. Out of their extreme inhumanity and brutality, the Umayyads used the blockade of water as a weapon against their rivalries. They did the same thing with Imam al-Hussein, his household, and his companions when they occupied the two banks of the River Euphrates and prevented Imam al-Hussein's army from having water.
As Imam Ali noticed that Muawiya's troops would not permit his army to have water after they had refused his calls to peace, he allowed his army to attack. They could defeat Muawiya's army and occupy the two banks of the river. Some of the commanders asked Imam Ali to prevent Muawiya's troops from having water, but he, out of his incomparable mercy and feelings of responsibility towards human beings in general and Muslims in particular, refused that request and permitted the other party to have water which is allowable to all creatures.
Unfortunately, Muawiya, his family, and his group did not thank for Imam Ali this unique situation. On the contrary, they rewarded Imam Ali's son and household evil when they prevented them, even their newborns and women, from having water.
When all efforts of peace failed, Imam Ali had to fight the other party. In the last stage of that war which lasted for two years causing ten thousands of casualties, Imam Ali was about to achieve victory and put an end to that war, but Muawiya turned to a trickery. He asked his defeated soldiers to impale copies of the holy Quran on their lances and call that the judge of the Quran should be sought.
Deluded by such false cries, some divisions in Imam Ali's army responded to these calls and asked Imam Ali to submit. The Imam tried his best to convince the deluded ones, the hypocrites, and the agents, but uselessly. He therefore had to submit to their demand of the arbitration of the holy Quran. Muawiya suggested that he would choose a man as his representative and Imam Ali should choose one as his representative. Under the pressure of the mutinous groups in Imam Ali's army, the Imam had to accept Abu-Musa al-Ash'ari as representative. Muawiya chose Amr ibn al-Aas the disreputable swindler. Before holding the session of arbitration, Amr ibn Al-Aas fooled al-Ash'ari by claiming that they both should judge of denouncing both Ali and Muawiya so as to save Muslims from such fitnah-Civil war. Moreover, Amr could convince al-Ash'ari to ascend the mimbar first and denounce his leader-Imam Ali.
Before the two parties, al-Ash'ari ascended the mimbar and denounced Imam Ali. When he came down, Amr ascended and called people to follow the 'legal' leadership of his leader-Muawiya! This farce of arbitration, which ended with deposing Imam Ali as caliph and appointing Muawiya as the new leader, folded the last page in the holiest Islamic government that aimed at achieving ideal social justice. However, the hypocrites and the Koreishite clans, especially the Umayyads, succeeded in overthrowing this government and replacing it with the reign of the Umayyad dynasty that brought about the most appalling tragedy-the massacre of the Prophet's household.
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Author: Abu Talib Al-Tabrizi
