Sayyidna Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated: One day I went to the Prophet ﷺ and saw tears flowing from his eyes. I said: “O Messenger of Allah! Has someone angered you? Why are your eyes flowing with tears?” The Prophet ﷺ said: “Rather, Jibril (peace be upon him) has just left me, and he told me that Husayn will be martyred on the bank of the Euphrates.”
Sayyidna Abdullah ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated: I saw the Prophet ﷺ in a dream at noon. His hair was disheveled and dusty, and he had a bottle of blood in his hand. I asked: “May my parents be sacrificed for you, what is this?” The Prophet ﷺ said: “This is the blood of Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him) and his companions; I have been collecting it since the morning.”
This shows that the Prophet ﷺ was deeply saddened by the martyrdom of Sayyidna Imam Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him).
Umm Salamah (may Allah be pleased with her) narrated that Husayn ibn Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) was present with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, and he was weeping. The Prophet ﷺ said: “Jibril (peace be upon him) informed me that my ummah will kill him after me.”
Shahr ibn Hawshab (saduq, hasan al-hadith, declared thiqah by the majority) narrated that when the news of the martyrdom of (Sayyidna) Husayn ibn Ali (may Allah be pleased with both of them) came from Iraq, Umm Salamah (may Allah be pleased with her) said: “May the Iraqis be cursed. The Iraqis have killed him. May Allah kill them. They deceived him and humiliated him; may Allah humiliate them.”
When Sayyidna Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred, his blessed head was brought before Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad (Ibn Marjanah, a cruel and despised man), and he began poking at his head with a staff. Seeing this, Sayyidna Anas (may Allah be pleased with him) said: “Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him) most resembled the Messenger of Allah ﷺ.”
Someone (from Iraq) asked Sayyidna Abdullah ibn Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) about the blood of a mosquito (or fly) while in the state of ihram. He said: “Look at this (Iraqi), he is asking about the blood of a mosquito, while they have killed the son (grandson) of the Prophet ﷺ.”
Sa’d ibn Ubaydah (a thiqah Tabi’i) states that I saw (Sayyidna) Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him); he used to wear a robe (cloak) of (burud) cloth. A man named Amr ibn Khalid al-Tuhawi shot an arrow at him which was hanging from his robe.
It is narrated from Shahr ibn Hawshab that I was present with Umm Salamah (may Allah be pleased with her), the wife of the Prophet ﷺ. I heard the news of the martyrdom of (Sayyidna) Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him) and informed Umm Salamah (that Sayyidna Husayn had been martyred). She said: “These people have done this deed; may Allah fill their houses or their graves with fire.” She then fainted from the intensity of her grief.
Sayyidah Umm al-Mu’minin Umm Salamah (may Allah be pleased with her), who died in the year 65 AH, said: I have heard the jinn weeping over (Imam) Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him)
Sayyidna Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him) was martyred on the 10th of Muharram (the day of Ashura) in the year 61 AH.
That day was a Saturday (Sabt). (Tarikh Abi Zur’ah al-Dimashqi: 243, with a sahih chain, from Abu Nu’aym al-Fadl ibn Dukayn al-Kufi, may Allah have mercy on him). Some say it was a Monday.
The famous, eminent and thiqah Tabi’i Abu Raja’ Imran ibn Milhan al-Attaridi, may Allah have mercy on him, lived in the time of jahiliyyah, but did not attain the honour of being a Companion. He died at the age of 120 years, in the year 105 AH.
Abu Raja’ al-Attaridi, may Allah have mercy on him, said: Do not speak ill of Ali and the Ahl al-Bayt. A neighbour of ours in Balhajim insulted (Sayyidna) Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him), and Allah made him blind.
Many weak, rejected and strange narrations are reported concerning the martyrdom of Sayyidna Husayn (may Allah be pleased with him), which I have deliberately not mentioned here. The religion depends on sahih and established narrations, not on weak and rejected narrations.
Shame upon those who base their beliefs and practices on unestablished and rejected historical narrations, and who even openly strive to present these rejected narrations as “established historical facts of Muslims.”
The younger Tabi’i Ibrahim ibn Yazid al-Nakha’i said: If I were among those who killed Husayn ibn Ali (may Allah be pleased with him), and then I was forgiven, and then I entered Paradise, I would be ashamed to pass by the Prophet ﷺ, lest he look at me.
Finally, a curse upon those who killed Sayyidna and our beloved and our Imam Husayn ibn Ali (may Allah be pleased with him), or caused him to be killed, or assisted in it in any way. O Allah! Fill our hearts with the love of Sayyidna al-Imam al-Mazlum al-Shahid Husayn ibn Ali, all the Ahl al-Bayt, and all the Companions (may Allah be pleased with them all). Ameen.
The Nawasib harbour enmity towards Sayyidna Ali, Sayyidna Husayn and the Ahl al-Bayt (may Allah be pleased with them), while the Shia, in their claim of love for them, harbour enmity towards the Companions of the Prophet (may Allah be pleased with them), and exaggerate in their love of the Ahl al-Bayt and deny the necessities of religion. Both groups walk on the paths of excess and deficiency. The path of Ahl al-Sunnah is the path of moderation and justice. And all praise is for Allah.
The eminent Imam of Ahl al-Sunnah, Abu Ja’far Muhammad ibn Jarir ibn Yazid al-Tabari, may Allah have mercy on him, narrated in his Tarikh al-Tabari the martyrdom of Husayn and other historical events through the chains of liars and abandoned narrators such as Abu Mikhnaf and others.
These accounts and details are rejected because they are fabricated (mawdu’) and invented, but Imam al-Tabari, may Allah have mercy on him, is free of blame because he stated their chains. Apart from Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim, from every book of hadith one should only present a narration whose chain is sahih li-dhatihi or hasan li-dhatihi in the light of the principles of hadith and the science of narrator biography; otherwise, silence is better. All the continuous, marfu’ hadiths with unbroken chains in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim are authentic. وما علينا إلا البلاغ
