Ali al-Asghar ibn Husayn

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Abd-Allah ibn al-Husayn
عَبْد ٱللَّٰه بْن ٱلْحُسَيْن
TitleAli al-Asghar (عَلِيّ ٱلْأَصْغَر)
Died
CE)
Karbala, Iraq
Resting placeImam Husayn Shrine, Karbala
Parents
(mother)
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Abd-Allah ibn al-Husayn (

Arabic: عَبْد ٱللَّٰه ٱبْن ٱلْحُسَيْن), also known as Ali al-Asghar (Arabic: عَلِيّ ٱلْأَصْغَر, lit. 'Ali, the junior'), was the youngest son of Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of Muhammad and the third Shia Imam. A young child, likely an infant, he was killed in the Battle of Karbala in 680 CE, alongside his father, family members, and a small number of supporters, all of whom were massacred by the forces of the Umayyad caliph Yazid (r. 680–683), who first surrounded them for some days and cut off their access to the nearby river Euphrates. Abd-Allah is commemorated in Shia Islam
as the quintessence symbol of the innocent victim.

Birth and background

Husayn imploring the Umayyad army for water for his infant son Ali al-Asghar, a common narrative in the Shia commemoration of the Battle of Karbala
An act of commemoration for Ali al-Asghar

Abd-Allah was the youngest son of

Tarikh-i Qom.[1]

Battle of Karbala and death (680)

Husayn denounced the accession of the Umayyad caliph Yazid ibn Mu'awiya in 680. When pressed by Yazid's agents to pledge his allegiance, Husayn first fled from his hometown of Medina to Mecca and later set off for Kufa in Iraq, accompanied by his family and a small group of supporters.[6] Among them was Rubab, according to the Sunni historian Ibn al-Athir (d. 1232-3) in The Complete History.[7] With her were her two children, Sakina and Abd-Allah,[6][2] who was at the time a young child,[2] likely an infant, as reported by the early historian Abu al-Faraj al-Isfahani (d. 967) in his biographical Maqatil al-Talibiyyin,[4] and by the Shia-leaning historian al-Ya'qubi (d. 897-8) in his Tarikh al-Ya'qubi.[1] The tenth-century historian Abu Ali Bal'ami and the Twelver jurist Ibn Tawus (d. 1266) report the age of Abd-Allah as one year and six months, respectively.[1] That he was an infant is the prevalent Shia view.[5]

Death

The small caravan of Husayn was intercepted and massacred on 10

Banu Asad tribe shot and killed Abd-Allah in his father's lap.[1] The man who killed Abd-Allah ibn Husayn is identified as Hani ibn Thabit Hadrami by al-Tabari, who adds that Harmala ibn Kahel killed Abd-Allah ibn Hasan, Husayn's nephew.[1] In contrast, some others report that it was Harmala who killed Abd-Allah ibn Husayn.[3][10] These authors include al-Mufid,[3] Husayn Kashefi,[1] and the Sunni historian al-Baladhuri (d. 892) in his Genealogies of the Nobles.[3]

Aftermath

The battle ended when Husayn was beheaded, whereupon the Umayyad soldiers pillaged his camp,[8][11] and severed the heads of Husayn and his fallen companions, which they then raised on spears for display.[11] The women and children were then taken captive and marched to Kufa and later the capital Damascus.[8] The captives were paraded in the streets of Damascus,[12] and then imprisoned for an unknown period of time.[13] They were eventually freed by Yazid and returned to Medina.[13][14]

Commemoration

Shia Muslims commemorate the events of Karbala throughout the months of Muharram and Safar,[15] particularly during the first ten days of Muharram, culminating on the tenth (Ashura) with processions in major Shia cities.[16][17] The main component of these ritual ceremonies (maj'alis, sg. majlis) is the narration of the stories of Karbala,[18][16] intended to raise sympathy and move the audience to tears.[19] In the Shia commemoration of Karbala, Abd-Allah is represented as an innocent child who suffered unbearable thirst,[1] described as "the quintessence of symbol of the innocent victim."[20] His death carries perhaps the heaviest emotional weight for the Shia mourners,[21] and replicas of his empty cradle are often present in mourning processions.[1] Abd-Allah is also heavily featured in the verbal narratives of the ritual practices (rawza khani) and a complete majlis is sometimes dedicated to him.[1] As an act of commemoration, Iranian mourners often dress their baby boys in white jacket and green headband, which is how Abd-Allah is often represented in religious paintings.[22]

See also

Footnotes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Calmard 1985.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Madelung 2004.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Mir 2014.
  4. ^ a b Tabatabai 1975, pp. 178, 188n37.
  5. ^ a b c Haider 2014, p. 68.
  6. ^ a b Burney Abbas 2009, p. 143.
  7. ^ Reyshahri 2009, p. 291.
  8. ^ a b c Veccia Vaglieri 2012.
  9. ^ Hazleton 2009, p. 186.
  10. ^ Hyder 2006, p. 212.
  11. ^ a b Momen 1985, p. 30.
  12. ^ Esposito 2022.
  13. ^ a b Qutbuddin 2005, p. 9938.
  14. ^ Qutbuddin 2019, p. 107.
  15. ^ Hyder 2006, p. 9.
  16. ^ a b Osman 2014, p. 133.
  17. ^ Momen 1985, p. 240.
  18. ^ D'Souza 1997.
  19. ^ Pinault 2000, p. 77.
  20. ^ Flaskerud 2010, p. 136.
  21. ^ Hyder 2006, p. 92.
  22. ^ Flaskerud 2010, p. 139.

References

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