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The Difficulties of Certain Reforms
73. Imām Ali (a.s.): “If my steps stay firm in these slippery places, I will alter [many] things.”1
74. al-Kāfi –narrated by Sulaym ibn Qays: “The Commander of the Faithful gave a speech praising and glorifying God and giving salutations to the Prophet (s.a.w.). He then said:
“There are two features that I fear for you most: following desires and [having] long hopes. As for following desires, it bars one from the Truth, and as for long hopes, it makes one forget the Hereafter. Indeed the world is [departing] turning its back and the Hereafter is upcoming, each one having its own children [i.e. seekers]. Be the children of the Hereafter and not the children of this world, as today is the day of action not of reckoning and tomorrow is the day of reckoning not of action.
The cause of the trials and seditions are the desires that are followed and the laws that are innovated, in which (seditions) the laws of God are disobeyed and by which some men take authority over others.
Verily, if truth had not been intermingled with falsehood no conflicts would have existed and if falsehood had not been intermingled with the truth, it would not have been concealed from the people of wisdom. But some from each have been taken, intermixed and are shown together. Thereby the Satan dominates over its followers and only those whom Allah has already promised blessings will be far from hell [are saved].”
“Verily I heard the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) say: “How will you be when sedition befalls upon you in which the children grow up and the elderly age. People will follow according to these seditions and consider them Sunnah [tradition] and if a part of it is altered they would cry out that the tradition has been changed and people have committed a wrong act! Adversities will then mount, children will be taken captive, iniquities will overtake them as fire overtakes dry woods and millstone rubs away the bed stone. They will acquire [religious] knowledge for other than God, learn not for the sake of practice and seek worldly gains by means of [selling] the hereafter.”
Then while a group of his near of kin, close companions and followers were around him he said:
“The previous governors acted in such a way that they purposely opposed the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) and broke their allegiance to him and altered his tradition (sunna). If I prompted people to give it up and turned it back to its original position as it was during the time of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), the troops would stay away from me and I would be left alone or would only be with a small group of my followers who knew my virtue and were aware of the necessity of my leadership which is based on the Book of God Almighty and the tradition of the Prophet (s.a.w.).”
“If I were to order the Station of Abraham (a.s.) to be taken back to its original place where the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) had laid it, to return Fadak to the inheritors of Fātima (a.s.), to return the measure scale (Sā`)2 of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) to its original measurement, to implement the land grants that the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) bestowed on some but they were not handed over to them, to return Ja`fār’s house to his inheritors and separate it from the Mosque, to nullify the unjust judgments, to separate the women who have been unrightfully married to men and return them back to their husbands, to carry out God’s ordinances about these women, to take Taghlab’s children captive,3 to take back the lands divided out in Khaybar, to close down offices of grants’ and to provide equal grants like the time of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) and prevent circulation of assets among the rich, to cancel taxes levied on lands and to promote equality in marriages, to implement the khums of the Prophet as God has ordained and made obligatory, to reshape the Mosque of the Prophet back to its original form, to close the opened up doors and to open the doors closed, to forbid wiping of the shoes [in ablution instead of the feet], to administer punishments (hadd) for drinking wine, to allow the two types of Mut’a [temporary marriage - mut`atu’l Hajj and mut`atu’l nis ā], to order the [number of] takbirs [saying Allah akbar] in the prayer performed for the dead to be five, to have people recite bi-smi ’llāh al –Rahmān al-Rahim loudly in prayers, to take out from the mosque those who were brought in next to the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) while he had expelled them and to bring back those who the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) had brought in but were expelled, to order people to obey the commands of God and divorce on the basis of the traditions (sunna), to collect all religious taxes (sadaqāts) in their various types and amounts, to take (the rules of) minor ablution (wudu), major ablution (ghusl) and prayer (Salāt) back to their original time and status and rules, to return the people of Najrān back to their homes, to change the way of treating the captives of Persia and of other origins back to the way commanded by the Book of God and the traditions of the Messenger of God, then they would disperse from around me.
“By God, I ordered people not to perform prayers in the month of Ramadan in congregation except for the obligatory prayers and instructed them that congregation in supererogatory prayers is an innovation (bid`ā). Suddenly some of the soldiers who were in my company screamed out: “O People of Islam! The tradition of `Ømar has been changed. He is preventing us from performing supererogatory prayers in Ramadan.” I was afraid that [if I had not cancelled this order] the deviators from the right path and callers to the fire would have aroused disunity among some of my troops.
From this I [also] gave the share of the relatives [of the Prophet (s.a.w.)] about whom God Almighty has said: “Know that whatever thing you may come by, a fifth of it is for Allah and the Apostle, for the relatives and the orphans, for the needy and the traveler, if you have faith in Allah and what we sent down to Our servant on the Day of Separation, the day when the two hosts met; and Allah has power over all things.”4 By God, we are those meant by ‘the relatives’, whom God has mentioned in association with Himself and His Messenger, as He Almighty said: “The spoils that Allah gave to His Apostle from the people of the townships, are for Allah and the Apostle, the relatives and the orphans, the needy and the traveler…”5 Meaning us, “…so that they do not circulate between the rich among you. Take whatever the Apostle gives you, and relinquish whatever he forbids you, and be wary of Allah.”6 He has [further] said about the injustice to the relatives of the Prophet: “Indeed Allah is severe in retribution”7 for those who oppress them. This is a form of grace from Him Almighty to us and richness by which God has made us free from need and He has instructed His Messenger so.God did not allocate for us a portion in the share of alms. He gave honor to His Messenger and He made us the Ahlul Bayt greater than to feed us from the remnants of the people. They denied God and denied His Messenger, repudiating the Book of God that speaks about our rights and they deprived us that which God has allocated for us. There is no family of any prophet who has endured so much suffering and hardship from his community as we have suffered after [the passing away of] our Prophet (s.a.w.). God supports us against those who have oppressed us and there is no power and no strength save in God the Exalted, the Supreme.”8
1.. Nahj al-Balāghah, Sermon ۲۷۲, Ghurar al-Hikam, h. ۷۵۷۰, `Uyun al-Hikam wa al-Mawā`iz, p. ۴۱۵, h. ۷۰۶۰.
2.. A measure that is common among Muslims which weighs four mudds (about ۱.۶ kg.); however, according to some traditions, the Prophet’s measure weighed five mudds. (Sharh Mullā Sālih, vol. ۱۱, p. ۳۷۳.)
3.. They were not people of Dhimma, thus taking them captive was permissible. In the time of ‘Umar, he compromised with them by exempting them from paying tax and they paid zakāt twice as much instead. (Mir'āt al-`Uqul, vol. ۲۵, p. ۱۳۴.)
4.. Qur'ān, ۸: ۴۱.
5.. Qur'ān, ۵۹: ۷.
6.. al-Kāfi, vol. ۸, p. ۵۸, h. ۲۱, al-Ihtijāj, vol. ۱, p. ۶۲۶, h. ۱۴۶, Kitāb Sulaym ibn Qays, vol. ۲, p. ۷۱۸, h. ۱۸.
