Revolutionary purpose of Imam Hussain (A.S) uprising

Leila Yazdani: The Battle of Karbala is one of the most significant events in Shia history. Imam Hussain’s (A.S) refusal to accept tyrant Yazid’s allegiance triggered the Battle of Karbala on the Day of Ashura. Imam Hussain (A.S), along with his family members and companions, were martyred on the plains of Karbala, and this marks a turning point for Shia Muslims.

Let us see what aims and objectives Imam Hussain (A.S) intended to achieve by this tragic sacrifice that he ventured into with full knowledge and awareness.

Freeing the people’s will

Usually tyrants employ two effective weapons against the people when they revolt against injustice: The weapons of terror and corruption. The characteristic feature of these two methods is that they strip the nation of awareness and the will and ability to act.

The first requirements of any action are awareness and will. When one loses awareness and the power of will, he loses all capacity to act and submits to the status quo. Then the despot and his courtiers dominate the will, consciousness and fate of the people, not even leaving their taste, morals and customs free. The very personality of the people is completely distorted as the despot now controls every aspect of their lives, while they get nothing from the tyrant except orders to be obedient and submissive.

It is this fact that the Quran alludes to with regard to the way Pharaoh treated his people and the way they regarded him: “So he despised his people and they obeyed him. Indeed they were a transgressing lot.” Henceforth the rulers from among the leaders of deviation live undisturbed by the people with nothing to decamp them from their side. So they will love what the rulers love and will what they will.

Thus, the process of transformation and distortion of the nation’s personality becomes complete, with the result that two classes are formed in the community:

(1) Class of the arrogant:

This includes the despotic rulers, their cohorts and the ‘nobility’ who benefit from them; the haughty, who lord it over the people. They place themselves in place of God, in the position of authority over man’s life, consider themselves master over the people and corrupt the earth. They are the rebels (Taghuts) who cross the limits of servitude and obedience to God the Most High, to assume the position of arrogance and absolute authority in place of God, and spread corruption in the lives of the people.

(2) The oppressed class:

This class is despised by the tyrant and denied its right in the scale of humanity, weakened and dispossessed of their God-given capabilities and faculties. This large group becomes the subjugated class which accepts the status quo, loses all its peculiarities and human values and turns into a compliant tool that does the bidding of the tyrant. The first thing this class loses is its consciousness and will and then every other thing God has given it, such as values and capabilities. “God has set a seal on their hearts and their hearing, and there is a blindfold on their sight”.

Imam Hussain (A.S) was facing a bad socio-political reality in which the Umayyads had completely distorted the personality of the nation and stripped it of its values, capabilities, awareness and will. The worst thing with regard to this volte-face was that the capabilities, which Islam had released from the inner selves of those people in order to extirpate oppression and idolatry and support monotheism and justice, had turned into a tool to prop up tyranny and polytheism. The sword with which the Messenger of God (PBUH) had armed them to fight the enemies of Islam had transformed, in their hands, into an instrument of fighting the Prophet’s descendants (PBUH) and their allies instead of fighting their enemies. This was the essence of the transmutation in civilization that took place in the life of this nation at the hands of the Umayyads. It was to this reality that Imam Hussain (A.S) was alluding to in his second speech, which he addressed to the army of Ibn Sa’ad on the Day of Ashura.

“You have drawn the sword with which we armed you, against us, and ignited the fire we kindled against our enemy and yours, against us. So you have joined hands with the forces of your enemies against your allies, in spite of being aware that they (your enemies) have not established any justice among you, nor do you expect any good from them.” They still harboured the spirit of the days of Ignorance, upheld its customs and moral outlook and terrorized and corrupted the people. The Quranic expression “they have lost [or ruined] themselves” which appears in several verses points to this kind of loss. Another expression employed in the Qur’an to describe those people who lose their souls in the life of this world is ‘injustice to oneself’.

That is, this deviation and transgression only affects them; these people are going astray at their own peril, their efforts and actions come to naught, and they earn for themselves nothing but deviation and ruin. It is indeed a great ruin that one should lose himself and waste all his efforts like “those whose endeavours go awry in the life of the world.” When man gets estranged from himself, and wrongs his own soul and becomes hostile to it, he inevitably loses it. And when this happens his endeavours go awry and come to naught.

Imam Hussain (A.S) was alluding to this loss when he addressed Al-Hurr’s companions at the station of Al-Baydah. He said: “I am Hussain ibn Ali and my mother is Fatimah (SA) the daughter of the Messenger of God (PBUH). My life is with your lives, and my family is with your families. You have a model in me …. If you do not act [in the way expected of you] and you go back on your word and revoke your allegiance to me; then you have missed your good fortune and wasted your share. ‘So whoever breaks his oath breaks it only to his own detriment and God will make me needless of you.

Through this transformation whose stages the Quran describes, man does injustice to himself, estranges and loses himself and turns into something entirely different from his former self. He moves with the people neither with his own volition nor with awareness; he only does the bidding of someone else. He acts according to the will of the tyrant who subjugates him and causes him to move not in the direction of what is beneficial to him but in the direction of what serves his enemy. Such are the people whose hearts become inverted and are sealed by God. God Most High presented the truth when God said: “We transform their hearts” and “God has set a seal on their hearts”.

Undoubtedly, a terrible change had occurred in the minds of these people resulting in a dangerous inversion with few parallels in history. It reached an extent whereby thirty thousand or more men left Kufa, the headquarters of the Commander of the Faithful (A.S) to fight the lord of the youth of paradise, the [grand] son of God’s Messenger (PBUH) and son of the Commander of the Faithful (A.S), but only seventy-odd men came out with Hussain (A.S) to confront Yazid ibn Muawiyah.

The only explanation for this inversion and volte-face that is observed in the collective personality of the nation – or at least a large cross section of it – lies in the extensive efforts put by the Umayyads in terrorizing and corrupting the people, in order to impose their control over the Muslims. Their Islamic identity was distorted to such an extent that even their consciences, perceptions and will power were controlled by the Umayyads. They pleased them and served their purposes.

Therefore, there was the need to jolt the conscience of the nation back into its consciousness, will and values. It needed to feel the depth of the catastrophe which befell it and feel repentant. If this jolt would not help anything with regard to the affected generation, it was considered a necessary step for saving the next generation, lest it become affected by this civilizational regress.

The struggle which the Imam (A.S) led and his tragic sacrifice created the necessary effect on the nation’s conscience. It served as the clarion call that the political and social climate was waiting for. On that day they felt that terrible nightmare weighing on their hearts and minds. Imam Hussain’s (AS) sacrifice had violently shaken the Muslims’ conscience and led them to feel the enormity of the crime that had been perpetrated and the depth of apostasy and inversion that had plagued their minds and lives. This calamitous event became the launching pad of many revolts and a great source of inspiration for political movements in Islamic history. This was the revolutionary purpose of the uprising of Imam Hussain (A.S).

Sources:

Ashura, Muhammad Mahdi Al-Asifi

Heroic Manifestations of Ashura, Abdullah Jawadi Amuli