HAZRAT ALI


 Ali was born to Abu Talib and his wife Fatima bint Asad around 600 CE,[3] possibly on 13 Rajab,[6][1] the date also celebrated annually by the Shia.[7] Shia and some Sunni sources introduce Ali as the only person born inside Ka'ba in Mecca,[1][6][3] some containing miraculous descriptions of the incident.[6][8] Ali's father was a leading member of the Banu Hashim clan,[6] who also raised his nephew Muhammad after his parents died. When Abu Talib fell into poverty later, Ali was taken in at the age of five and raised by Muhammad and his wife Khadija.[1]


HAZRAT ALI


In 610,[1] when Ali was aged between nine to eleven,[3] Muhammad announced that he had received divine revelations (wahy). Ali was among the first to believe him and profess to Islam, either the second (after Khadija) or the third (after Khadija and Abu Bakr), a point of contention among Shia and Sunni Muslims.[9] Gleave nevertheless writes that the earliest sources seem to place Ali before Abu Bakr,[3] while Watt (d. 2006) comments that Abu Bakr's status after Muhammad's death might have been reflected back into the early Islamic records.[10][11]


Muhammad's call to Islam in Mecca lasted from 610 to 622, during which Ali provided for the needs of the Meccan Islamic community, especially the poor.[1] Some three years after the first revelation and after receiving verse 26:214,[12] Muhammad gathered his relatives for a feast, invited them to Islam, and asked for their assistance.[13] The Sunni al-Tabari (d. 923) writes that Ali was the only relative who offered his support and Muhammad subsequently announced him as his brother, his trustee, and his successor.[13][3] This declaration was met with ridicule from the infamous Abu Lahab and the guests then dispersed.[13] The announcement attributed to Muhammad is not included in the Sunni collection Musnad Ahmad ibn Hanbal,[14] but readily found in the Shia exegeses of verse 26:214.[14] The similar account of Ibn Ishaq (d. 767) in his Sira[15] was later omitted in the recension of the book by the Sunni Ibn Hisham (d. 833), possibly because of its Shia implications.[14] The Shia interpretation of these accounts is that Muhammad had already designated Ali as his successor from an early age.[13][16]


From migration to Medina to the death of Muhammad

In 622, Muhammad was informed of an assassination plot by the Meccan elites and it was Ali who is said to have stayed in Muhammad's house overnight to fool the assassins waiting outside, while the latter escaped to Yathrib (now Medina),[1][17] thus marking 1 AH in the Islamic calendar. This incident is given by the early exegete Ibn Abbas (d. c. 687) and some others as the reason of the revelation for verse 2:207, "But there is also a kind of man who gives his life away to please God..."[18][19][6] Ali too escaped Mecca soon after returning the goods entrusted to Muhammad there.[9] In Medina, Muhammad paired Muslims for fraternity pacts and he is said to have selected Ali as his brother,[20] telling him, "You are my brother in this world and the Hereafter,"[1] according to the canonical Sunni collection Sahih al-Tirmidhi.[21] Ali soon married Muhammad's daughter Fatima in 1 or 2 AH (623-5 CE),[22][23] at the age of about twenty-two.[24][1] Their union holds a special spiritual significance for Muslims, write Nasr and Afsaruddin,[1] and Muhammad said he followed divine orders to marry Fatima to Ali, narrates the Sunni al-Suyuti (d. 1505), among others.[23][25][1] The Sunni Ibn Sa'd (d. 845) and some others write that Muhammad had earlier turned down the marriage proposals by Abu Bakr and Umar.[26][23][27]


Event of Mubahala

After an inconclusive debate in 10/631-2, Muhammad and the Najranite Christians decided to engage in mubuhala, where both parties would pray to invoke God's curse upon the liar. Verse 3:61 of the Quran is associated with this incident.[28] Madelung argues based on this verse that Muhammad participated in this event alongside Ali, Fatima, and their two sons, Hasan and Husayn.[29] This is also the Shia view.[30] In contrast, most Sunni accounts by al-Tabari do not name the participants of the event, while some other Sunni historians agree with the Shia view.[31][28] During the event, Muhammad gathered Ali, Fatima, Hasan and Husayn under his cloak and addressed them as his ahl al-bayt, according to some Shia and Sunni sources,[32][33] including the canonical Sunni Sahih Muslim and Sahih al-Tirmidhi.[34] Madelung suggests that their inclusion by Muhammad in this significant ritual must have raised the religious rank of his family.[29] A similar view is voiced by Lalani.[35]



The calligraphy of the names of ahl al-kisa and two hadiths of Muhammad on the cloth, probably belonging to Iran or Central Asia

Missions

Ali acted as Muhammad's secretary and deputy in Medina.[21][9] He was also one of the scribes tasked by Muhammad with committing the Quran to writing.[1] In 628, Ali wrote down the terms of the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, the peace treaty between Muhammad and the Quraysh. In 630, Muhammad sent Abu Bakr to read the sura at-Tawbah for pilgrims in Mecca but then dispatched Ali to take over this responsibility, later explaining that he received a divine command to this effect,[31][36] as related by Musnad Ibn Hanbal[37] and the canonical Sunni collection Sunan al-Nasa'i.[6] At the request of Muhammad, Ali helped ensure that the Conquest of Mecca in 630 was bloodless and later removed the idols from Ka'ba.[1] In 631, Ali was sent to Yemen to spread the teachings of Islam,[1] as a consequence of which the Hamdanids peacefully converted.[17][6] Ali was also tasked with resolving the dispute with the Banu Jadhima, some of whom had been killed by Khalid ibn al-Walid (d. 642) after being promised safety by him.[6]


Military career

See also: Military career of Ali

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Campaigns of Ali


Arabic calligraphy which means "There is no brave youth except Ali and there is no sword which renders service except Zulfiqar"

Ali accompanied Muhammad in all of his military expeditions except the Battle of Tabuk (630), during which he was left behind in charge of Medina.[17] The Hadith of Position is linked with this occasion, "Are you not content, Ali, to stand to me as Aaron stood to Moses, except that there will be no prophet after me?" This appears in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim.[38] For the Shia, the hadith signifies Ali's usurped right to succeed Muhammad,[39] while it primarily supports the finality of Muhammad in the chain of prophets for the Sunni.[40] Ali commanded the expedition to Fadak (628) in the absence of Muhammad.[9][1]


Ali was renowned for his bravery.[20][9] He was the standard-bearer in the Battle of Badr (624) and the Battle of Khaybar (628).[21] He vigorously defended Muhammad in the Battle of Uhud (625) and the Battle of Hunayn (630),[20][1] while Veccia Vaglieri (d. 1989) attributes the Muslims' victory in the Battle of Khaybar to his courage,[9] where he is popularly said to have torn off the iron gate of the enemy fort.[20] At Uhud, Muhammad reported hearing a divine voice, "[There is] no sword but Zulfiqar [Ali's sword], [there is] no chivalrous youth (fata) but Ali,"[36][1] writes al-Tabari.[6] After defeating Amr ibn Abd Wudd, who had challenged Ali to single combat in the Battle of the Trench (627), Muhammad praised him, "Faith, in its entirety, has appeared before polytheism, in its entirety," writes the Shia Rayshahri.[6] According to Veccia Vaglieri, Ali and Zubayr oversaw the killing of the Banu Qurayza men for treachery in 5 AH,[9] though the historicity of this incident has been disputed by some,[41][42][43] while Shah-Kazemi comments on the defensive nature of the battles fought by Ali[6] and his magnanimity towards his defeated enemies.[44]



Zulfiqar with, and without the shield. The Fatimid depiction of Ali's sword as carved on the Gates of Old Islamic Cairo, namely Bab al-Nasr


Ali's Sword and shield carved on Bab al-Nasr gate wall, Cairo

Ghadir Khumm

Main article: The event of Ghadir Khumm


The Investiture of Ali, at Ghadir Khumm (MS Arab 161, fol. 162r, 1307–8 Ilkhanid manuscript illustration)

As Muhammad was returning from the Farewell Pilgrimage in 632, he halted the large caravan of pilgrims at Ghadir Khumm and addressed them after the congregational prayer.[45] During his sermon, taking Ali by the hand, Muhammad asked the crowd if he was not closer (awla) to the believers than they were to themselves, which they affirmed.[46] Muhammad then declared, "He whose mawla I am, Ali is his mawla."[47][48] Musnad Ibn Hanbal, a canonical Sunni source, adds that Muhammad repeated this sentence three or four more times and that his companion Umar congratulated Ali after the sermon, "You have now become mawla of every faithful man and woman."[49][50] In this sermon and earlier in Mecca, Muhammad is said to have alerted Muslims about his impending death.[46][51][52][53] Shia sources describe the event in greater detail, linking the event to the revelation of verses 5:3 and 5:67 of the Quran.[46]


With some exceptions,[54] the authenticity of the Ghadir Khumm is rarely contested,[48][55][56][57][51] as its recorded tradition is "among the most extensively acknowledged and substantiated" in classical Islamic sources.[58] The numerous Shia accounts include one by the proto-Shia Ya'qubi (d. 284/897-8),[46] while the Sunni accounts include the sunans of al-Tirmidhi (d. 892), al-Nasa'i (d. 915), Ibn Maja (d. 887), Abu Dawud (d. 889), and the works of Ibn al-Athir (d. 1232-3), Ibn Abd al-Barr (d. 1071), Ibn Abd Rabbih (d. 940), Jahiz (d. 869),[59] Ibn Asakir (d. 571/1176),[51][46] and Ibn Kathir (d. 1373).[46] Some Sunni authors, such as al-Tabari (d. 310/923), Ibn Hisham (d. 218/833), and Ibn Sa'd (d. 168/784-5) nevertheless made little or no mention of the Ghadir Khumm,[46] perhaps because the story seem to justify the Shia claims,[51] or perhaps to avoid angering their Sunni rulers by supporting the Shia claims.[46][51]