Seekers' thoughts

Continuing the theme of Ashura being a mercy, though the tragedy of Karbala was heart-breaking, martyrdom at Karbala was a mercy for al-Hussain: God let His beloved ones escape from tyranny, just like Moses (peace be upon him) and his people did, but through the station of martyrdom. God didn’t allow the 72 martyrs of Karbala to witness the days of oppression that would see the holy sanctuaries of Makkah and Madinah besieged by the tyrant ruler of the time, Yazeed. It would have been more painful for al-Hussain to live through his grandfather’s city of Madinah, and the house of Allah in Makkah, being desecrated than to sacrifice his life. And the mercy extended beyond this. Allah was not just merciful to al-Hussain and the martyrs of Karbala that they didn’t have to see the destruction of Madinah and Makkah and that they attained the highest of ranks in Jannah, but Allah was merciful again to the believers and the remaining members of al-Hussain’s group that they were left with the true message of Islam and to continue spreading it, becoming witnesses and custodians of the truth.

Delving further into his martyrdom, al-Hussain re-defined, or re-established, victory for the believers. He revived the sunnah of the Prophet (peace be upon him) and his companions, the ones of Badr and Uhud: that even in death, we are victorious. During an era of widespread military victories, and no doubt martyrs who sacrificed in order to help in those victories that saw the expansion of the Islamic empire, Hussain’s martyrdom showed victory in a way that Badr and Uhud did. The victory of the likes of Hamza, Mus’ab and Hanzalah (martyrs of Uhud); of Haritha, Rafi’ and Sa’d (martyrs of Badr) who never got to see the result of their sacrifices in this world. They never got to see Islam spread vastly. It wasn’t (just) about winning power, land, conquest or anything. Badr wasn’t for land: it was to protect the message of Islam. The Prophet’s (peace be upon him) dua at Badr makes this clear: that Badr was about ensuring the message of Islam survived, that the spirit of the Qur’an and the worship of Allah remained firm on the face of the Earth, that the Muslims that day could not be wiped out lest Islam be wiped out.¹ Uhud wasn’t for land, and in-fact the Muslims were apparently defeated. But they were victorious because the message of Islam remained in-tact, and lived on to become a powerful entity. Al-Hussain’s sacrifice and victory was spiritual, emotional, ideological. It wasn’t for leadership, power or control. He kept true Islam alive. He cleansed the filth away. He kept the message pure from corruption that was creeping in. This was about sacrifice to reignite the Islam of Badr and Uhud. But just like Badr and Uhud established Islam’s message firmly, and drew the line between Truth and Falsehood, Iman and Kufr, Karbala drew the line between the righteous and the wicked, the pure and the dirty, the just and the tyrants, the true Islam of believers and the ones being corrupted by desires; it drew the line between al-Hussain and Yazeed. One claimed to be the leader of the Muslims by right of power and inheritance of the seat of leadership (Yazeed); the other didn’t make a claim at all, but died not just as the Imam of the believers, but Sayyid ash-Shuhada (Master of the Martyrs), who are the Ummah’s greatest. There is a strong message in this…

And it has been a repeated motif of the Muslims, that you cannot defeat a people who look into the barrel of a gun and see heaven, a people who love death as others love life. This religion values sacrifice, values blood. We realise the value of humanity, so that when blood is spilled it is a fire ignited, it is spirituality uplifted. We do not forget the vanquished. Their blood becomes our life energy. 

And that is the victory of Karbala. Hussain’s blood, which is the blood of the Prophet, reignited the world. The Prophet set the globe alight with his life, his work and the Speech of Allah (the Qur’an); he reignited it when his blood was spilled on the planes of Karbala when al-Hussain and his family were killed. And in that is the two-fold victory Islam teaches: in life, victorious, and in death, victorious – when it is for Islam. Such is the Mercy God has granted the Muslims. And such is the theme of Karbala and of Ashura. Mercy. Because mercy is powerful. Peace be upon the Prophet and his family.

1. Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1763 https://sunnah.com/muslim:1763 ↩︎