The Torch of Perpetual Guidance, an Exposé on Ziyarat Ashura of al-Imam al-Husayn b. Ali

Section Fifteen

يَا أَبا عَبْدِ اللّهِ، إِنِّي أَتَقَرَّبُ إِلَى اللّهِ، وَإِلى رَسُولِهِ، وَإِلى أَمِيرِ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ، وَإِلى فاطِمَةَ، وَإِلَى الْحَسَنِ، وَإِلَيْكَ بِمُوَالاتِكَ، وَبِالْبَراءَةِ مِـمَّـنْ أَسَّسَ أَسَاسَ ذلِكَ وَبَنى عَلَيْهِ بُنْيانَهُ، وَجَرى فِي ظُلْمِهِ وَجَوْرِهِ عَلَيْكُمْ وَعَلَى أَشْياعِكُمْ.

“O’ Aba ‘Abdillah! Surely I seek closeness to Allah and to His Messenger and to the Commander of the Faithful and to Fatimah and to Hasan and to you through love of you and through distancing myself from those who laid the foundations and those who built upon and carried out oppression and cruelty upon you all and upon your followers.”

What does it mean to seek closeness to Allah, His Messenger and the other noble personalities mentioned in this section? Without doubt, ‘closeness’ to these individuals cannot be in the physical sense of the word – rather, it is a spiritual meaning. Therefore, being close to Allah means to be at the highest pinnacles of faith and certainty such that a person has no doubts or misgivings of the path of life, Al-Islam, which he has chosen to follow.

Closeness to the Messenger of Allah, the Commander of the Faithful, Fatimah, Hasan, and Imam Husayn is also achieved through following their mission and way of life and becoming ‘one’ with them on the spiritual realms.

According to this section of the Ziyarat, closeness to Allah can only be achieved through “TawAllah” and “Tabarrah” – love and hate for those whom Allah has commanded us to show these two opposing states towards. This is not only a concept seen in this Ziyarat, rather, in many of the verses of the Qur’an, we are also told to have love and companionship for the believers and to be harsh and firm against the disbelievers.

Thus in summary, we see that the only way to be close to Allah and His Messenger and those whom we are ordered to follow and obey is through love for them – and true love entails a complete obedience to the one whom we love (as the Qur’an also attests to). At the same time, love is not enough as ‘love cannot conquer evil’ – thus, we also need to distance ourselves and make known our aversion to those people who oppressed and mercilessly killed the family of the Prophet – we have mentioned who these people are in our previous discussions and more shall be mentioned in this Ziyarat, Insha-Allah.