Alhassanain(p) Network for Heritage and Islamic Thought

Chapter One

Bukhari as a Narrator

It has tomentioned right in the beginning that Abu Zar’ah Razi and Abu Hatam Razi have abandoned citing traditions from Bukhari, prohibiting others as well to quote traditions from Bukhari.

Abu Zar’ah and Abu Hatam on Bukhari

In hisal-Tabaqat al-Shafi’ayya al-Kubra , Suki quotes Taqi al-Din bin Daqiq al-‘Aeed as saying: The honor of Muslims is one of the pitfalls of Hell. Two groups of people stand around it: narrators and rulers. Subki goes on saying: In my point of view, the opinion mentioned by some that Abu Zar’ah and Abu Hatam shunned citing Bukhari’s traditions because of Bukhari’s belief in Qur’an as being created is an instance of the above-mentioned word. May Allah help Muslims! Is it permissible for some to abandon Bukhari who is considered as a forerunner in hadith science and an imam of Sunnis?![1]

Shams al-Din al-Dahabi has mentioned the name of Bukhari among the weak and rejected. Regretting this, Manawi says: Bukhari is the ornament of Islamic community, honor of the imams, author of the most authentic book after the Holy Quran and owner of perpetual excellence. Commenting on him, Ibn Khazima says: Bukhari is a divine sign that walks on land.

In hisal-Kashif, Dahabi says: Bukhari was a religious minded, pious person with utmost dignity.

In hisal-Du’afawa al-Matrukin , he, nevertheless, ignoring his being a Sunni, says: ماسلم من الکلام لاجل مسأله اللفظ ترکه لاجلها الرازیان

Because of his belief in the Holy Qur’an as being created, people spoke ill of him and that was why Abu Zar’ah Razi and Abu Hatam Razi refrained from narrating his traditions.

Dahabi goes on saying: I have only quoted his words. I ask Allah to forgive him and to grant us good health. I feel lonely and take refuge to Him.[2]

In hisMizan al-Itidal , Dahabi, commenting on Ali Madini, says: Ali bin Abdullah bin Ja’afar bin Hasan is a memorizer of tradition and an outstanding figure of his time. One of the objections concerning Aqili is that he has mentioned the name of Ali bin Abdullah in hisal-Du’afa , saying: He was a supporter of Ibn Abi Dawood and was a member of Jahmiyya, but, Allah willing, his traditions are (good) unaffected by these objections. Abdullah, son of Ahmad bin Hanbal told me: My father used to narrate us traditions from Ali bin Abdullah, but he would never mention his name, saying: “Somebody told me”. He eventually gave up narrating from him.

It needs however to be said that the traditions of Ali bin Madini are mentioned in Ahmad’sMusnad.

Ibrahim Harbi has also left aside the traditions transmitted by Ali Madini, for he was inclined towards Ahmad bin Abi Dawood, doing favor to him.

It was similarly on account of this that he avoided mentioning his traditions in hisSahih , just as Abu Zar’ah and Abu Hatam avoided mentioning the traditions reported by his disciple, Muhammad (Bukhari), due to his belief that Qur’an was created.

Abd al-Rahman bin Abu Hatam says that Abu Zar’ah did not narrate Bukhari’s traditions because of what happened to Bukhari during the time of ‘tribulation[3] ’.[4]

A glance at the biography of Abu Zar’ah Razi

Abu Zar’ah Razi (d. 264 AH) is a great Sunni imam. Comparing him to Muslim, Tirmidhi, Nisaee and Ibn Maja, Dahabi says: Ubaidullah bin Abd al-Karim (known as) Abu Zar’ah Razi, a memorizer of tradition is a great scholar. He has narrated from Abu Naeem Isfahani, Qa’anabi, Qabisa and other scholars of their category here and there. On the other hand, Muslim, Tirmidhi, Nisaee, Ibn Maja, Abu ‘Awana, Muhammad bin Husain, Qatan etc. have narrated traditions from him.

Ibn Rahwaih says: Any tradition that is not recognized by Abu Zar’ah is worth nothing.

Commenting on him Dahabi says that his merits are too many.[5]

Ibn Hajar has also placed the above-mentioned four names beside his name, saying: Ubadullah bin Abd al-Karim bin Yazid bin Farrukh, Abu Zar’ah Razi was an imam, memorizer (hafiz), reliable, well-known and one of the eleven imams.[6]

Commenting on him, Yafiee says: Abu Zar’ah is a memorizer of tradition and a great scholar …

Speaking about him, Abu Hatam says: No doubt, there is no one that can replace him scientifically, jurisprudentially and in matters of preservation and honesty. I know no one in the world, who can reach him (in terms of knowledge and excellence). Ishaq bin Rahwaih says: Any tradition Abu Zar’ah does not know by heart is not credible.[7]

Khatib Baghdadi says: Ubaidullah bin Abd al-Karim bin Yazid bin Farrukh, Abu Zar’ah Razi was a divine imam, an outstanding memorizer of tradition, truthful and a narrator of numerous traditions. Several times he visited Baghdad, held dialogues with Ahmad bin Hanbal and narrated traditions. Among the people of Baghdad, Ibrahim bin Ishaq Harbi, Abdullah bin Ahmad bin Hanba and Qasim bin Zakariya Mutarraz have narrated traditions from him …[8]

A glance at biography of Abu Hatam Razi

Let’s now have a look at the biography of Abu Hatam Razi who died in the year 227 AH. Commenting on him Dahabi says:

Muhammad bin Idris Abu Hatam Razi was a memorizer of tradition. He heard traditions from Ansari and Ubaidullah bin Musa. His son, Abd al-Rahman bin Abu Hatam, Abu Dawood, Nisaee and Muhamili have narrated his traditions.

Regarding him, Musa bin Ishaq Ansari says: I saw no one who was as good as Abu Hatam in terms of memorizing tradition. He died in Sha’aban 277 AH.[9]

Speaking about him Sam’ani says: Abu Hatam was an imam of his time. The scholars used to refer to him to find a solution to the problems related to tradition. He was full of virtues. He was a memorizer of tradition and a great well-known scholar. He used to travel and visit scholars.[10]

Placing the names of Abu Dawood, Nisaee and Maja beside his name, Ibn Hajar says: Muhammad bin Idris bin Munzir, bin Dawood bin Mehran Hanzali, Abu Hatam Razi was a great memorizer (of tradition) and an imam… In their commentaries on the Holy Qur’an, Abu Dawood, Nisaee and Ibn Maja have narrated his traditions… In hisal-Kuna , Hakim Abu Ahmad says: Abu Hatam bin Idris [is such a great scholar] that Muhammad bin Ismael Ja’afi, his son Abd al-Rahman, his friend Abu Zar’ah etc. have narrated traditions from him.

Abu Bakr Khallal says: Abu Hatam was a leading figure in tradition. He narrated many things from Ahmad, which are available to us in a scattered form and are unusual.

Ibn Kharsh, commenting on him, says: he was trustable and a person of high understanding.

Nisaee, regarding him says: He was a credible person.

Lalkaee, talking about him, says: Abu Hatam was an imam, memorizer of tradition, outstanding and a professional researcher.

Commenting on him, Khatib Baghdadi says: Abu Hatam was a leading figure and a memorizer who was credible. He was known for his knowledge and virtues. He died in 277 in Ray.[11]

Zuhli and his criticism of Bukhari

One of the great Sunni imams who have criticized Bukhari is Muhammad bin Yahya Zuhli. He questioned the reputation and credibility of Bukhari, accusing him of introducing innovation in religion.

Elaborating on his life, Subki quotes Abu Hamid bin Sharqi as saying: I saw Bukhari in the funeral ceremony of Sa’aid bin Marwan. This is while Bukhari used to avoid answering any question by Duhli about his name, surname and weakness.

After one month had hardly passed ever since the occurrence of this event, Duhli said: Those who attend Bukhari’s lectures are not allowed to attend my lectures. This is because it is written to me from Baghdad that Bukhari has talked about the createdness of the Holy Qur’an. Though I told him not to accept this view, he continued to believe in it. So do not approach him!

After relating the words of Abu Hamid Sharqi, Subki says: Based on what he is reported to have said (with which we will deal later), Bukhari is a person who believes that Qur’an is created. This is while Muhammad bin Yahya Duhli says: Anyone who thinks that Qur’an is created is an innovator and thus it is not allowed to associate with or talk to him. Anyone who thinks that Qur’an is created is a disbeliever.

Mentioning the same thing, Ibn Hajar Asqalani quotes Abu Hamid Sharqi as saying: I heard Muhammad Yahya Duhli say: Qur’an is Allah’s words and is not created. Anyone who considers it as created, is an innovator and it is not allowed to associate with or talk to him. From now onward, anyone who visits Muhammad bin IsmaelBukhari, must be accused of having such a belief. This is because those who attend Bukhari’s lectures, advocate his school of thought.[12]

A glance at Duhli’s life

Duhli was one of the professors of Bukhari, Abu Dawood, Tirmidhi, Nisaee and other great scholars of tradition. Ibn Abi Dawood called him ‘commander of the faithful in hadith sciences’.

Commenting on him, Dahabi says: Bukhari, four of the authors of Sihah Sitta, Ibn Khazima, Abu ‘Awana and Abu Ali Maydani narrated traditions from him. This is while Bukhari, due to a dispute he had with him, does not mention his name. Ibn Dawood says: Muhammad bin Yahya narrated us traditions and was an imam in hadith sciences.

Concerning him, Abu Hatam, says: He was an imam of his time. He died at the age of 86 in the year 258 AH.[13]

Speaking about him, Sam’ani says: In his era, Duhli was the imam of the people of Nayshabur, and a leading scholar.[14]

Safdi says: Imam Duhli Naishaburi was the master of narrators and the memorizer of traditions. He listened to the traditions of various narrators and all narrators –except Muslim – have narrated his traditions. Duhli himself says: To obtain knowledge and acquire traditions, I travelled three times, for which I spent as much as one hundred fifty thousand (Dinars).

Regarding him, Nisaee says: Duhli is a credible and reliable person.

Talking about him, Abu Amr Ahmad bin Nasr Khaffaf says: I saw Muhammad bin Yahya in a dream. I asked him as to what Allah had done to him. He said that Allah had forgiven him. “What did He do with your traditions?, I asked. “They wrote my traditions with gold and put them on a lofty place.” He answered.[15]

Bukhari and his deviation from the path of Ahl al-Bayt

Ibn Dihya’s opinion

The great Sunni scholars such as Abu Zar’ah, Abu Hatam, Zuhli and other professors of Bukhari have treated him with contempt, considering him as misled. Their mistreatment of Bukhari was the worldly consequence of his deviation from the path of Ali, the commander of the faithful and the Holy Prophet’s progeny (a.s), his treatment of them with contempt and his concealment of their virtues and merits. In hisSharh Asma al-Nabi , Allama Zu al-Nasabain, Ibn Dihya says: In hisSahih , in a chapter on al-Maghazi, Bukhari relates the following story:

Before Farewell Hajj, Ali bin Abi Talib (a.s) and Khalid bin Walid were dispatched to Yemen. Ahmad bin Uthman narrates from Shuraih bin Muslima, from Ibrahim bin Yusuf bin Ishaq bin Ibu Ishaq, from his father, from AbuIshaq who quotes Barra as saying: The Holy Prophet (s)[16] sent me along with Khalid bin Walid to Yemen. Thereupon he sent Ali (a.s) as Khalid’s successor to Yemen!

The Holy Prophet (s) addressing Ali (a.s) said: Tell Khalid’s companions that they can stay with you or come back to Medina. I was among those who stayed with Ali (a.s). I received several awqiya[17] (a quantity of gold) from war booties.

Muhammad bin Bashar narrated from Rowh bin Ibada, from Ali bin Suaid bin Manjuq, from Abdullah bin Barida who quoted his father as saying: The Holy Prophet (s) dispatched Ali (a.s) (to Yemen) to take khums from Khalid. I deemed Ali an enemy. As he (Ali) (chose himself a female slave from the war booties and) took bath I told Khalid: Do you not see this?

When we came back, I related the story to the Prophet (s).

The Holy Prophet (s) said: یا بریده أتبغض علیا؟

O’ Barida! Do you hate Ali?

I said: Yes.

He said: لا تبغضه فإن له فی الخمس أکثر من ذلک

Do not hate him for his share of khums is more than this.

After quoting these two traditions, Zu al-Nasabain says: As you see Bukhari has narrated this tradition incompletely. To narrate such traditions incompletely is the habit of Bukhari. His deviation from the right course is the outcome of his mismanagement and lack of prudence.

Imam Ahmad Hanbal has related the above-mentioned story fully and correctly. Qazi Adil, the remainder of great scholars of Iraq, Taj al-Din Abu al-Fath Muhammad bin Ahmad bin Mandaee – who heard this tradition in Wasit, a city in Iraq – has narrated this story from Raees Abu al-Qasim bin Hasin, a reliable person, from Waez Abu Ali Husain bin Mazhab, a credible person, from Abu Bakr Ahmad bin Ja’afar bin Hamdan Qati’aee, another reliable person, from Imam Abd al-Rahman Abdullah, from his father Abdullah Ahmad bin Hanbal – a Sunni imam- who said: Yahya bin Saeed quoted Abd al-Jalil as saying: I attended a meeting that was attended by Abu Majliz and Barida’s two sons.

Abdullah bin Barida said: I did not hate anyone as much as I hated Ali. I befriended that person –though I did not like him before – just because he was an enemy of Ali. That person was dispatched along a group of horsemen to Yemen. I accompanied him as well. I accompanied him just because he considered Ali as his enemy.

In this military expedition, we took some people as captives. The person in question, reporting this to the Holy Prophet (s), said: Send someone to determine the khums of the booties.

The Holy Prophet (s) sent us Ali (a.s). Among the captives, there was a slave woman who was the best. Ali specified khums and divided the war booties. Thereupon Ali got out of his tent, with the drops of water dripping from his head.

We said: O Aba al-Hasan, why did you do like this?

He said: Did you not see the slave woman among the captives? While dividing war booties and specifying khums, I allocated her as khums. Thus she was possessed by the Prophet’s progeny and me as a member of the Prophet’s progeny. That is why I made intercourse with her.

Ibn Barida says: The person in question (Khalid) wrote another report to the Holy Prophet (s) and I asked him to send me as confirmer of the courier!

He sent me as a witness. When the letter was read to the Holy Prophet (s) I confirmed it. It was at this moment that the Holy Prophet (s) took my hand saying: أتبغض علیا؟

Do you make enmity towards Ali?

I said: Yes.

He said: فلا تبغضه وان کنت تحبه فازدد له حبا فو الذی نفس محمد بیده لنصیب آل علی فی الخمس افضل من وصیفه

Do not make enmity towards him. If you befriend him improve your friendship. By Allah in whose hand is Muhammad’s life the share of Ali’s discendants is more than a female slave.

Ibn Barida continues: After I heard this from the Holy Prophet (s) I liked no one as much as I like Ali (a.s).

He further said: By Allah who has no associate there was intermediary between me and the Holy Prophet (s) except my father.[18]

Elsewhere in hisSharh Asma al-Nabi , after narrating a tradition from Muslim, he says: I commenced my discussion with a tradition from Muslim, because he has related this story completely. This is while Bukhari has related it incompletely and as you see he has, based on his own methodology, omitted certain parts of it. He has been criticized on account of his relating stories incompletely especially stories related to Ali (a.s).

A glance at Ibn Dihya’s life

It is worth noting that Abu al-Khattab bin Dihya was one of the greatest and most well-known Sunni scholars and memorizers. Elaborating on his life, Ibn Khallakan says:

Abu al-Khattab Umar bin Hasan bin Ali bin Muhammad bin Jameel bin Farrukh bin Khalaf bin Qums bin Mazlan bin Malal bin Badr bin Dihya bin Fruh Kalbi, known as Zu al-Nasabain was from Blanes, Spain. He was a memorizer of tradition. That was how he describes himself through his own notes.

Ibn Dihya said: His mother is Amat al-Rahman, daughter of Abdullah bin Abu al-Bassam Musa bin Abdullah bin Husain bin Ja’afar bin Ali bin Muhammad bin Ali bin Musa bin Ja’afar bin Muhammad bin Ali bin Husain bin Ali bin Abi Talib (a.s). That is why he said he had two lineages with one ending to Dihya and the other to Husain (a.s).

Ibn Dihya introduces himself as the grandchild of Abu al-Bassam. He was a great celebrated scholar. He knew very well prophetic traditions and the sciences related to them. He knew about Arabic syntax, etymology and poems. He also knew about Arab wars. In order to acquire traditions, he several times travelled across Spain, meeting scholars and masters. He went to Barr al-‘Adwa in Morocco and met the scholars over there.

He went to Egypt in Africa and then to Syria and Iraq. In Baghdad he listened to the traditions of some of the companions of ibn Hasin whereas inWasit , he gave his ear to the traditions of Abu al-Fath Muhammad bin Ahmad bin Mandaee.

He also travelled to Iraq ‘Ajam (present Iran), Khurasan and Mazindaran. He made all these trips in order to meet tradition scholars and to learn traditions from them. Meanwhile, other narrators would also benefit from him.

In Isfahan, he listened to the traditions of Abu Ja’afar Saidalani whereas in Nashabur he gave his ear to the traditions of Mansur bin Abd al-Mun’aeem Farawi.[19]

Commenting on Ibn Dihya, Jala al-Din Suyuti, in his Bughya al-W’at says:Abu al-Khattab, Umar bin Hasan bin Ali bin Muhammad bin Jameel bin Farrukh bin Dihya Kalbi Andulusi was a memorizer of tradition and a reputed man of knowledge and virtue. He knew the science of tradition and the issues related to it. He knew Arabic syntax, etymology and poems. He was aware of the history of Arab wars. He travelled and listened to traditions. Malik Kamil, the king of his time, founded Kamiliyya Dar al-Hadith for in Cairo. He appointed him as the Sheikh of this establishment.

Ibn Salah and others narrated traditions from him. He died on Rabi’a al-Awal the fourteenth in the year 633 AH.[20]

In hisHusn al-Muhazira as well, Suyuti deals with his life, saying: Abu al-Khattab Ibn Dihya, Umar bin Hasan Andulusi was an imam, scholar, great memorizer. He was in possession of profound knowledge of tradition. He also knew about Arabic etymology and language. He wrote many books and chose Egypt as his settlement.

He took upon himself to train Malik Kamil, the king of his time. He taught in Kamilia Dar al-Hadith. He died in on Rabi’a al-Awal the fourteenth in the year 633 AH.[21]

Bukhari and Ghadir tradition

It is on account of his extreme prejudice (towards Shiism) that he criticizes the successively narrated Ghadir tradition. Ghadir tradition is narrated by more than one hundred companions of the Holy Prophet (s). The standard of Ghadir tradition is far above the standards of a successively reported tradition. Great Sunni scholars who know traditions admit that Ghadir tradition is a successively reported tradition. This is what the books compiled by Sunni scholars tell us. For example, in order to find it, one can refer to Jala al-Din Suyuti’s al-Azhar al-Mutanathira fi al-Akhbar al-Mutawatira wa al-Fawaeed al-Mutakathira fi al-Akhbar al-Mutawatira , Noor al-Din Azizi’sSharh al-Jamee’a al-Saghir , Manawi’sSharh al-Jamee’a al-Saghir , Ali Qari’sal-Mirqat , Jamal al-Din Muhaddith Shirazi’sal-Arbaeenfi Manaqib Amir al-Mu’amineen ,al-Sayf al-Maslul by Shah Waliullah’s student, father of the author ofTuhfaIthna’ashariyya , Ibn Jawzi’sAsna al-Matalib etc.

Commenting on Ghadir tradition, Ibn Taymiyya says: It is said that the Holy Prophet (s) said: Of whomsoever I am a master, Ali is his master.

This tradition is not in sihah, but scholars have narrated it and people have differed on it. It is said that Bukhari, Ibrahim Harbi and a group of scholars have criticized it.[22]

It has to be noted that Bukhari criticized some of the chains of this tradition but Ibn Taymiyya attributed the criticism to the tradition itself.

Major Sunni scholars and Ghadir tradition

If Bukhari criticizes Ghadir tradition itself then in response it can be said that a number of major Sunni scholars have explicitly rejected the views of those who are skeptic about Ghadir tradition no matter who they are. Badakhshi, for example, says:

هذا حدیث مشهور و لم تکلم فی صحته الا متعصب جاحد لا اعتبار بقوله فلن الحدیث کثیر الطرق جدا و قد استوعبها ابن عقده فی کتاب مفرد و قد نص الذهبی علی کثیر من طرقه بالصحه ورواه من الصحابه عدد کثیر[23]

This is an authentic and famous tradition. Those who cast doubt about itsauthenticity, are prejudiced and deny the truth. Their words are not reliable, because this tradition is narrated via numerous ways. In hisal-Mufrad , Ibn Uqda has assessed it utterly. Dahabi has also mentioned that many of its chains are authentic. A Great number of the Holy Prophet’s companions have reported it.

Ibn JAzer and Ghadir tradition

Hafiz bin JAzeri has also accused those who deny Ghadir tradition of being ignorant and prejudiced.[24]

Let’s now have a cursory look at Ibn JAzeri’s life. Ibn JAzeri Shaf’aee is a famous memorizer of tradition. He has written many books. Scholars have praised him and his works.

Ibn Hajar ‘Asqalani has dealt with Ibn JAzeri’s life, calling him as ‘memorizer’ and ‘imam’. He says: He was a master of the science of recitation all over the Islamic world. He was the first one who wrote a comprehensive book on supplication titledal-Hisn al-Hasin min Kalam Sayyid al-Mursalin. He was well-known in Yemen and was praised a lot …

He gave importance to recitation. That is why he wrote an invaluable appendix to Dahabi’sal-Tabaqat al-Qurra and composed an ode on three recitations. He also wroteal-Nashr bi al-Qira’at al-‘Ashr … He was called a great imam and … On the whole, he was a unique and well-known person. People benefited from his writings. He was like a sun shining in the sky.[25]

Another scholar who has treated his life in detail is Sakhawi. Enumerating his professors in different sciences, he said that he had many licenses for giving fatwa, teaching, and recitation. He presided over the board of reciters at ‘Adiliyya Madrasa in Damascus.

Sakhawi has also dealt with his trips to different countries and his interesting accounts. He has shed light on his works and described all of them as useful. Among his worksis Asna al-Matalib fi Manaqib Ali bin Abi Talib .

He says: Commenting on JAzeri, Tawoosi says: He was unique in narrating and memorizing traditions, jarh and ta’adeel (the science of praising and criticizing) and knowing early and later narrators.

Thereupon Sakhawi the words of Ibn Hajar concerning him…[26] Ibn JAzeri died in the year 833 AH.

Bukhari and his skepticism about Imam Sadiq’s traditions

It is one of the signs of Bukhari’s animositytowards the Holy Prophet’s progeny and his deviation from their conduct, that he did not mention Imam Sadiq’s traditions in his book and above all he cast doubts on some of his traditions!!

With all insolence, commenting on Imam Sadiq, Bukhari says: No one from among the four imams has taken juristic rules from Ja’afar [Sadiq (a.s)], but they have narrated his tradition along with the traditions of others, with the difference that the traditions of others are much more in number than those of his. The traditions by Zahri cannot be thus compared to those of J’afar [Sadiq (a.s)] in terms of strength and number.

When some of his traditions were narrated to him by Yahya bin Sa’ee Qattan, he objected to them and cast doubt about them. It was because of this that he refrained from narrating his traditions. The ability of Ja’afar [Sadiq (a.s)] in memorizing traditions is far less than the memorization abilities of those referred to by Bukhari!![27]

Sunni scholars and issue of loving Prophet’s progeny

Look! How this arch enemy of the Prophet’s progeny has cast doubt on this Holy Imam on the basis of Qattan’s words.

This is while great Sunni scholars – whether in the part or in the present – have said that it is necessary to love, respect and follow the Holy Prophet’s progeny (a.s) to the extent that they distance Sunnis from making enmity towards the Holy Prophet’s progeny and acquit those who objected the Prophet’s progeny, put their credibility to question or tuned away from them. They consider the attribution of such matters to Sunnis as something that originates from Shiite prejudices. Kabuli consider the following as the nineteenth prejudices of Shiites (against Sunnis), saying: Sunnis have gone to extremes in making enmity towards the Holy Prophet’s progeny. Ibn Shar Ashub and most Shiite scholars, mentioning such topic, have regarded Sunnis as the enemies of the Holy Prophet’s progeny. But this is a big lie! This is because it is one of the undisputed conditions of faith that one should love the Holy Prophet’s progeny more than one loves oneself. One of the traditions that one can mention here is the tradition narrated by Bayaqi, Abu al-Sheikh and Daylami. The Holy Prophet (s) says:

لایومن احد حتی اکون احب اله من نفسه و یکون عتی احب الیه من نفسه

No one is a believer unless he loves me and my progeny more than himself.

Tirmidhi and Hakim have also narrated from Ibn Abas that he has quoted the Holy Prophet (s) as saying:

احبوا اهل بیتی بحبی

Love my progeny on account of loving me.

Sunni scholars are of the view that anyone who does not love the Holy Prophet’s progeny betrays him, whereas the Holy Qur’an says:

لاتخونوا الله و الرسول[28]

Do not betray Allah and the Apostle.

Likewise, anyone who makes enmity towards the Hoy Prophet’sprogeny, makes enmity, in fact, towards the Apostle of Allah. A poet has beautifully described this, composing:

فلا تعدل باهل البیت خلقا ـــــــــــ فأهل البیت هم آهل السعاده

فبغضهم من الإنسان خسر ــــــــــ حقیقی و حبهم عباده

Do not consider anyone as equal to Prophet’s progeny

This is because it is only the Prophet’s progeny who attain happiness

Making enmity towards them is a real loss and loving them is worship

Sunni scholars deem it necessary to say salawat (peace be upon the Holy Prophet’s progeny) in prayers. Sheik Farid al-Din Ahmad bin Muhammad Nayshabur says: Anyone who believes in Muhammad (s) and does not believe in his progeny is not a believer.All scholars and mysticsare of the same opinion on this issue with no one denying it. [29]

Are they truthful in making this claim?

As a matter of fact, Sunni scholars claim that “anyone who believes in Muhammad (s) and does not believe in his progeny is not a believer”. On the other hand, all scholars and mystics are unanimous on this issue with no one denying it.

Let’s now ask them this question: if you are truthful in making this claim, what do you say Qattan, Bukhari, Ibn Taymiyya and their likes?

Commenting on Safina tradition (my progeny is Noah’s ship. Anyone whogets on it will be saved and anyone who leaves it will be drowned) he says: This tradition shows that salvation and guidance is the result of loving and following the Holy Prophet’s progeny. Any deviation from this path will bring about one’s perdition.

As the discussion proceeds, Shah Abd al-Aziz Dehlavi considers affection towards and obedience to the Prophet’s progeny as a peculiarity of Sunnis!![30]

If Shah Abd al-Aziz is truthful in his claim he must comment on those who put to question the reputation of Imam Sadiq (a.s).

One must not think that Qattan, Bukhari and their advocates criticized Imam Sadiq (a.s) not because of their animosity towards him but because of scientific studies and religious precautions. Such a view is wrong. This is because if Ibn Taymiyya’s words (concerning Imam Sadiq) are not deviation and animosity, then what are they? Can we find any other example for deviation and animosity? If Ibn Taymiyya is not an enemy of the Prophet’s progeny then who is their enemy who is deviated and prejudiced? Was it the intensity of religious precaution and piety that caused Bukhari to leave aside the traditions of Imam Sadiq (a.s) and other imams and to give space in hisSahih to traditions by misled and corrupt individuals like Akrama who had deep hatred towards the Holy Prophet’s progeny? How can thus one excuse Bukhari and justify his deed?

Buhkari and Duhli have questioned the credibility of one another in a manner that tells us they were lewd. Bukhari avoids mentioning Zuhli’s name explicitly. Despite all this animosity, he relates Zuhli’s tradition but refrains from mentioning Imam Sadiq’s traditions!!

Qattan and his criticism of Imam Sadiq (a.s)

Qattan has also put to question the reputation and credibility of Imam Sadiq (a.s). This has appeared in Sunnis’ rijal books. In two sentences he criticizes Imam Sadiq (a.s). He says: “I do not accept him” and “I like Mujalid more than him”.

Elaborating on Imam Sadiq’s life, Dahabi says: Abu Abdullah Ja’afar bin Muhammad Sadiq’s mother is Umm e Farwa, daughter of Qasim bin Muhammad. His maternal grandmother is Asma, daughter of Abd al-Rahman bin Abu Bakr. Ja’afar Sadiq said: Abu Bakr has brought me to this world twice.

He listened to the traditions of Qasim, ‘Ata and his father (Muhammad Baqir (a.s)), Shu’aba and Qattan have narrated his traditions. Qattan says: I do not accept him….[31]

Elsewhere Dahabimentions: Ja’afar bin Muhammad bin Ali is a reliable person, though Bukhari has not mentioned his traditions. Yahya bin Mu’aeen and Ibn Udai consider his traditions as credible, though Qattan says that he likes Mujalid more than him.[32]

Who is Mujalid bin Sa’eed?

Given the preceding discussion, most Sunni scholars have questioned the credibility and reputation of Mujalid bin Sa’eed. Commenting on him,Dahabi says: Mujalid bin Sa’eed Bin Umair Hamadani is a popular figure with traditions though weak. He narrated traditions from Qabas bin Abu Hazim and Sha’abi. Yahaya Qattan, Abu Usama and others have narrated traditions from him.

Speaking about him Ibn Mu’aeen and others says: One cannot rely on Mujalid’s traditions.

Talking about him, Ahmad says: No one has reported as many marfu’a (chainless) traditions as Mujalid has done. One must not pay attention to his traditions.

Nisaee says that Mujalid is not strong in terms of transmitting traditions.Ashaj says that Mujalid is a Shiite.n Dar Qutni says that Mujalid is weak in terms of narrating traditions. Bukhari says: Yahya bin Sa’eed has always criticized Mujalid whereas Ibn Mahdi has refrained from narrating his traditions.

Falas says: I heard Yaya bin Sa’eed say: If I asked Mujalid to begin all his traditions with the phrase “from Sha’bi, from Masruq, from Abdullah” he would do it.

When Takhan, Mujalid’s maternal uncle was asked as to why he did not record Mujalid’s traditions when he was in Kufa he said: because Mujalid keeps long beard.

In my point of view, some scholars have rejected Mujalid’s tradition that “If I willed, Allah would give me mountains of gold and silver” as false. Mujalid has narrated this tradition in marfu’a format from Sha’abi, from Masruq, from ‘Aisha.[33]

This is a part of the views of biographers concerning Mujalid bin Sa’eed whom Qattan preferred to Imam Sadiq (a.s). You can now judge yourself about the characters of Qattan, Bukhari and their co-thinkers on the basis of justice and religious standards.

Dahabi and Imam Sadiq (a.s)

Albeit Dahabi has considered Imam Sadiq (a.s) as reliable, he has made no objection to Qattan and Bukhari’s prejudice against Imam Sadiq (a.s). On the contrary, in hisal-Mizan , he has mentioned the criticism made by Qattan and Bukhari against Imam Sadiq (a.s), saying:

Ja’afar bin Muhammad bin Ali bin Husain Hashimi, Abu Abdullah is among great, benevolent and truthful imams. Bukhari has refrained from narrating from him. Yahya bin Sa’aeed says that he likes Mujalid more than him.

Mus’ab bin Abdullah quotes Darawardi as saying: Malik refrained from narrating from Ja’afar (Imam Sadiq (a.s)) before the dominance of Bani Abbas. If he narrated anything from him he would add the name of another narrator to his name.

Ahmad bin Sa’eed bin Abu Maryam quotes Yahya as saying: I did not ask Yahya bin Sa’aeed anything about the traditions of Ja’afar (Imam Sadiq (a.s). It was because of this that he asked: Why do you not ask him about the traditions’ of Ja’afar.

I said: I do not like his traditions.

Yahya bin Sa’eed said: If Ja’afar is a memorizer he can narrate authentic traditions from his father.[34]

In his preface to this book, Dahabi, on the other hand, points out that he does not intend to mention the names of those great scholars of jurisprudence whom Bukhari and Ibn Udai have criticized.[35]

Is the position of Imam Sadiq (a.s) is lower than that of some of the lewd companions (of the Holy Prophet (s)) such as 'Amr bin ‘As, Busr bin Arta’a and their likes? Were Shafi’aee and others better off than Imam Sadiq (a.s)?

No doubt, they were not. Thus it is prejudice against and animosity towards the Holy Prophet’s progeny that make one to commits such a grieve sin. One must take refuge to Allah from such sins.

Who is Qattan?

Let’s now see how Sunni scholars have exaggerated in praising Qattan while elaborating on his life. Sam’ani says: Qattan is a person who sells cotton. Qattan was called Qattan for he was as seller of cotton. His full name is Abu Sa’eed, Yahya bin Sa’eed bin Farrukh Ahwal Qattan. He was among the slaves of Bani Tamim and the imams of Basra.

He narrated traditions from Yahya bin Sa’eed Ansari and Hisham bin Urwa and the people of narrated his traditions.

Qattan died on Sunday in the year 198 AH. When a person asked Allah to cure his illness when he was ill, he would say: I like that which Allah likes.

He was among the top figures of his time in memorizing traditions, piety, reason, understanding, virtue, religion and knowledge. It was he who taught Iraqis how to record traditions.

He spent most of his time in learning about reliable narrators and leaving weak narrators. Ahmad bin Hanbal, Yahya bin Mu’aeen and Ali bin Madini have learnt the science of hadith from him.

Talking about him, Amr bin Ali Falas says: Yahya bin Sa’eed Qattan used to recite the entire Qur’an in every twenty four hours. He used to pray for as many as one thousand people. In the final hours of afternoon, he would go out of his house in order to relate traditions for people.

He narrated traditions from Yahya bin Sa’eed Ansari, his homonym, Hisham bin Urwa, ‘Amash bin Jarih, Thawri, Shu’aba, Malik etc. He said that he had accompanied Shu’aba for twenty years during which time he had learnt as many as three to ten traditions from him.

Yahya bin Mu’aeen says: He used to recite the entire Quran every night for twenty consecutive years. He used to offer his noon prayers in mosque for forty year in succession, though he was never seen in congregational prayer.[36]

Speaking about Qattan, he says: His full name is Yahya bin Saeed Qattan, Abu Saeed bin Farrukh Tamimi. He was the imam of Basran narrators and was among the followers of the followers. He listened to the traditions of Yahya bin Saeed Ansari, Hanzala bin Abu Sufyan, bin ‘Ajlan, Sayf bin Sulaiman, Hisham bin Hassan, bin Jarih, Saeed bin ‘Aruba, bin Abu Zaeb, Noori, bin ‘Aenae, Malik, Mush’aeer, Shu’aba and others.

Noori, Ibn ‘Aeena, Shu’ab, Ibn Mahdi, ‘Affan, Ahmad bin Hanbal, Yahya bin Mu’een, Ali bin Madini, Ishaq bin Rahwiyya, Abu Abdi Qasim bin Salam, Abu Khtima, Abu Bakr bin Abu Shayba, Musaddid, Ubaydullah bin Umar Qawariri, Amr, bin Ali, Ibn Muthana, Ibn Bashar etc. have narrated traditions from him.

All scholars have admitted his imamate, greatness, memorization and his immense knowledge.

Commenting on him, Dahabi says: Yahya bin Sa’eed bin Farrukh, Abu Sa’eed Tamimi, Qattan, a great memorizer was the imam of Basran narrators. He narrated traditions from Urwa, Hamid and Amash. Ahmad, Ali and Yahya narrated traditions from him.

Ahmad says: Qattan is a unique personality. Bandar says: Yahya Qattan was the imam of his time. I was in touch with him for twenty years. I think he did not commit even a single sin!

Qattan was top in terms of knowledge and good deeds. He was born in 120 AH and died in Safar 198 AH.[37]

Speaking about Qattan, Yafi’aee said: Imam Abu Sa’eed Yahya bin Sa’eed Qattan was from Basra. He was memorizer of tradition and a great scholar. Bandar says: I was in touch with him for twenty years. I think he did not commit even a single sin!

Ahmad bin Hanbal said: Qattan was a unique personality. Ibn Mu’aeen said: He used to recite the entire Quran every night for twenty consecutive years and pray in mosque for forty years without any cessation.[38]

Incredible claims

The above-mentioned scholars were aware of Qattan’s words concerning Imam Sadiq (a.s), but despite that they praised him. Theses praises determine Sunnis’ attitude towards the Holy Prophet’s progeny (a.s).

Thus we cannot agree with some Sunni scholars who say that Sunnis respect the Holy Prophet’s progeny and appealed to them. It cannot be accepted that someone loves the Holy Prophet’s progeny and praises their enemies!

The story of Ibn Madini’s al-Ilal

One of the objections that target Bukhari’s piety and credibility is his way of approachingal-Illal written by Ibn Madini, his teacher.

In hisal-T’arikh , Muslima bin Qasim (based on what is narrated)[39] , says:Bukhari wrote his Sahih in order to compete Ali bin Madini who had writtenal -Ilal and wan not willing to publish it.

Considering his book as very great and useful, he did not narrate its traditions to anyone. One day Ali bin Madini went somewhere to do something. [Utilizing the opportunity], Bukhari visited one his children. He proposed to him to lend himal-Ilal to study for three days in return for one hundred Dinars.

Being attracted by the charms of Dinars, Ibn Madini’s family lent it to him and asked him to return it after three days.

Bukhari got the book that was consisting of one hundred volumes and distributed it among one hundred writers asking each one to transcribe and edit his portion within twenty four hours.

As expected, the writers in question completed its transcription and editing within twenty four hours.

After accomplishing the task, Bukhari returnedal-Ilal back to Ali bin Madini’s son, saying that he could study only parts of it.

Not knowing about what had happened, Ali bin Madini arrived home. Bukhari now studied the book and memorized its content. He had good relations with Ibn Madini. Ibn Madini used to devote one day to the people of tradition, elaborating on the weakness and chains of traditions.

After some times, Bukhari visited Ibn Madini. “Where are you? I have not seen you for a long time?”, Ibn Madini said. “I was busy doing something”, replied Bukhari.

Thereupon Ali bin Madini narrated some traditions and asked the people of traditions to comment on their weaknesses.

Bukhari replied, while mentioning the exact words of Ibn Madini in hisal-Ilal . Ibn Madini was surprised by Bukhari’s comment and thus he, addressing him, said: How did you know the answer to this question? I have written it in my book. Presently no one except me knows about such issues.

Saddened and made sorrowful, Ibn Madini came back home. At his home, he learnt that Bukhari had taken the book from his family after giving them some money. His sorrow continued to increase until he died a short while later.

Now that Bukhari hadal-Ilal at his disposal he did not need to attend Madini’s lectures anymore. That is why he left for Khurasan where he became a jurist making use ofal-Ilal .

He wrote hisSahih and history books and became popular. He was the first scholar who wroteSahih in the world of Islam and other scholars followed in his footsteps and wrote their sahih books.

The afore-mentioned story shows that Bukhari was the main factor behind the death of his teacher, Ali bin Madini, for it was Bukhari who borrowed Ibn Madini’sal-Ilal from his family through trick and deceit and introduced changes in it.

Biography of the late Ayatullah Murtadha Mutahhari

Ayatullāh Murťadhā Muťahharī, one of the principle architects of the new Islāmic consciousness in Iran, was born on February 2nd, 1920, in Farīmān, then a village and now a township about sixty kilometres from Mashhad, the great centre of Shī`a pilgrimage and learning in Eastern Iran.1

His father was Muhammad Ĥusaīn Muťahharī, a renown scholar who studied in Najaf and spent several years in Egypt and the Hijāz before returning to Farīmān. The elder Muťahharī was of a different caste of mind then his son, who in any event came to outshine him.

The father was devoted to the works of the celebrated traditionalist, Mullāh Muhammad Bāqir Majlisī; whereas the son’s great hero among the Shī`a scholars of the past was the theosophist Mullā Sadrā.

Nonetheless, Āyatullāh Muťahharī always retained great respect and affection for his father, who was also his first teacher, and he dedicated to him one of his most popular books, Dastān-e-Rastān (“The Epic of the Righteous”), first published in 1960, and which was later chosen as book of the year by the Iranian National Commission for UNESCO in 1965.

At the exceptionally early age of twelve, Muťahharī began his formal religious studies at the teaching institution in Mashhad, which was then in a state of decline, partly because of internal reasons and partly because of the repressive measures directed by Ridhā Khān, the first Pahlavī autocrat, against all Islāmic institutions.

But in Mashhad, Muťahharī discovered his great love for philos­ophy, theology, and mysticism, a love that remained with him throughout his life and came to shape his entire outlook on religion:

“I can remember that when I began my studies in Mashhad and was still engaged in learning elementary Arabic, the philosophers, mys­tics, and theologians impressed me far more than other scholars and scientists, such as inventors and explorers. Naturally I was not yet acquainted with their ideas, but I regarded them as heroes on the stage of thought.”2

Accordingly, the figure in Mashhad who aroused the greatest devotion in Muťahharī was Mīrzā Mahdī Shahīdī Razavī, a teacher of philosophy.

But Razavī died in 1936, before Muťahharī was old enough to participate in his classes, and partly because of this reason he left Mashhad the following year to join the growing number of students congregating in the teaching institution in Qum.

Thanks to the skillful stewardship of Shaykh `Abdul Karīm Hā’irī, Qum was on its way to becoming the spiritual and intellectual capital of Islāmic Iran, and Muťahharī was able to benefit there from the instruction of a wide range of scholars.

He studied Fiqh and Uŝūl - the core subjects of the traditional curriculum - with Āyatul­lāh Ĥujjat Kuhkamarī, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Dāmād, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Ridhā Gulpāyagānī, and Ĥajj Sayyid Ŝadr al-Dīn as-Ŝadr. But more important than all these was Āyatullāh Burujerdī, the successor of Ĥā’irī as director of the teaching establishment in Qum. Muťahharī attended his lectures from his arrival in Qum in 1944 until his departure for Tehran in 1952, and he nourished a deep respect for him.

Fervent devotion and close affinity characterized Muťahharī’s relationship with his prime mentor in Qum, Āyatullāh Rūhullāh Khumaynī. When Muťahharī arrived in Qum, Āyatullāh Khumaynī was a young lecturer, but he was already marked out from his contem­poraries by the profoundness and comprehensiveness of his Islāmic vision and his ability to convey it to others.

These qualities were manifested in the celebrated lectures on ethics that he began giving in Qum in the early 1930s. The lectures attracted a wide audience from outside as well as inside the religious teaching institution and had a profound impact on all those who attended them. Muťahharī made his first acquaintance with Āyatullah Khumaynī at these lectures:

“When I migrated to Qum, I found the object of my desire in a personality who possessed all the attributes of Mīrzā Mahdī (Sha­hīdī Razavī) in addition to others that were peculiarly his own. I realized that the thirst of my spirit would be quenched at the pure spring of that personality. Although I had still not completed the preliminary stages of my studies and was not yet qualified to embark on the study of the rational sciences (ma`qulāt), the lectures on ethics given by that beloved personality every Thursday and Friday were not restricted to ethics in the dry, aca­demic sense but dealt with gnosis and spiritual wayfaring, ­and thus, they intoxicated me. I can say without exaggeration that those lectures aroused in me such ecstasy that their effect remained with me until the following Monday or Tuesday. An important part of my intel­lectual and spiritual personality took shape under the influence of those lectures and the other classes I took over a period of twelve years with that spiritual master (ustād-i ilahī) [meaning Āyatullāh Khumaynī].”3

In about 1946, Āyatullāh Khumaynī began lecturing to a small group of students that included both Muťahharī and his roommate at the Fayziya Madressah, Āyatullāh Muntazarī, on two key philosophical texts, the Asfar al-Arba`a of Mullā Ŝadra and the Sharh-e-Manzuma of Mullā Hādī Sabzwārī. Muťahharī’s participation in this group, which continued to meet until about 1951, enabled him to establish more intimate links with his teacher.

Also in 1946, at the urging of Muťahharī and Muntazarī, the Āyatullāh Khumaynī taught his first formal course on Fiqh and Uŝūl, taking the chapter on rational proofs from the second volume of Akhund Khurāsānī’s Kifāyatal Uŝūl as his teaching text. Muťahharī followed his course assiduously, while still pursuing his studies of Fiqh with Āyatullāh Burūjerdī.

In the first two post-war decades, Āyatullāh Khumaynī trained numer­ous students in Qum who became leaders of the Islāmic Revolution and the Islāmic Republic, such that through them (as well as directly), the imprint of his personality was visible on all the key developments of the past decade.

But none among his students bore to Āyatullāh Khumaynī the same relationship of affinity as Muťahharī, an affinity to which the Āyatullāh Khumaynī himself has borne witness to.

The pupil and master shared a profound attachment to all aspects of traditional scholarship, without in any way being its captive; a comprehensive vision of Islām as a total system of life and belief, with particular importance ascribed to its philosophical and mystical aspects.

An absolute loyalty to the reli­gious institution, tempered by an awareness of the necessity of reform; a desire for comprehensive social and political change, accompanied by a great sense of strategy and timing; and an ability to reach out beyond the circle of the traditionally religious, and gain the attention and loyalty of the secularly educated.

Among the other teachers whose influence Muťahharī was exposed in Qum, was the great exegete of the Qur’ān and philosopher, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Ĥusain Ťabā’ťabā’ī. Muťahharī participated in both Ťabāťabā’ī’s classes on the Shifā` of Abū `Alī Sīnā from 1950 to 1953, and the Thursday evening meetings that took place under his direction.

The subject of these meetings was materialist philosophy, a remarkable choice for a group of traditional scholars. Muťahharī himself had first conceived a critical interest in materialist philosophy, especially Marxism, soon after embarking on the formal study of the rational sciences.

Ac­cording to his own recollections, in about 1946 he began to study the Persian translations of Marxist literature published by the Tudeh party, the major Marxist organization in Iran and at that time an important force in the political scene.

In addition, he read the writings of Taqī Arānī, the main theoretician of the Tudeh party, as well as Marxist publications in `Arabic emanating from Egypt.

At first he had some difficulty understanding these texts because he was not acquainted with modern philosophical terminology, but with continued exertion (which included the drawing up of a synopsis of Georges Pulitzer’s Elementary Principles of Philosophy), he came to master the whole subject of materialist philosophy.

This mastery made him an important contributor to Ťabā’ťabāī’s circle and later, after his move to Tehran, an effective combatant in the ideological war against Marxism and Marxist-influenced interpretations of Islām.

Numerous refutations of Marxism have been essayed in the Islāmic world, both in Iran and elsewhere, but almost all of them fail to go beyond the obvious incompatibilities of Marxism with reli­gious belief and the political failures and inconsistencies of Marxist political parties.

Muťahharī, by contrast, went to the philosophical roots of the matter and demonstrated with rigorous logic the contra­dictory and arbitrarily hypothetic nature of key principles of Marx­ism. His polemical writings are characterized more by intellectual than rhetorical or emotional force.

However, for Muťahharī, philosophy was far more than a polemi­cal tool or intellectual discipline; it was a particular style of religios­ity, a way of understanding and formulating Islām. Muťahharī belongs, in fact, to the tradition of Shī`a philosophical concern that goes back at least as far as Nasīr ad-Dīn Ťuŝī, one of Muťahharī’s personal heroes.

To say that Muťahharī’s view of Islām was philo­sophical is not to imply that he lacked spirituality or was determined to subordinate revealed dogma to philosophical interpretation and to impose philosophical terminology on all domains of religious con­cern,

Rather it means that he viewed the attainment of knowledge and understanding as the prime goal and benefit of religion and for that reason assigned to philosophy a certain primacy among the disciplines cultivated in the religious institution.

In this he was at variance with those numerous scholars for whom Fiqh was the be-all and end-all of the curriculum, with modernists for whom philos­ophy represented a Hellenistic intrusion into the world of Islām, and with all those whom revolutionary ardour had made impatient with careful philosophical thought.4

The particular school of philosophy to which Muťahharī adhered was that of Mullā Ŝadra, the “sublime philosophy” (hikmat-i muta`āliya) that seeks to combine the methods of spiritual insight with those of philosophical deduction.

Muťahharī was a man of tranquil and serene disposition, both in his general comportment and in his writings. Even when engaged in polemics, he was invaria­bly courteous and usually refrained from emotive and ironical word­ing.

But such was his devotion to Mullā Ŝadrā that he would passionately defend him even against slight or incidental criticism, and he chose for his first grandchild - as well as for the publishing house in Qum that put out his books - the name Ŝadrā.

Insofar as Ŝadrā’s school of philosophy attempts to merge the methods of inward illumination and intellectual reflection, it is not surprising that it has been subject to varying interpretations on the part of those more inclined to one method than the other.

To judge from his writings, Muťahharī belonged to those for whom the intel­lectual dimension of Ŝadrā’s school was predominant; there is little of the mystical or markedly spiritual tone found in other exponents of Ŝadrā’s thought, perhaps because Muťahharī viewed his own inward experiences as irrelevant to the task of instruction in which he was engaged or even as an intimate secret he should conceal.

More likely, however, this predilection for the strictly philosophical dimension of the “sublime philosophy” was an expression of Muťahharī’s own temperament and genius. In this respect, he dif­fered profoundly from his great mentor, Āyatullāh Khumaynī, many of whose political pronouncements continue to be suffused with the language and concerns of mysticism and spirituality.

In 1952, Muťahharī left Qum for Tehran, where he married the daughter of Āyatullāh Rūhānī and began teaching philosophy at the Madressah Marwi, one of the principal institutions of religious learning in the capital.

This was not the beginning of his teaching career, for already in Qum he had begun to teach certain subjects - logic, philosophy, theology, and Fiqh - while still a student himself.

But Muťahharī seems to have become progressively impatient with the somewhat restricted atmosphere of Qum, with the factional­ism prevailing among some of the students and their teachers, and with their remoteness from the concerns of society. His own future prospects in Qum were also uncertain.

In Tehran, Muťahharī found a broader and more satisfying field of religious, educational, and ultimately political activity. In 1954, he was invited to teach philosophy at the Faculty of Theology and Islāmic Sciences of Tehran University, where he taught for twenty-­two years.

First the regularization of his appointment and then his promotion to professor was delayed by the jealousy of mediocre colleagues and by political considerations (for Muťahharī’s closeness to Āyatullāh Khumaynī was well known).

But the presence of a figure such as Muťahharī in the secular university was significant and effective. Many men of Madressah background had come to teach in the univer­sities, and they were often of great erudition.

However, almost without exception they had discarded an Islāmic worldview, together with their turbans and cloaks. Muťahharī, by contrast, came to the university as an articulate and convinced exponent of Islāmic science and wisdom, almost as an envoy of the religious institution to the secularly educated. Numerous people responded to him, as the peda­gogical powers he had first displayed in Qum now fully unfolded.

In addition to building his reputation as a popular and effective university lecturer, Muťahharī participated in the activities of the numerous professional Islāmic associations (anjumanhā) that had come into being under the supervision of Mahdī Bāzārgān and Āyatullāh Taleqānī, lecturing to their doctors, engi­neers, teachers and helping to coordinate their work. A number of Muťahharī’s books in fact consist of the revised transcripts of series of lectures delivered to the Islāmic associations.

Muťahharī’s wishes for a wider diffusion of religious knowledge in society and a more effective engagement of religious scholars in social affairs led him in 1960 to assume the leadership of a group of Tehran `Ulamā known as the Anjuman-e-Mahāna-yi Dīnī (“The Monthly Religious Society”).

The members of this group, which included the late Āyatullāh Beheshtī, a fellow-student of Muťahharī in Qum, organized monthly public lectures designed simultaneously to demonstrate the relevance of Islām to contempo­rary concerns, and to stimulate reformist thinking among the `Ulamā.

The lectures were printed under the title of Guftār-e-Māh (“Dis­course of the Month”) and proved very popular, but the government banned them in March 1963 when Āyatullāh Khumaynī began his public denunciation of the Pahlavī regime.

A far more important venture in 1965 of the same kind was the foundation of the Ĥusayniya-e-Irshād, an institution in north Tehran, designed to gain the allegiance of the secularly educated young to Islām. Muťahharī was among the members of the directing board; he also lectured at the Ĥusayniya-e-Irshād and edited and contrib­uted to several of its publications.

The institution was able to draw huge crowds to its functions, but this success - which without doubt exceeded the hopes of the founders, was overshadowed by a number of internal problems. One such problem was the political context of the institution’s activities, which gave rise to differing opinions on the opportuneness of going beyond reformist lecturing to political confrontation.

The spoken word plays in general a more effective and immediate role in promoting revolutionary change than the written word, and it would be possible to compose an anthology of key sermons, addresses, and lectures that have carried the Islāmic Revolution of Iran forward.

But the clarification of the ideological content of the revolution and its demarcation from opposing or competing schools of thought have necessarily depended on the written word, on the composition of works that expound Islāmic doctrine in systematic form, with particular attention to contemporary problems and con­cerns.

In this area, Muťahharī’s contribution was unique in its volume and scope. Muťahharī wrote assiduously and continuously, from his student days in Qum up to 1979 the year of his martyr­dom.

Much of his output was marked by the same philosophical tone and emphasis already noted, and he probably regarded as his most important work Uŝūl-e-Falsafa wa Ravish-e-Ri’ālism (“The Principles of Philosophy and the Method of Realism”), the record of Ťabāťabāī’s discourses to the Thursday evening circle in Qum, supple­mented with Muťahharī’s comments.

But he did not choose the topics of his books in accordance with personal interest or predilection, but with his perception of need; wherever a book was lacking on some vital topic of contemporary Islāmic interest, Muťahharī sought to supply it.

Single handily, he set about constructing the main ele­ments of a contemporary Islāmic library. Books such as `Adl-e-Ilāhī (“Divine Justice”), Nizām-e-Ĥuquq-e-Zan dar Islām (“The System of Women’s Rights in Islām”), Mas’ala-yi Ĥijāb (“The Question of the Veil”), Ashnā’i ba `Ulūm-e-Islāmī (“An Introduction to the Islāmic Sciences”), and Muqaddima bar Jahānbīnī-yi Islāmi (“An Introduc­tion to the Worldview of Islām”) were all intended to fill a need, to contribute to an accurate and systematic understanding of Islām and the problems in the Islāmic society.

These books may well come to be regarded as Muťahharī’s most lasting and important contribution to the rebirth of Islāmic Iran, but his activity also had a political dimension that admittedly subordi­nate, should not be overlooked.

While a student and fledgling teacher in Qum, he had sought to instill political consciousness in his contemporaries and was particularly close to those among them who were members of the Fida’iyan-i Islām, the Militant Organization founded in 1945 by Nawwab Safawī.

The Qum headquarters of the Fida’iyan was the Madrasa-yi Fayziya, where Muťahharī himself resided, and he sought in vain to prevent them from being removed from the Madressah by Āyatullāh Burūjerdī, who was resolutely set against all political confrontation with the Shah’s regime.

During the struggle for the nationalization of the Iranian Oil Industry, Muťahharī sympa­thized with the efforts of Āyatullāh Kāshānī and Dr. Muhammad Musaddiq, although he criticized the latter for his adherence to secular nationalism. After his move to Tehran, Muťahharī collabo­rated with the Freedom Movement of Bāzārgān and Taleqānī, but never became one of the leading figures in the group.

His first serious confrontation with the Shah’s regime came dur­ing the uprising of Khurdad 15th, 1342/June 6th, 1963, when he showed himself to be politically, as well as intellectually, a follower of Āyatullāh Khumaynī by distributing his declarations and urging sup­port for him in the sermons he gave.5

He was accordingly arrested and held for forty-three days. After his release, he participated actively in the various organizations that came into being to maintain the momentum that had been created by the uprising, most impor­tantly the Association of Militant Religious Scholars (Jami`a yi Ruhāniyāt-e-Mubāriz).

In November 1964, Āyatullāh Khumaynī entered on his fourteen years of exile, spent first in Turkey and then in Najaf, and throughout this period Muťahharī remained in touch with Āyatullāh Khumaynī, both directly - by visits to Najaf - and indirectly.

When the Islāmic Revolution approached its triumphant climax in the winter of 1978 and Āyatullāh Khumaynī left Najaf for Paris, Muťahharī was among those who travelled to Paris to meet and consult with him. His closeness to Āyatullāh Khumaynī was confirmed by his appointment to the Council of the Islāmic Revolution, the existence of which Āyatullāh Khumaynī announced on January 12th, 1979.

Muťahharī’s services to the Islāmic Revolution were brutally curtailed by his assassination on May 1st, 1979. The murder was carried out by a group known as Furqān, which claimed to be the protagonists of a “progressive Islām,” one freed from the allegedly distorting influence of the religious scholars.

Although Muťahharī appears to have been chairman of the Council of the Islāmic Revolu­tion at the time of his assassination, it was as a thinker and a writer that he was martyred.

In 1972, Muťahharī published a book entitled `Illal-i Girayish ba Maddigarī (“Reasons for the Turn to Materialism”), an impor­tant work analyzing the historical background of materialism in Europe and Iran.

During the revolution, he wrote an introduction to the eighth edition of this book, attacking distortions of the thought of Ĥafiz and Hallaj that had become fashionable in some segments of Irānian society and refuting certain materialistic interpretations of the Qur’ān.

The source of the interpretations was the Furqān group, which sought to deny fundamental Qur’ānic concepts such as the divine transcendence and the reality of the hereafter.

As always in such cases, Muťahharī’s tone was persuasive and solicitous, not angry or condemnatory, and he even invited a response from Furqān and other interested parties to comment on what he had written. Their only response was the gun.

The threat to assassinate all who opposed them was already con­tained in the publications of Furqān, and after the publication of the new edition of `Illal-e-Girayish ba Maddigarī, Muťahharī apparently had some premonition of his martyrdom.

According to the testi­mony of his son, Mujtabā, a kind of detachment from worldly concerns became visible in him; he augmented his nightly prayers and readings of the Qur’ān, and he once dreamed that he was in the presence of the Prophet (S), together with Āyatullāh Khumaynī .

On Tuesday, May 1st, 1979 Muťahharī went to the house of Dr. Yadullāh Sahābī, in the company of other members of the Council of the Islāmic Revolution. At about 10:30 at night, he and another participant in the meeting, Engineer Katira`i, left Sahābī’s house.

Walking by himself to an adjacent alley where the car that was to take him home was parked, Muťahharī suddenly heard an unknown voice call out to him. He looked around to see where the voice was coming from, and as he did, a bullet struck him in the head, entering beneath the right earlobe and exiting above the left eyebrow.

He died almost instantly, and although he was rushed to a nearby hospi­tal, there was nothing that could be done but mourn for him. The body was left in the hospital the following day, and then on Thursday, amid wide­spread mourning, it was taken for funeral prayers first to Tehran University and then to Qum for burial, next to the grave of Shaykh `Abdul Karīm Hā’irī .

Āyatullāh Khumaynī wept openly when Muťahharī was buried in Qum, and he described him as his “dear son,” and as “the fruit of my life,” and as “a part of my flesh.” But in his eulogy Āyatullāh Khumaynī also pointed out that with the murder of Muťahharī neither his personality was diminished, nor was the course of the revolution interrupted:

“Let the evil-wishers know that with the departure of Muťahharī - his Islāmic personality, his philosophy and learning, have not left us. Assassinations cannot destroy the Islāmic personality of the great men of Islām…Islām grows through sacrifice and martyrdom of its cherished ones. From the time of its revelation up to the present time, Islām has always been accompanied by martyrdom and heroism.”6

The personage and legacy of Āyatullāh Muťahharī have certainly remained unforgotten in the Islāmic Republic, to such a degree that his posthumous presence has been almost as impressive as the attainments of his life. The anniversary of his martyrdom is regularly commemorated, and his portrait is ubiquitous throughout Iran.

Many of his unpublished writings are being printed for the first time, and the whole corpus of his work is now being distributed and studied on a massive scale. In the words of Āyatullāh Khamene’ī, President of the Republic, the works of Muťahharī have come to constitute “the intellectual infrastructure of the Islāmic Republic.”

Efforts are accordingly under way to promote a knowledge of Muťahharī’s writings outside the Persian-speaking world as well, and the Ministry of Islāmic Guidance has sponsored translations of his works into languages as diverse as Spanish and Malay.

In a sense, however, it will be the most fitting memorial to Muťahharī if revolutionary Iran proves able to construct a polity, society, economy and culture that are authentically and integrally Islāmic. For Muťahharī’s life was oriented to a goal that transcended individual motivation, and his martyrdom was the final expression of that effacement of self.

Notes

1. This sketch of the life and works of Āyatullāh Muťahharī is based chiefly on Muhammad Wa'izzāda Khurāsānī’s, “Sayrī dar Zindagi-yi `Ilmī wa Inqilābiīyi Ustad Shahīd Murtadhā Muťahharī,” in Yadnāma-yi Ustād Shahīd Murtadhā Muťahharī, ed. `Abdul Karīm Surūsh, Teh­ran, 1360 Sh./1981, pp. 319-380, an article rich in information on many aspects of the recent history of Islāmic Irān. Reference has also been made to Mujtabā Muťahhari, “Zindagi-yi Pidaram,” in Harakat (journal of the students at the Tehran Faculty of Theology), no. 1 (n.d.), pp. 5-16; M. Hoda, In Memory of Martyr Muťahharī, a pam­phlet published by the Ministry of Islāmic Guidance, Tehran, April, 1982; and Āyatullāh Muťahharī’s autobiographical introduction to the eighth edition of `Ilal-i Girayish ba Maddīgarī; Qum, 1357 Sh./1978, pp. 7ff.

2. `Ilal-e-Girayish ba Maddīgarī, Page 9.

3. `Ilal-i Girayish ba Maddigari, Page 9.

4. The authoritative statement of this view was made by Sayyid Qutb in his Khasā’is al-Tasawwur al-Islāmī wa Muqawwimatuhu, Cairo, numer­ous editions, which was translated into Persian and had some influence on views toward philosophy.

5. Muhahharī’s name comes ninth in a list of clerical detainees prepared by the military prosecutor’s office in June, 1963. See facsimile of the list in Dihnavi, Qiyam-e-Khunin-i 15 Khurdad 42 ba Rivāyat-e-Asnād, Tehran, 1360 Sh./1981, Page 77.

6. Text of Āyatullāh Khumaynī’s eulogy in Yādnama-yi Ustād-i Shahīd Murtadha Muhahharī, pp. 3-5.

Good Deeds of Non-Muslims

Outline of the Discussion

One of the issues which is discussed regarding “Divine justice” is the issue of the good deeds performed by non-Muslims.

Today, the issue of whether the good deeds of non-Muslims are accepted by God or not is under discussion amongst the different classes - whether learned or unlearned, literate or illiterate. If they are accepted, what difference does it make if a person is a Muslim or not; the important thing is to do good in this world.

If a person is not a Muslim and practices no religion, he or she has lost nothing. And if their actions are not acceptable and are altogether void with no reward or recompense from God, then how is that compatible with Divine justice?

This same question can be asked from a Shī`a perspective within the bounds of Islām: Are the actions of a non-Shī`a Muslim acceptable to God, or are they null and void? If they are acceptable, what difference does it make if a person is a Shī`a Muslim or a non-Shī`a Muslim?

What is important is to be Muslim; a person who is not a Shī`a and doesn’t believe in the wilāyah (Divinely-appointed guardianship) of the Ahlul Baīt (as) has not lost anything. And if the actions of such a person are not acceptable to God, then how is that compatible with Divine justice?

In the past, this issue was only discussed by philosophers and in the books of philosophy. However, today it has entered into the minds of all levels of society; few people can be found who have not at least broached the subject for themselves and in their own minds.

Divine philosophers would discuss the issue from the aspect that if all people who are outside the fold of religion are to face perdition and Divine punishment, it necessarily follows that in the universe, evil and compulsion are preponderant. However, the fact that felicity and good have primacy in the universe not evil and wretchedness is an accepted and definitive principle.

Humanity is the greatest of all of creation; everything else has been created for it (of course, with the correct conception of this idea that is understood by the wise, not the perception that the short-sighted people commonly possess).

If humanity itself is to be created for the Hell-fire – that is, if the final abode of the majority of humanity is to be Hell then one must grant that the anger of God supersedes His mercy.

This is because the majority of people are strangers to the true religion; and even those who are within the fold of the true religion are beset by deviation and digression when it comes to practicing.This was the background of the discussion amongst the philosophers.

It has been nearly half a century that, as a result of easier communication among Muslim and non-Muslim nations, an increase in the means of communication, and greater interaction amongst nations, the issue of whether being a Muslim and a believer as a necessary condition for the acceptability of good deeds is being discussed among all levels of society, especially the so-called intellectuals.

When these people study the lives of inventors and scientists of recent times who were not Muslim but who performed valuable services for humanity, they find such people worthy of reward.

On the other hand since they used to think that the actions of non-Muslims are altogether null and void, they fall into serious doubt and uncertainty. In this way, an issue which for years was the exclusive domain of the philosophers has entered the general conversations of people and has taken the form of an objection with regard to Divine justice.

Of course, this objection is not directly related to Divine justice; it is related to Islām’s viewpoint about human beings and their actions, and becomes related to Divine justice inasmuch as it appears that such a viewpoint regarding human beings, their actions, and God’s dealing with them is in opposition to the standards of Divine justice.

In the interactions that I have and have had with students and the youth, I have frequently been faced with this question. Sometimes they ask whether the great inventors and scientists, with all the worthy services which they have done for humanity, will go to Hell.

Will the likes of Pasteur and Edison go to Hell while indolent holy people who have spent their lives idly in a corner of the Masjid go to Heaven? Has God created Heaven solely for us Shī`as?

I remember that once an acquaintance from my city, who was a practicing Muslim, came to Tehran to visit me, and he raised this issue.

This man had visited a lepers’ hospital in Mashhad and had been stirred and deeply affected by the sight of the Christian nurses who were sincerely (at least in his view) looking after the patients with leprosy. At that time, this issue came up in his mind and he fell into doubt.

You are aware that looking after a patient of leprosy is a very difficult and unpleasant task and when this hospital was established in Mashhad, very few doctors were willing to serve there, and similarly, no one was willing to care for the patients.

Advertisements for the employment of nurses were taken out in the newspapers; in all of Iran, not a single person gave a positive answer to this invitation. A small group of so-called ascetic Christian women from France came and took charge of nursing the lepers.

This man, who had seen the humanitarianism and loving care of those nurses towards lepers, who had been abandoned by even their own parents, had been strongly affected by these nurses.

He related that the Christian nurses wore long, loose clothes, and apart from their face and hands, no part of their body was visible. Each of them had a long rosary which had perhaps a thousand beads and whenever they would find free time from work, they would busy themselves in their recitations on the rosary.

Then the man asked with a troubled mind and in a disturbed tone whether it was true that non-Muslims would not enter Heaven?

Of course, right now we are not concerned with the motives of those Christian ladies. Was it truly for God, in God’s way, and out of pure humanitarianism that they did what they did, or was another motive in play?

Certainly, we don’t want to be pessimistic, just as we are not overly optimistic; our point is that these incidents and events have introduced our people to a serious question.

Several years ago, I was invited to an association to give a speech. In that association, in accordance with their tradition, the participants were requested to write down any questions they had so that they could be answered at the appropriate time.

Those questions had been recorded in a notebook, and that notebook had been given to me so I could choose the topic of my speech from amongst those topics (noted in the book).

I noticed that the question that had been repeated more than any other was whether God will send all non-Muslims to Hell. Will Pasteur, Edison, and Kokh be amongst those who will be punished in the Hereafter?

It was from that time that I realized the importance of this issue inasmuch as it had attracted people’s thoughts.Now, in this part of the book, we will discuss this issue. But before we begin, we need to clarify two points in order for the topic at hand to become completely clear.

1. The General Aspect of the Discussion

The purpose of this discussion is not to clarify the status of individuals, for example to specify whether Pasteur will go to Heaven or Hell. What do we know about his true thoughts and beliefs? What were his true intentions? What were his personal and moral traits; and in fact what was the sum of all his actions? Our familiarity with him is limited to his intellectual services, and that is all.

This doesn’t apply only to Pasteur. As a matter of principle, the status of individuals is in the hands of God; no one has the right to express an opinion with certainty about whether someone will go to Heaven or Hell. If we were to be asked, “Is Shaykh Murtadhā al-Anŝārī , in view of his known asceticism, piety, faith, and deeds, definitely among the inhabitants of Heaven?”

Our answer would be, “From what we know of the man, in his intellectual and practical affairs we haven’t heard of anything bad. What we know of him is virtue and goodness. But as to say with absolute certainty whether he will go to Heaven or Hell, that isn’t our prerogative.

It is God who knows the intentions of all people, and He knows the secrets and hidden things of all souls; and the account of all people’s actions is also with Him. We can only speak with certainty about those whose final outcome has been made known by the religious authorities.”

Sometimes people discuss and debate amongst themselves about who was the most virtuous and excellent among the `Ulamā (scholars) in terms of nearness to God. For example, was it Sayyid Ibn Ťāwūs , or Sayyid Bahrul `Ulūm ? Or Shaykh al-Anŝārī ? Or sometimes they ask about the most eminent among the descendents of the A’immah.

For example, is Sayyid `Abdul `Adhīm al-Hasanīī (as) is superior in God’s view, or Sayyidah Fāťimah al-Ma`ŝūmah (as)?

Once, one of the Mujtahids was asked whether `Abbās Ibn `Alī (as) was superior or `Alī al-Akbar (as). In order to give the question the form of a practical issue so the Mujtahid would be compelled to answer it, they asked, “If someone vows to sacrifice a sheep for the most superior of the Imāms’ descendents, what is his duty? Is `Abbās Ibn `Alī superior, or `Alī al-Akbar?”

It is obvious that such discussions are improper, and answering such questions is neither the duty of a Faqīh (scholar of Islāmic law), nor of anyone else. Specifying the rank of God’s creation is not our responsibility. It should be left to God, and no one has any knowledge about the matter except through God himself.

In the early era of Islām, there were instances when people expressed such unjustified opinions, and the Prophet Muhammad (S) forbade them from doing so.

When `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn died, a woman of the Anŝār named Umme `Alī, who apparently was the wife of the man in whose house `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn was staying and whose guest he was, addressed his bier in the presence of the Prophet Muhammad (S) and said:

    هَنِيئاً لَكَ الْجَنَّةُ

“May Heaven be pleasant for you!”

Although `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn was an eminent man, and the Prophet Muhammad (S) cried heavily at his funeral and threw himself over the bier and kissed him, the inappropriate statement of that woman displeased him.

He turned to her and with an unhappy look said, “How did you know? Why did you make a statement out of ignorance? Have you received a revelation, or do you know the accounts of God’s creation?”

The woman replied, “O Messenger of God, he was your companion and a brave warrior!” The Noble Messenger (S) answered her with interesting words that are worthy of attention, he said:

    إِنِّي رَسُولُ اللٌّهِ وَمَا أَدْرِي مَا يُفْعَلُ بِــي

“I am the Messenger of God, yet I don’t know what will be done with me.”1

This sentence is the exact purport of a verse of the Qur’ān:

    قُلْ مٌـا كُنْتُ بِدْعاً مِّنَ الرُّسُلِ وَ مٌا أَدْرِي مٌا يُفْعَلُ بِي وَ لاٌ بِكُمْ

“Say, ‘I am not a novelty among the apostles, nor do I know what will be done with me, or with you.”2 3

A similar incident has also been related regarding the death of Sa`d Ibn Mu`ādh. In that instance, when the mother of Sa`d said a similar sentence over his coffin, the Messenger (S) said to her, “Be silent; don’t make a decision with certainty in God’s affairs.”4

2. No Religion Except Al-Islām is Accepted

The other point that must be made clear before beginning the discussion is that the topic of the non-Muslims’ good deeds can be discussed in two ways and in reality, is two discussions:

First, is any religion other than Islām acceptable to God, or is Islām the only acceptable religion? That is, is it necessary only for a person to have some religion or at most follow a religion associated with one of the Divine prophets, without it then making a difference which religion that is, for example, whether one be a Muslim, Christian, Jew, or even a Zoroastrian? Or is there only one true religion in each era?

After we have accepted that the true religion in each era is only one, the other discussion is whether a person who doesn’t follow the true religion but performs a good deed, one that is actually good and is also sanctioned by the true religion, is worthy of reward or not? In other words, is faith in the true religion a condition for one’s good deeds to merit reward?

What will be discussed here is the second issue

With respect to the first issue, we can say briefly that there is only one true religion in each era, and all are obligated to believe in it.

The idea that has recently become common among some so-called intellectuals to the effect that all Divine religions have equal validity in all eras is a fallacious one.

Of course, it is true that there is no disagreement or contradiction among the prophets of God. All of the prophets of God call towards a single goal and the same God. They have not come to create mutually contradicting groups and sects among humanity.

But this doesn’t mean that in every era there are several true religions, and thus people in each era can then choose whichever religion they want.

To the contrary, it means that a person must believe in all of the Prophets and affirm that each Prophet would give tidings of the Prophet to come, especially the final and greatest of them; and likewise, each Prophet would affirm the previous one.

Thus, the necessary consequence of believing in all of the Prophets is to submit in every era to the religion of the Prophet of the time. And of course, it is necessary that in the final era we act on the final commands that have been revealed by God to the final Prophet. And this is what necessarily follows from Islām, that is, submission to God and acceptance of the missions of His Messengers.

Many people in our day have subscribed to the view that it is sufficient for a person to worship God and be affiliated with and practice one of the Divine religions that was revealed by God; the form of the commandments is not that important.

`Isa (Jesus) (as) was a Prophet, Muhammad (S) was also a Prophet; if we follow the religion of `Isa (as) and go to church once a week, that is fine, and if we follow the religion of the final Messenger (S) and pray five times a day, that is also correct. These people say that what is important is for a person to believe in God and practice one of the Divine religions.

George Jordac, author of the book, Imām `Alī; Gibrān Khalīl Gibrān, the well-known Lebanese Christian author; and others like them have such a view.5 These two individuals speak of the Prophet Muhammad (S) and Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťālib (as) and especially Amīrul Mo’minīn (as) – just as a Muslim would.

Some people ask how these people, in spite of their belief in Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as) and the Prophet Muhammad (S), are still Christian.

If they were truthful, they would have become Muslims, and since they haven’t done so, it is clear there is something behind the curtain. They are being deceptive, and they aren’t sincere in their expression of love and belief in the Prophet Muhammad (S) and `Alī Ibn Abī Ťālib (as).

The answer is that they are not without sincerity in their expression of love and belief in the Prophet Muhammad (S) and Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as). However, they have their own way of thinking regarding practicing a religion.

These individuals believe that human beings are not held to a particular religion; any religion is sufficient. Thus, at the same time that they are Christians, they consider themselves admirers and friends of `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as), and they even believe that he himself held their view. George Jordac says, “`Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib declines to compel people to necessarily follow a particular religion.”

However, we consider this idea void. It is true that there is no compulsion in religion:

    لاٌ إِكْرٌاهَ فِي الدِّينِ

“There is no compulsion in religion.”6

But this doesn’t mean that there is more than one religion in every age that is acceptable to God, and we have the right to choose any one we please. This is not the case; in every age, there is one true religion and no more.

Whenever a Prophet was sent by God with a new religion, the people were obligated to avail themselves of his teachings and learn his laws and commandments, whether in acts of worship or otherwise, until the turn of the Seal of the Prophets came.

In this (current) age, if someone wishes to come near God, he or she must seek guidance from the precepts of the religion he brought.

The Noble Qur’ān says:

    وَ مَنْ يَبْتَغِ غَيْرَ الإِسْلاٌمَ دِيناً فَلَنْ يُقْبَلَ مِنْهُ وَ هُوَ فِي الأَخِرَةِ مِنَ الْخٌاسِرِينَ

“And whoever desires a religion other than Islām, it shall never be accepted from him, and in the hereafter he shall be among the losers.”7

If someone were to say that the meaning of “Islām” in this verse is not our religion in particular; rather, the intent is the literal meaning of the word, or submission to God, the answer would be that without doubt Islām means submission and the religion of Islām is the religion of submission, but the reality of submission has a particular form in each age.

And in this age, its form is the same cherished religion that was brought by the Seal of the Prophets. So it follows that the word Islām (submission) necessarily applies to it alone.

In other words, the necessary consequence of submission to God is to accept His commandments, and it is clear that one must always act on the final Divine commandments. And the final commandment of God is what His final messenger has brought.

Biography of the late Ayatullah Murtadha Mutahhari

Ayatullāh Murťadhā Muťahharī, one of the principle architects of the new Islāmic consciousness in Iran, was born on February 2nd, 1920, in Farīmān, then a village and now a township about sixty kilometres from Mashhad, the great centre of Shī`a pilgrimage and learning in Eastern Iran.1

His father was Muhammad Ĥusaīn Muťahharī, a renown scholar who studied in Najaf and spent several years in Egypt and the Hijāz before returning to Farīmān. The elder Muťahharī was of a different caste of mind then his son, who in any event came to outshine him.

The father was devoted to the works of the celebrated traditionalist, Mullāh Muhammad Bāqir Majlisī; whereas the son’s great hero among the Shī`a scholars of the past was the theosophist Mullā Sadrā.

Nonetheless, Āyatullāh Muťahharī always retained great respect and affection for his father, who was also his first teacher, and he dedicated to him one of his most popular books, Dastān-e-Rastān (“The Epic of the Righteous”), first published in 1960, and which was later chosen as book of the year by the Iranian National Commission for UNESCO in 1965.

At the exceptionally early age of twelve, Muťahharī began his formal religious studies at the teaching institution in Mashhad, which was then in a state of decline, partly because of internal reasons and partly because of the repressive measures directed by Ridhā Khān, the first Pahlavī autocrat, against all Islāmic institutions.

But in Mashhad, Muťahharī discovered his great love for philos­ophy, theology, and mysticism, a love that remained with him throughout his life and came to shape his entire outlook on religion:

“I can remember that when I began my studies in Mashhad and was still engaged in learning elementary Arabic, the philosophers, mys­tics, and theologians impressed me far more than other scholars and scientists, such as inventors and explorers. Naturally I was not yet acquainted with their ideas, but I regarded them as heroes on the stage of thought.”2

Accordingly, the figure in Mashhad who aroused the greatest devotion in Muťahharī was Mīrzā Mahdī Shahīdī Razavī, a teacher of philosophy.

But Razavī died in 1936, before Muťahharī was old enough to participate in his classes, and partly because of this reason he left Mashhad the following year to join the growing number of students congregating in the teaching institution in Qum.

Thanks to the skillful stewardship of Shaykh `Abdul Karīm Hā’irī, Qum was on its way to becoming the spiritual and intellectual capital of Islāmic Iran, and Muťahharī was able to benefit there from the instruction of a wide range of scholars.

He studied Fiqh and Uŝūl - the core subjects of the traditional curriculum - with Āyatul­lāh Ĥujjat Kuhkamarī, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Dāmād, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Ridhā Gulpāyagānī, and Ĥajj Sayyid Ŝadr al-Dīn as-Ŝadr. But more important than all these was Āyatullāh Burujerdī, the successor of Ĥā’irī as director of the teaching establishment in Qum. Muťahharī attended his lectures from his arrival in Qum in 1944 until his departure for Tehran in 1952, and he nourished a deep respect for him.

Fervent devotion and close affinity characterized Muťahharī’s relationship with his prime mentor in Qum, Āyatullāh Rūhullāh Khumaynī. When Muťahharī arrived in Qum, Āyatullāh Khumaynī was a young lecturer, but he was already marked out from his contem­poraries by the profoundness and comprehensiveness of his Islāmic vision and his ability to convey it to others.

These qualities were manifested in the celebrated lectures on ethics that he began giving in Qum in the early 1930s. The lectures attracted a wide audience from outside as well as inside the religious teaching institution and had a profound impact on all those who attended them. Muťahharī made his first acquaintance with Āyatullah Khumaynī at these lectures:

“When I migrated to Qum, I found the object of my desire in a personality who possessed all the attributes of Mīrzā Mahdī (Sha­hīdī Razavī) in addition to others that were peculiarly his own. I realized that the thirst of my spirit would be quenched at the pure spring of that personality. Although I had still not completed the preliminary stages of my studies and was not yet qualified to embark on the study of the rational sciences (ma`qulāt), the lectures on ethics given by that beloved personality every Thursday and Friday were not restricted to ethics in the dry, aca­demic sense but dealt with gnosis and spiritual wayfaring, ­and thus, they intoxicated me. I can say without exaggeration that those lectures aroused in me such ecstasy that their effect remained with me until the following Monday or Tuesday. An important part of my intel­lectual and spiritual personality took shape under the influence of those lectures and the other classes I took over a period of twelve years with that spiritual master (ustād-i ilahī) [meaning Āyatullāh Khumaynī].”3

In about 1946, Āyatullāh Khumaynī began lecturing to a small group of students that included both Muťahharī and his roommate at the Fayziya Madressah, Āyatullāh Muntazarī, on two key philosophical texts, the Asfar al-Arba`a of Mullā Ŝadra and the Sharh-e-Manzuma of Mullā Hādī Sabzwārī. Muťahharī’s participation in this group, which continued to meet until about 1951, enabled him to establish more intimate links with his teacher.

Also in 1946, at the urging of Muťahharī and Muntazarī, the Āyatullāh Khumaynī taught his first formal course on Fiqh and Uŝūl, taking the chapter on rational proofs from the second volume of Akhund Khurāsānī’s Kifāyatal Uŝūl as his teaching text. Muťahharī followed his course assiduously, while still pursuing his studies of Fiqh with Āyatullāh Burūjerdī.

In the first two post-war decades, Āyatullāh Khumaynī trained numer­ous students in Qum who became leaders of the Islāmic Revolution and the Islāmic Republic, such that through them (as well as directly), the imprint of his personality was visible on all the key developments of the past decade.

But none among his students bore to Āyatullāh Khumaynī the same relationship of affinity as Muťahharī, an affinity to which the Āyatullāh Khumaynī himself has borne witness to.

The pupil and master shared a profound attachment to all aspects of traditional scholarship, without in any way being its captive; a comprehensive vision of Islām as a total system of life and belief, with particular importance ascribed to its philosophical and mystical aspects.

An absolute loyalty to the reli­gious institution, tempered by an awareness of the necessity of reform; a desire for comprehensive social and political change, accompanied by a great sense of strategy and timing; and an ability to reach out beyond the circle of the traditionally religious, and gain the attention and loyalty of the secularly educated.

Among the other teachers whose influence Muťahharī was exposed in Qum, was the great exegete of the Qur’ān and philosopher, Āyatullāh Sayyid Muhammad Ĥusain Ťabā’ťabā’ī. Muťahharī participated in both Ťabāťabā’ī’s classes on the Shifā` of Abū `Alī Sīnā from 1950 to 1953, and the Thursday evening meetings that took place under his direction.

The subject of these meetings was materialist philosophy, a remarkable choice for a group of traditional scholars. Muťahharī himself had first conceived a critical interest in materialist philosophy, especially Marxism, soon after embarking on the formal study of the rational sciences.

Ac­cording to his own recollections, in about 1946 he began to study the Persian translations of Marxist literature published by the Tudeh party, the major Marxist organization in Iran and at that time an important force in the political scene.

In addition, he read the writings of Taqī Arānī, the main theoretician of the Tudeh party, as well as Marxist publications in `Arabic emanating from Egypt.

At first he had some difficulty understanding these texts because he was not acquainted with modern philosophical terminology, but with continued exertion (which included the drawing up of a synopsis of Georges Pulitzer’s Elementary Principles of Philosophy), he came to master the whole subject of materialist philosophy.

This mastery made him an important contributor to Ťabā’ťabāī’s circle and later, after his move to Tehran, an effective combatant in the ideological war against Marxism and Marxist-influenced interpretations of Islām.

Numerous refutations of Marxism have been essayed in the Islāmic world, both in Iran and elsewhere, but almost all of them fail to go beyond the obvious incompatibilities of Marxism with reli­gious belief and the political failures and inconsistencies of Marxist political parties.

Muťahharī, by contrast, went to the philosophical roots of the matter and demonstrated with rigorous logic the contra­dictory and arbitrarily hypothetic nature of key principles of Marx­ism. His polemical writings are characterized more by intellectual than rhetorical or emotional force.

However, for Muťahharī, philosophy was far more than a polemi­cal tool or intellectual discipline; it was a particular style of religios­ity, a way of understanding and formulating Islām. Muťahharī belongs, in fact, to the tradition of Shī`a philosophical concern that goes back at least as far as Nasīr ad-Dīn Ťuŝī, one of Muťahharī’s personal heroes.

To say that Muťahharī’s view of Islām was philo­sophical is not to imply that he lacked spirituality or was determined to subordinate revealed dogma to philosophical interpretation and to impose philosophical terminology on all domains of religious con­cern,

Rather it means that he viewed the attainment of knowledge and understanding as the prime goal and benefit of religion and for that reason assigned to philosophy a certain primacy among the disciplines cultivated in the religious institution.

In this he was at variance with those numerous scholars for whom Fiqh was the be-all and end-all of the curriculum, with modernists for whom philos­ophy represented a Hellenistic intrusion into the world of Islām, and with all those whom revolutionary ardour had made impatient with careful philosophical thought.4

The particular school of philosophy to which Muťahharī adhered was that of Mullā Ŝadra, the “sublime philosophy” (hikmat-i muta`āliya) that seeks to combine the methods of spiritual insight with those of philosophical deduction.

Muťahharī was a man of tranquil and serene disposition, both in his general comportment and in his writings. Even when engaged in polemics, he was invaria­bly courteous and usually refrained from emotive and ironical word­ing.

But such was his devotion to Mullā Ŝadrā that he would passionately defend him even against slight or incidental criticism, and he chose for his first grandchild - as well as for the publishing house in Qum that put out his books - the name Ŝadrā.

Insofar as Ŝadrā’s school of philosophy attempts to merge the methods of inward illumination and intellectual reflection, it is not surprising that it has been subject to varying interpretations on the part of those more inclined to one method than the other.

To judge from his writings, Muťahharī belonged to those for whom the intel­lectual dimension of Ŝadrā’s school was predominant; there is little of the mystical or markedly spiritual tone found in other exponents of Ŝadrā’s thought, perhaps because Muťahharī viewed his own inward experiences as irrelevant to the task of instruction in which he was engaged or even as an intimate secret he should conceal.

More likely, however, this predilection for the strictly philosophical dimension of the “sublime philosophy” was an expression of Muťahharī’s own temperament and genius. In this respect, he dif­fered profoundly from his great mentor, Āyatullāh Khumaynī, many of whose political pronouncements continue to be suffused with the language and concerns of mysticism and spirituality.

In 1952, Muťahharī left Qum for Tehran, where he married the daughter of Āyatullāh Rūhānī and began teaching philosophy at the Madressah Marwi, one of the principal institutions of religious learning in the capital.

This was not the beginning of his teaching career, for already in Qum he had begun to teach certain subjects - logic, philosophy, theology, and Fiqh - while still a student himself.

But Muťahharī seems to have become progressively impatient with the somewhat restricted atmosphere of Qum, with the factional­ism prevailing among some of the students and their teachers, and with their remoteness from the concerns of society. His own future prospects in Qum were also uncertain.

In Tehran, Muťahharī found a broader and more satisfying field of religious, educational, and ultimately political activity. In 1954, he was invited to teach philosophy at the Faculty of Theology and Islāmic Sciences of Tehran University, where he taught for twenty-­two years.

First the regularization of his appointment and then his promotion to professor was delayed by the jealousy of mediocre colleagues and by political considerations (for Muťahharī’s closeness to Āyatullāh Khumaynī was well known).

But the presence of a figure such as Muťahharī in the secular university was significant and effective. Many men of Madressah background had come to teach in the univer­sities, and they were often of great erudition.

However, almost without exception they had discarded an Islāmic worldview, together with their turbans and cloaks. Muťahharī, by contrast, came to the university as an articulate and convinced exponent of Islāmic science and wisdom, almost as an envoy of the religious institution to the secularly educated. Numerous people responded to him, as the peda­gogical powers he had first displayed in Qum now fully unfolded.

In addition to building his reputation as a popular and effective university lecturer, Muťahharī participated in the activities of the numerous professional Islāmic associations (anjumanhā) that had come into being under the supervision of Mahdī Bāzārgān and Āyatullāh Taleqānī, lecturing to their doctors, engi­neers, teachers and helping to coordinate their work. A number of Muťahharī’s books in fact consist of the revised transcripts of series of lectures delivered to the Islāmic associations.

Muťahharī’s wishes for a wider diffusion of religious knowledge in society and a more effective engagement of religious scholars in social affairs led him in 1960 to assume the leadership of a group of Tehran `Ulamā known as the Anjuman-e-Mahāna-yi Dīnī (“The Monthly Religious Society”).

The members of this group, which included the late Āyatullāh Beheshtī, a fellow-student of Muťahharī in Qum, organized monthly public lectures designed simultaneously to demonstrate the relevance of Islām to contempo­rary concerns, and to stimulate reformist thinking among the `Ulamā.

The lectures were printed under the title of Guftār-e-Māh (“Dis­course of the Month”) and proved very popular, but the government banned them in March 1963 when Āyatullāh Khumaynī began his public denunciation of the Pahlavī regime.

A far more important venture in 1965 of the same kind was the foundation of the Ĥusayniya-e-Irshād, an institution in north Tehran, designed to gain the allegiance of the secularly educated young to Islām. Muťahharī was among the members of the directing board; he also lectured at the Ĥusayniya-e-Irshād and edited and contrib­uted to several of its publications.

The institution was able to draw huge crowds to its functions, but this success - which without doubt exceeded the hopes of the founders, was overshadowed by a number of internal problems. One such problem was the political context of the institution’s activities, which gave rise to differing opinions on the opportuneness of going beyond reformist lecturing to political confrontation.

The spoken word plays in general a more effective and immediate role in promoting revolutionary change than the written word, and it would be possible to compose an anthology of key sermons, addresses, and lectures that have carried the Islāmic Revolution of Iran forward.

But the clarification of the ideological content of the revolution and its demarcation from opposing or competing schools of thought have necessarily depended on the written word, on the composition of works that expound Islāmic doctrine in systematic form, with particular attention to contemporary problems and con­cerns.

In this area, Muťahharī’s contribution was unique in its volume and scope. Muťahharī wrote assiduously and continuously, from his student days in Qum up to 1979 the year of his martyr­dom.

Much of his output was marked by the same philosophical tone and emphasis already noted, and he probably regarded as his most important work Uŝūl-e-Falsafa wa Ravish-e-Ri’ālism (“The Principles of Philosophy and the Method of Realism”), the record of Ťabāťabāī’s discourses to the Thursday evening circle in Qum, supple­mented with Muťahharī’s comments.

But he did not choose the topics of his books in accordance with personal interest or predilection, but with his perception of need; wherever a book was lacking on some vital topic of contemporary Islāmic interest, Muťahharī sought to supply it.

Single handily, he set about constructing the main ele­ments of a contemporary Islāmic library. Books such as `Adl-e-Ilāhī (“Divine Justice”), Nizām-e-Ĥuquq-e-Zan dar Islām (“The System of Women’s Rights in Islām”), Mas’ala-yi Ĥijāb (“The Question of the Veil”), Ashnā’i ba `Ulūm-e-Islāmī (“An Introduction to the Islāmic Sciences”), and Muqaddima bar Jahānbīnī-yi Islāmi (“An Introduc­tion to the Worldview of Islām”) were all intended to fill a need, to contribute to an accurate and systematic understanding of Islām and the problems in the Islāmic society.

These books may well come to be regarded as Muťahharī’s most lasting and important contribution to the rebirth of Islāmic Iran, but his activity also had a political dimension that admittedly subordi­nate, should not be overlooked.

While a student and fledgling teacher in Qum, he had sought to instill political consciousness in his contemporaries and was particularly close to those among them who were members of the Fida’iyan-i Islām, the Militant Organization founded in 1945 by Nawwab Safawī.

The Qum headquarters of the Fida’iyan was the Madrasa-yi Fayziya, where Muťahharī himself resided, and he sought in vain to prevent them from being removed from the Madressah by Āyatullāh Burūjerdī, who was resolutely set against all political confrontation with the Shah’s regime.

During the struggle for the nationalization of the Iranian Oil Industry, Muťahharī sympa­thized with the efforts of Āyatullāh Kāshānī and Dr. Muhammad Musaddiq, although he criticized the latter for his adherence to secular nationalism. After his move to Tehran, Muťahharī collabo­rated with the Freedom Movement of Bāzārgān and Taleqānī, but never became one of the leading figures in the group.

His first serious confrontation with the Shah’s regime came dur­ing the uprising of Khurdad 15th, 1342/June 6th, 1963, when he showed himself to be politically, as well as intellectually, a follower of Āyatullāh Khumaynī by distributing his declarations and urging sup­port for him in the sermons he gave.5

He was accordingly arrested and held for forty-three days. After his release, he participated actively in the various organizations that came into being to maintain the momentum that had been created by the uprising, most impor­tantly the Association of Militant Religious Scholars (Jami`a yi Ruhāniyāt-e-Mubāriz).

In November 1964, Āyatullāh Khumaynī entered on his fourteen years of exile, spent first in Turkey and then in Najaf, and throughout this period Muťahharī remained in touch with Āyatullāh Khumaynī, both directly - by visits to Najaf - and indirectly.

When the Islāmic Revolution approached its triumphant climax in the winter of 1978 and Āyatullāh Khumaynī left Najaf for Paris, Muťahharī was among those who travelled to Paris to meet and consult with him. His closeness to Āyatullāh Khumaynī was confirmed by his appointment to the Council of the Islāmic Revolution, the existence of which Āyatullāh Khumaynī announced on January 12th, 1979.

Muťahharī’s services to the Islāmic Revolution were brutally curtailed by his assassination on May 1st, 1979. The murder was carried out by a group known as Furqān, which claimed to be the protagonists of a “progressive Islām,” one freed from the allegedly distorting influence of the religious scholars.

Although Muťahharī appears to have been chairman of the Council of the Islāmic Revolu­tion at the time of his assassination, it was as a thinker and a writer that he was martyred.

In 1972, Muťahharī published a book entitled `Illal-i Girayish ba Maddigarī (“Reasons for the Turn to Materialism”), an impor­tant work analyzing the historical background of materialism in Europe and Iran.

During the revolution, he wrote an introduction to the eighth edition of this book, attacking distortions of the thought of Ĥafiz and Hallaj that had become fashionable in some segments of Irānian society and refuting certain materialistic interpretations of the Qur’ān.

The source of the interpretations was the Furqān group, which sought to deny fundamental Qur’ānic concepts such as the divine transcendence and the reality of the hereafter.

As always in such cases, Muťahharī’s tone was persuasive and solicitous, not angry or condemnatory, and he even invited a response from Furqān and other interested parties to comment on what he had written. Their only response was the gun.

The threat to assassinate all who opposed them was already con­tained in the publications of Furqān, and after the publication of the new edition of `Illal-e-Girayish ba Maddigarī, Muťahharī apparently had some premonition of his martyrdom.

According to the testi­mony of his son, Mujtabā, a kind of detachment from worldly concerns became visible in him; he augmented his nightly prayers and readings of the Qur’ān, and he once dreamed that he was in the presence of the Prophet (S), together with Āyatullāh Khumaynī .

On Tuesday, May 1st, 1979 Muťahharī went to the house of Dr. Yadullāh Sahābī, in the company of other members of the Council of the Islāmic Revolution. At about 10:30 at night, he and another participant in the meeting, Engineer Katira`i, left Sahābī’s house.

Walking by himself to an adjacent alley where the car that was to take him home was parked, Muťahharī suddenly heard an unknown voice call out to him. He looked around to see where the voice was coming from, and as he did, a bullet struck him in the head, entering beneath the right earlobe and exiting above the left eyebrow.

He died almost instantly, and although he was rushed to a nearby hospi­tal, there was nothing that could be done but mourn for him. The body was left in the hospital the following day, and then on Thursday, amid wide­spread mourning, it was taken for funeral prayers first to Tehran University and then to Qum for burial, next to the grave of Shaykh `Abdul Karīm Hā’irī .

Āyatullāh Khumaynī wept openly when Muťahharī was buried in Qum, and he described him as his “dear son,” and as “the fruit of my life,” and as “a part of my flesh.” But in his eulogy Āyatullāh Khumaynī also pointed out that with the murder of Muťahharī neither his personality was diminished, nor was the course of the revolution interrupted:

“Let the evil-wishers know that with the departure of Muťahharī - his Islāmic personality, his philosophy and learning, have not left us. Assassinations cannot destroy the Islāmic personality of the great men of Islām…Islām grows through sacrifice and martyrdom of its cherished ones. From the time of its revelation up to the present time, Islām has always been accompanied by martyrdom and heroism.”6

The personage and legacy of Āyatullāh Muťahharī have certainly remained unforgotten in the Islāmic Republic, to such a degree that his posthumous presence has been almost as impressive as the attainments of his life. The anniversary of his martyrdom is regularly commemorated, and his portrait is ubiquitous throughout Iran.

Many of his unpublished writings are being printed for the first time, and the whole corpus of his work is now being distributed and studied on a massive scale. In the words of Āyatullāh Khamene’ī, President of the Republic, the works of Muťahharī have come to constitute “the intellectual infrastructure of the Islāmic Republic.”

Efforts are accordingly under way to promote a knowledge of Muťahharī’s writings outside the Persian-speaking world as well, and the Ministry of Islāmic Guidance has sponsored translations of his works into languages as diverse as Spanish and Malay.

In a sense, however, it will be the most fitting memorial to Muťahharī if revolutionary Iran proves able to construct a polity, society, economy and culture that are authentically and integrally Islāmic. For Muťahharī’s life was oriented to a goal that transcended individual motivation, and his martyrdom was the final expression of that effacement of self.

Notes

1. This sketch of the life and works of Āyatullāh Muťahharī is based chiefly on Muhammad Wa'izzāda Khurāsānī’s, “Sayrī dar Zindagi-yi `Ilmī wa Inqilābiīyi Ustad Shahīd Murtadhā Muťahharī,” in Yadnāma-yi Ustād Shahīd Murtadhā Muťahharī, ed. `Abdul Karīm Surūsh, Teh­ran, 1360 Sh./1981, pp. 319-380, an article rich in information on many aspects of the recent history of Islāmic Irān. Reference has also been made to Mujtabā Muťahhari, “Zindagi-yi Pidaram,” in Harakat (journal of the students at the Tehran Faculty of Theology), no. 1 (n.d.), pp. 5-16; M. Hoda, In Memory of Martyr Muťahharī, a pam­phlet published by the Ministry of Islāmic Guidance, Tehran, April, 1982; and Āyatullāh Muťahharī’s autobiographical introduction to the eighth edition of `Ilal-i Girayish ba Maddīgarī; Qum, 1357 Sh./1978, pp. 7ff.

2. `Ilal-e-Girayish ba Maddīgarī, Page 9.

3. `Ilal-i Girayish ba Maddigari, Page 9.

4. The authoritative statement of this view was made by Sayyid Qutb in his Khasā’is al-Tasawwur al-Islāmī wa Muqawwimatuhu, Cairo, numer­ous editions, which was translated into Persian and had some influence on views toward philosophy.

5. Muhahharī’s name comes ninth in a list of clerical detainees prepared by the military prosecutor’s office in June, 1963. See facsimile of the list in Dihnavi, Qiyam-e-Khunin-i 15 Khurdad 42 ba Rivāyat-e-Asnād, Tehran, 1360 Sh./1981, Page 77.

6. Text of Āyatullāh Khumaynī’s eulogy in Yādnama-yi Ustād-i Shahīd Murtadha Muhahharī, pp. 3-5.

Good Deeds of Non-Muslims

Outline of the Discussion

One of the issues which is discussed regarding “Divine justice” is the issue of the good deeds performed by non-Muslims.

Today, the issue of whether the good deeds of non-Muslims are accepted by God or not is under discussion amongst the different classes - whether learned or unlearned, literate or illiterate. If they are accepted, what difference does it make if a person is a Muslim or not; the important thing is to do good in this world.

If a person is not a Muslim and practices no religion, he or she has lost nothing. And if their actions are not acceptable and are altogether void with no reward or recompense from God, then how is that compatible with Divine justice?

This same question can be asked from a Shī`a perspective within the bounds of Islām: Are the actions of a non-Shī`a Muslim acceptable to God, or are they null and void? If they are acceptable, what difference does it make if a person is a Shī`a Muslim or a non-Shī`a Muslim?

What is important is to be Muslim; a person who is not a Shī`a and doesn’t believe in the wilāyah (Divinely-appointed guardianship) of the Ahlul Baīt (as) has not lost anything. And if the actions of such a person are not acceptable to God, then how is that compatible with Divine justice?

In the past, this issue was only discussed by philosophers and in the books of philosophy. However, today it has entered into the minds of all levels of society; few people can be found who have not at least broached the subject for themselves and in their own minds.

Divine philosophers would discuss the issue from the aspect that if all people who are outside the fold of religion are to face perdition and Divine punishment, it necessarily follows that in the universe, evil and compulsion are preponderant. However, the fact that felicity and good have primacy in the universe not evil and wretchedness is an accepted and definitive principle.

Humanity is the greatest of all of creation; everything else has been created for it (of course, with the correct conception of this idea that is understood by the wise, not the perception that the short-sighted people commonly possess).

If humanity itself is to be created for the Hell-fire – that is, if the final abode of the majority of humanity is to be Hell then one must grant that the anger of God supersedes His mercy.

This is because the majority of people are strangers to the true religion; and even those who are within the fold of the true religion are beset by deviation and digression when it comes to practicing.This was the background of the discussion amongst the philosophers.

It has been nearly half a century that, as a result of easier communication among Muslim and non-Muslim nations, an increase in the means of communication, and greater interaction amongst nations, the issue of whether being a Muslim and a believer as a necessary condition for the acceptability of good deeds is being discussed among all levels of society, especially the so-called intellectuals.

When these people study the lives of inventors and scientists of recent times who were not Muslim but who performed valuable services for humanity, they find such people worthy of reward.

On the other hand since they used to think that the actions of non-Muslims are altogether null and void, they fall into serious doubt and uncertainty. In this way, an issue which for years was the exclusive domain of the philosophers has entered the general conversations of people and has taken the form of an objection with regard to Divine justice.

Of course, this objection is not directly related to Divine justice; it is related to Islām’s viewpoint about human beings and their actions, and becomes related to Divine justice inasmuch as it appears that such a viewpoint regarding human beings, their actions, and God’s dealing with them is in opposition to the standards of Divine justice.

In the interactions that I have and have had with students and the youth, I have frequently been faced with this question. Sometimes they ask whether the great inventors and scientists, with all the worthy services which they have done for humanity, will go to Hell.

Will the likes of Pasteur and Edison go to Hell while indolent holy people who have spent their lives idly in a corner of the Masjid go to Heaven? Has God created Heaven solely for us Shī`as?

I remember that once an acquaintance from my city, who was a practicing Muslim, came to Tehran to visit me, and he raised this issue.

This man had visited a lepers’ hospital in Mashhad and had been stirred and deeply affected by the sight of the Christian nurses who were sincerely (at least in his view) looking after the patients with leprosy. At that time, this issue came up in his mind and he fell into doubt.

You are aware that looking after a patient of leprosy is a very difficult and unpleasant task and when this hospital was established in Mashhad, very few doctors were willing to serve there, and similarly, no one was willing to care for the patients.

Advertisements for the employment of nurses were taken out in the newspapers; in all of Iran, not a single person gave a positive answer to this invitation. A small group of so-called ascetic Christian women from France came and took charge of nursing the lepers.

This man, who had seen the humanitarianism and loving care of those nurses towards lepers, who had been abandoned by even their own parents, had been strongly affected by these nurses.

He related that the Christian nurses wore long, loose clothes, and apart from their face and hands, no part of their body was visible. Each of them had a long rosary which had perhaps a thousand beads and whenever they would find free time from work, they would busy themselves in their recitations on the rosary.

Then the man asked with a troubled mind and in a disturbed tone whether it was true that non-Muslims would not enter Heaven?

Of course, right now we are not concerned with the motives of those Christian ladies. Was it truly for God, in God’s way, and out of pure humanitarianism that they did what they did, or was another motive in play?

Certainly, we don’t want to be pessimistic, just as we are not overly optimistic; our point is that these incidents and events have introduced our people to a serious question.

Several years ago, I was invited to an association to give a speech. In that association, in accordance with their tradition, the participants were requested to write down any questions they had so that they could be answered at the appropriate time.

Those questions had been recorded in a notebook, and that notebook had been given to me so I could choose the topic of my speech from amongst those topics (noted in the book).

I noticed that the question that had been repeated more than any other was whether God will send all non-Muslims to Hell. Will Pasteur, Edison, and Kokh be amongst those who will be punished in the Hereafter?

It was from that time that I realized the importance of this issue inasmuch as it had attracted people’s thoughts.Now, in this part of the book, we will discuss this issue. But before we begin, we need to clarify two points in order for the topic at hand to become completely clear.

1. The General Aspect of the Discussion

The purpose of this discussion is not to clarify the status of individuals, for example to specify whether Pasteur will go to Heaven or Hell. What do we know about his true thoughts and beliefs? What were his true intentions? What were his personal and moral traits; and in fact what was the sum of all his actions? Our familiarity with him is limited to his intellectual services, and that is all.

This doesn’t apply only to Pasteur. As a matter of principle, the status of individuals is in the hands of God; no one has the right to express an opinion with certainty about whether someone will go to Heaven or Hell. If we were to be asked, “Is Shaykh Murtadhā al-Anŝārī , in view of his known asceticism, piety, faith, and deeds, definitely among the inhabitants of Heaven?”

Our answer would be, “From what we know of the man, in his intellectual and practical affairs we haven’t heard of anything bad. What we know of him is virtue and goodness. But as to say with absolute certainty whether he will go to Heaven or Hell, that isn’t our prerogative.

It is God who knows the intentions of all people, and He knows the secrets and hidden things of all souls; and the account of all people’s actions is also with Him. We can only speak with certainty about those whose final outcome has been made known by the religious authorities.”

Sometimes people discuss and debate amongst themselves about who was the most virtuous and excellent among the `Ulamā (scholars) in terms of nearness to God. For example, was it Sayyid Ibn Ťāwūs , or Sayyid Bahrul `Ulūm ? Or Shaykh al-Anŝārī ? Or sometimes they ask about the most eminent among the descendents of the A’immah.

For example, is Sayyid `Abdul `Adhīm al-Hasanīī (as) is superior in God’s view, or Sayyidah Fāťimah al-Ma`ŝūmah (as)?

Once, one of the Mujtahids was asked whether `Abbās Ibn `Alī (as) was superior or `Alī al-Akbar (as). In order to give the question the form of a practical issue so the Mujtahid would be compelled to answer it, they asked, “If someone vows to sacrifice a sheep for the most superior of the Imāms’ descendents, what is his duty? Is `Abbās Ibn `Alī superior, or `Alī al-Akbar?”

It is obvious that such discussions are improper, and answering such questions is neither the duty of a Faqīh (scholar of Islāmic law), nor of anyone else. Specifying the rank of God’s creation is not our responsibility. It should be left to God, and no one has any knowledge about the matter except through God himself.

In the early era of Islām, there were instances when people expressed such unjustified opinions, and the Prophet Muhammad (S) forbade them from doing so.

When `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn died, a woman of the Anŝār named Umme `Alī, who apparently was the wife of the man in whose house `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn was staying and whose guest he was, addressed his bier in the presence of the Prophet Muhammad (S) and said:

    هَنِيئاً لَكَ الْجَنَّةُ

“May Heaven be pleasant for you!”

Although `Uthmān Ibn Ma`zūn was an eminent man, and the Prophet Muhammad (S) cried heavily at his funeral and threw himself over the bier and kissed him, the inappropriate statement of that woman displeased him.

He turned to her and with an unhappy look said, “How did you know? Why did you make a statement out of ignorance? Have you received a revelation, or do you know the accounts of God’s creation?”

The woman replied, “O Messenger of God, he was your companion and a brave warrior!” The Noble Messenger (S) answered her with interesting words that are worthy of attention, he said:

    إِنِّي رَسُولُ اللٌّهِ وَمَا أَدْرِي مَا يُفْعَلُ بِــي

“I am the Messenger of God, yet I don’t know what will be done with me.”1

This sentence is the exact purport of a verse of the Qur’ān:

    قُلْ مٌـا كُنْتُ بِدْعاً مِّنَ الرُّسُلِ وَ مٌا أَدْرِي مٌا يُفْعَلُ بِي وَ لاٌ بِكُمْ

“Say, ‘I am not a novelty among the apostles, nor do I know what will be done with me, or with you.”2 3

A similar incident has also been related regarding the death of Sa`d Ibn Mu`ādh. In that instance, when the mother of Sa`d said a similar sentence over his coffin, the Messenger (S) said to her, “Be silent; don’t make a decision with certainty in God’s affairs.”4

2. No Religion Except Al-Islām is Accepted

The other point that must be made clear before beginning the discussion is that the topic of the non-Muslims’ good deeds can be discussed in two ways and in reality, is two discussions:

First, is any religion other than Islām acceptable to God, or is Islām the only acceptable religion? That is, is it necessary only for a person to have some religion or at most follow a religion associated with one of the Divine prophets, without it then making a difference which religion that is, for example, whether one be a Muslim, Christian, Jew, or even a Zoroastrian? Or is there only one true religion in each era?

After we have accepted that the true religion in each era is only one, the other discussion is whether a person who doesn’t follow the true religion but performs a good deed, one that is actually good and is also sanctioned by the true religion, is worthy of reward or not? In other words, is faith in the true religion a condition for one’s good deeds to merit reward?

What will be discussed here is the second issue

With respect to the first issue, we can say briefly that there is only one true religion in each era, and all are obligated to believe in it.

The idea that has recently become common among some so-called intellectuals to the effect that all Divine religions have equal validity in all eras is a fallacious one.

Of course, it is true that there is no disagreement or contradiction among the prophets of God. All of the prophets of God call towards a single goal and the same God. They have not come to create mutually contradicting groups and sects among humanity.

But this doesn’t mean that in every era there are several true religions, and thus people in each era can then choose whichever religion they want.

To the contrary, it means that a person must believe in all of the Prophets and affirm that each Prophet would give tidings of the Prophet to come, especially the final and greatest of them; and likewise, each Prophet would affirm the previous one.

Thus, the necessary consequence of believing in all of the Prophets is to submit in every era to the religion of the Prophet of the time. And of course, it is necessary that in the final era we act on the final commands that have been revealed by God to the final Prophet. And this is what necessarily follows from Islām, that is, submission to God and acceptance of the missions of His Messengers.

Many people in our day have subscribed to the view that it is sufficient for a person to worship God and be affiliated with and practice one of the Divine religions that was revealed by God; the form of the commandments is not that important.

`Isa (Jesus) (as) was a Prophet, Muhammad (S) was also a Prophet; if we follow the religion of `Isa (as) and go to church once a week, that is fine, and if we follow the religion of the final Messenger (S) and pray five times a day, that is also correct. These people say that what is important is for a person to believe in God and practice one of the Divine religions.

George Jordac, author of the book, Imām `Alī; Gibrān Khalīl Gibrān, the well-known Lebanese Christian author; and others like them have such a view.5 These two individuals speak of the Prophet Muhammad (S) and Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťālib (as) and especially Amīrul Mo’minīn (as) – just as a Muslim would.

Some people ask how these people, in spite of their belief in Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as) and the Prophet Muhammad (S), are still Christian.

If they were truthful, they would have become Muslims, and since they haven’t done so, it is clear there is something behind the curtain. They are being deceptive, and they aren’t sincere in their expression of love and belief in the Prophet Muhammad (S) and `Alī Ibn Abī Ťālib (as).

The answer is that they are not without sincerity in their expression of love and belief in the Prophet Muhammad (S) and Amīrul Mo’minīn `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as). However, they have their own way of thinking regarding practicing a religion.

These individuals believe that human beings are not held to a particular religion; any religion is sufficient. Thus, at the same time that they are Christians, they consider themselves admirers and friends of `Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib (as), and they even believe that he himself held their view. George Jordac says, “`Alī Ibn Abī Ťalib declines to compel people to necessarily follow a particular religion.”

However, we consider this idea void. It is true that there is no compulsion in religion:

    لاٌ إِكْرٌاهَ فِي الدِّينِ

“There is no compulsion in religion.”6

But this doesn’t mean that there is more than one religion in every age that is acceptable to God, and we have the right to choose any one we please. This is not the case; in every age, there is one true religion and no more.

Whenever a Prophet was sent by God with a new religion, the people were obligated to avail themselves of his teachings and learn his laws and commandments, whether in acts of worship or otherwise, until the turn of the Seal of the Prophets came.

In this (current) age, if someone wishes to come near God, he or she must seek guidance from the precepts of the religion he brought.

The Noble Qur’ān says:

    وَ مَنْ يَبْتَغِ غَيْرَ الإِسْلاٌمَ دِيناً فَلَنْ يُقْبَلَ مِنْهُ وَ هُوَ فِي الأَخِرَةِ مِنَ الْخٌاسِرِينَ

“And whoever desires a religion other than Islām, it shall never be accepted from him, and in the hereafter he shall be among the losers.”7

If someone were to say that the meaning of “Islām” in this verse is not our religion in particular; rather, the intent is the literal meaning of the word, or submission to God, the answer would be that without doubt Islām means submission and the religion of Islām is the religion of submission, but the reality of submission has a particular form in each age.

And in this age, its form is the same cherished religion that was brought by the Seal of the Prophets. So it follows that the word Islām (submission) necessarily applies to it alone.

In other words, the necessary consequence of submission to God is to accept His commandments, and it is clear that one must always act on the final Divine commandments. And the final commandment of God is what His final messenger has brought.