How authentic is what is said — that al-Husayn took on the state of one in the throes of death when bidding farewell to his son ʿAli al-Akbar, that his eyes sank deep into his head, and that he fainted?
In the Name of Allah, the All-beneficent, the All-merciful
And blessings and peace be upon the noblest of Allah's creation, our master Muhammad, and his pure Household.
We have not found these exact phrases in the martyrdom chronicles available to us, whether well known or not; however, it is established and reported in the various kinds of chronicles, and well known among the eminent scholars, that after the killing of ʿAli al-Akbar (a), intense grief befell Imam al-Husayn (a), and he made clear that it was a great calamity, through his actions and his words. Among them, for example: (Al-Husayn (a) came until he stood over him, placed his cheek on his cheek, and said: May Allah kill a people who killed you..) al-Malhuf, p. 166. In others: (And his father held him to himself until he died), and in some: (He held him to his chest and brought him to the entrance of the tent).
The Imam invoked numerous imprecations against his killers, expressing intense indignation and pain, such as his saying: (May Allah kill a people who killed you, my son! How audacious they are against the All-beneficent and in violating the sanctity of the Messenger! And his eyes poured forth with tears; then he said: After you, may obliteration be upon the world”. al-Irshad by al-Mufid, vol. 2, p. 106.
All of this points to the greatness of the personality of ʿAli al-Akbar; it suffices that he was the person who most resembled the Messenger of Allah (s) in physical form, in character and in speech, and he was the one whom they would look at whenever they longed for the Messenger of Allah..
As for the expression of being in the throes of death and on the verge of death, and perhaps the fainting that goes along with it, we have found more than one [author] reporting it from al-Shaykh al-Tustari, among them Maʿali al-Sibtayn:
It reports that the Imam, in the calamity of his son, was in the throes of death and on the verge of death three times.. and this is the text of his words:
“Al-Husayn (a), in the calamity of his son, was in the throes of death and on the verge of death three times:
The first: when ʿAli al-Akbar went forth to fight and sought his father's permission, and he permitted him, clothed him in armor and weapons, and mounted him on al-ʿUqab. He (r) said: When the face of his countenance shone forth from the horizon of al-ʿUqab, and his hand and foot took hold of the reins and the stirrup, the women came out and surrounded him; his aunts and sisters took hold of his reins and stirrup and held him back from his resolve. At that, the state of al-Husayn (a) changed such that he was on the verge of death, and he cried out to his women and family: Leave him, for he is consumed in Allah and slain in the way of Allah. Then he took him by the hand and brought him out from among them, and looked at him with the look of one who has despaired of him,
The second, in which al-Husayn (a) was in the throes of death, was when ʿAli al-Akbar (a) returned from the battle having sustained many wounds, with blood flowing from the rings of his armor, and the heat and thirst having grown severe upon him. He stood and said: O father, thirst! So al-Husayn (a) held him to his chest, wept, and was on the verge of death from the intensity of anguish and grief, since he was unable to give him water to drink,
And the third time: when he saw ʿAli fall and call out: O father, peace be upon you from me. Sukayna said: When my father heard the voice of his son, I looked at him and saw that he was on the verge of death, his eyes rolling like one in the throes of death; he began looking at the sides of the tent, his soul was about to depart from his body, and he cried out from the middle of the tent: My son, may Allah kill a people who killed you!” Maʿali al-Sibtayn, p. 411.
As for the observations on this report:
First: the word “being in the throes of death” occurring in this text is an expression by the observer of a state befalling the person described, and not the statement of the Infallible himself; so it does not go beyond being a description of the immensity of the calamity that befell Imam al-Husayn (a) and of his states at the time it occurred.
Second: al-Tustari did not mention his source for the report, though he may have come across sources that have not reached us, and we know his eminent standing.
Third: ʿAllama al-Tustari has a particular approach in classifying the Husayni characteristics and states, in that he brings together similar characteristics that revolve around a single theme and mentions them together; this was his method in his valuable book (al-Khasaʾis al-Husayniyya). Accordingly, that classification may be a thematic approach on his part to the pain and grief that befell Imam al-Husayn (a), which reached lofty degrees expressed as being in the throes of death.
Fourth: if we grant that being in the throes of death, or something like it, occurred to Imam al-Husayn (a), we should not believe that this caused a paralysis of events on the day of ʿAshura, because all the sources mention to us the tasks that Imam al-Husayn (a) carried out after the killing of his eldest son: carrying him to the camp, dressing the wounds of the women's hearts, watching over the battlefield, and dealing with the martyrdom of some of the martyrs. All of that did not keep him from invoking imprecations against them, from declaring the greatness of his son ʿAli al-Akbar, and from declaring the enormity of the crime they had committed.
Sayed Mahmoud Al-Mosawi
Muharram al-Haram 1444 AH