My friend took me to a mosque next to the mausoleum,
where the floors were covered by carpets, and around its
Mihrab there were some Qur'anic verses, engraved in beautiful
calligraphy. I noticed a few turbaned youngsters sitting
near the Mihrab studying, and each one of them had a book
in his hand.
I was impressed by the scene, since I had never seen
Shaykhs aged between thirteen and sixteen, and what made
them look so cute was their costumes. My friend asked them
about the Master "al-Sayyid", so they told him that he was
leading the prayer. I did not know what he meant by "al-
Sayyid", and thought he might be one of the Ulama, but later
I realized it was "al-Sayyid al-Khu'i" the leader of the Shiite
community.
It was worth noting here that the title "Sayyid" - master
for the Shia is given to those who are the descendants of
the family of the Prophet (saw), and the "Sayyid", whether
he is a student or an Alim [learned man], wears a black turban,
but other Ulama usually wear white turbans and bear
the title of "Shaykh". There are other notables [al-Ashraf]
who are not Ulama and wear a green turban.
My friend asked them if I could sit with them, whilst he
went to meet al-Sayyid. They welcomed me and sat around
me in a semi-circle and I looked at their faces which were
full of innocence and purity, and then I remembered the saying
of the Prophet (saw) "Man is born to live by nature, so
his parents could make him a Jew or a Christian or a Magus"
... and I said to myself, "Or make him a Shi'i."
They asked me, which countly I came from, I answered.
"From Tunisia." They asked, "Have you got religious
schools?" I answered, "We have universities and schools." I
was bombarded by questions from all sides, and all the questions
were sharp and concentrated. What could I say to those
innocent boys who thought that the Islamic world was full of
religious schools where they teach Jurisprudence, Islamic
Law, principle of Islam and Qur'anic commentary. They did
not know that in the modern world of Islam we have changed
the Qur'anic schools to kindergartens supervised by Christ-
ian nuns so should I tell them that they are considered by us
as being "backward"? One of the boys asked me, "Which
Madhhab (religious school) is followed in Tunis'?" I said,
"The Maliki madhhab." And noticed that some of them
laughed, but I did not pay much attention. He asked me, "Do
you not know the Jafari Madhhab?" I said, "What is this new
name? No we only know the four Madhahibs, and apart from
that is not within Islam."
He smiled and said, "The Jafari Madhhab is the essence
of Islam, do you not know that Imam Abu Hanifah studied
under Imam Jafar al-Sadiq? And that Abu Hanifah said,
"Without the two years al-Numan would have perished." I
remained silent and did not answer, for I had heard a name that
I had never heard before, but thanked Allah that he -
i.e. their Imam Jafar al-Sadiq - was not a teacher of Imam
Malik, and said that we are Malikis and not Hanafis. He said,
"The four Madhahibs took from each other, Ahmed ibn
Hanbal took from al-Shafii, and al-Shafii took from Malik,
and Malik took from Abu Hanifah, and Abu Hanifah from
Jafar al-Sadiq, therefore, all of them were students of Jafar
ibn Muhammad, who was the first to open an Islamic University in
the mosque of his grandfather, the Messenger of Allah.
and under him studied no less than four thousand jurisprudents
and specialists in Hadith (prophetic traditions).
I was surprised by the intelligence of that young boy who
seemed to have learnt what he was saying in the same way
that one recites a Surah from the Qur'an. I was even more
astonished when he started telling me some historical references
which he knew the number of their volumes and chapters, and he
continued with his discussion as if he was a
teacher teaching a student. In fact I felt weak before him and
wished that I had gone with my friend instead of staying
with the young boys. I was not able to answer every question
connected with jurisprudence or history that they asked me.
He asked me, "Which of the Imams I followed?" I said,
"Imam Malik." He said, "How do you follow a dead man
with fourteen centuries between you and him. If you want to
ask him a question about current issues, would he answer
you?" I thought for a little while and then said, "Your Jafar
also died fourteen centuries ago, so whom do you follow?"
He and other boys answered me quickly, "We follow al-
Sayyid al-Khu'i, for he is our Imam." I did not know who was
more knowledgeable, al-Khu'i or Jafar al-Sadiq. I tried my
best to change the subject so I kept asking them questions
such as, "What is the population of al- Najaf? How far is al-
Najaf from Baghdad? Did they know other countries beside
Iraq ..." And every time they answered, I prepared another
question for them to prevent them from asking me, for I felt
incapable of matching their knowledge. But I refused to
admit it, despite the fact that inside myself, I accepted
defeat. The days of glory and scholarship in Egypt had dissipated
here, especially after meeting those youngsters, and
then I remembered the following wise words:
Say to him who claims knowledge in Philosophy, "You
have known one thing but you are still unaware of many
things."
I thought the minds of those young boys were greater
than the minds of those Shaykhs whom I met in al-Azhar and
the minds of our Shaykhs in Tunisia.
Al-Sayyid al-Khu'i entered the place, and with him came
a group of Ulama who looked respectable and dignified, and
all the boys stood up, and me with them, then each one of
them approached al-Sayyid to kiss his hand, but I stayed rigid
in my place. Al-Sayyid did not sit down until everybody sat
down, then he started greeting them one by one, and he was
greeted back by each individual until my turn came, so I
replied in the same way. After that my friend, who had whispered
to al-Sayyid, pointed to me to get nearer to al-Sayyid,
which I did, and he sat me to his right. After we exchanged
the greetings my friend said to me, "Tell al-Sayyid the things
you hear in Tunisia about the Shia." I said, "Brother, let us
forget about the stories we hear from here and there, and I
want to know for myself what the Shia say, so I want frank
answers to some questions that I have." My friend insisted
that I should inform al-Sayyid about what we thought of al-
Shia. I said, "We consider the Shia to be harder on Islam than
the Christian and Jews, because they worship Allah and
believe in the Message of Musa-may Allah grant him
peace, but we hear that the Shia worship Ali and consider
him to be sacred, and there is a sect among them who worship
Allah but put Ali at the same level as the Messenger of
Allah." Also I told him the story about how the angel Gabriel
betrayed his charge - as they say - so instead of giving the
message to Ali he gave it to Muhammad (saw).
Al-Sayyid remained silent for a little while, with his head
down, then he looked at me and said, "We believe that there
is no other God but Allah, and that Muhammad (saw) is
the Messenger of Allah, and that Ali was but a servant of
Allah." 'He turned to his audience and said, indicating to me
"Look at these innocent people how they have been
brain-washed by the false rumours; and this is not surprising
for I heard more than that from other people - (so we say)
there is no power or strength save in Allah, the Highest and
the Greatest." Then he turned to me and said, "Have you
read the Qur'an?" I answered, "I could recite half of it by
heart before I was ten." He said, "Do you know that all the
Islamic groups, regardless of their sects agree on the Holy
Qur'an, for our Qur'an is the same as yours?" I said, "Yes I
know that." He then said, "Have you not read the words of
Allah, praise be to Him the Sublime:
And Muhammad is no more than a messenger, the messengers have already
passed away before him (Holy Qur'an 3:144)
Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and those with
him are from of heart against the unbelievers (Holy Qur'an 48:29)
Muhammad is not the father of any of your men, but
he is the Messenger of Allah and the last of the Prophets
(Holy Qur'an 33:40)
I said, "Yes I know all these
Qur'anic verses." He said, "Where is Ali then? If our Qur'an says
that Muhammad (saw) is the Messenger of Allah, so where did this lie come from?"
I remained silent and could not find an answer. He
added, "As for the betrayal of Gabriel, God forbid, it is
worse than the first, because when Allah sent Gabriel unto
Muhammad (saw), Muhammad (saw) was forty years
old then, and Ali was a lad of six or seven years, so how could
Gabriel make a mistake and did not differentiate between
Muhammad (saw) the man and Ali the lad?" He stayed
silent for a long time, and I started thinking about what he
had said, which appeared to me as logical reasoning, so that
it left a deep impression on me, and I asked myself why we
did not base our analysis on such logical reasoning.
Al-Sayyid al-Khu'i added, "I would like to inform you
that the Shia is the only group, among all the Islamic groups,
which believe in the infallability of the Prophets and Imams;
so if our Imams, may Allah grant them peace, are infallible,
and they are human beings like us, then how about Gabriel,
who is an angel favoured by Allah and He called him "The
faithful spirit".
I asked, "Where did all these rumours come from?" He
said, "From the enemies of Islam who want to divide the
Muslims into groups that fight each other, otherwise Muslims are
brothers, whether they were Shia or Sunnis, for all of
them worship Allah alone and do not associate any other
God with Him, and they have one Qur'an, one Prophet and
one Qiblah (Direction to which Muslims turn in praying-
i.e. Kabaa). The Shia and the Sunnis only differ on issues
regarding jurisprudence, in the same way that the different
schools of jurisprudence in the Sunni school differ among
each other; as Malik did not agree all the way with Abu
Hanifah who himself did not agree all the way with al-Shafii
... and so on."
I said, "Therefore, all the things which have been said
about you are just lies?" He said, "You, praise be to Allah,
are a sensible man and could comprehend things, also you
have seen Shi'i countries and have travelled in their midst; so
did you hear or see anything related to these lies?" I said,
"No, I have not seen or heard anything but good things, and
I thank Allah for giving me the opportunity to meet Mr.
Munim on the ship, since he was the reason for my presence
in Iraq, and indeed I have learnt many things that I had not
known before."
My friend Munim said, with a smile, "Including the
existence of a grave for the Imam Ali?" I winked at him and said,
"In fact I have learnt many new things even from those young
lads and wish I had had the opportunity to learn as they do in
this Religious School."
Al-Sayyid said, "Welcome, if you want to study here,
then there will be a place for you in this school." Everybody
welcomed the suggestion, especially my friend Munim whose
face was full of joy.
I said, "I am a married man with two boys." He said, "We
will take care of your accommodation and living and whatever
you need, but the important thing is learning."
I thought for a little while and said to myself, "It does not
seem acceptable to become a student after having spent five
years as a teacher and educationalist, and it is not easy to take
a decision so hastily."
I thanked al-Sayyid al-Khu'i for his offer and told him
that I would think about the matter seriously after I came
back from al-Umrah, but I needed some books. Al-Sayyid
said, "Give him the books." A group of learned people stood
up and went to their book cabinets and after a few minutes
each one of them presented me with a book, so I had more
than seventy. I realized that I could not carry all these books
with me, especially as I was going to Saudi Arabia, where the
authorities censor any book entering their countries, lest new
ideas get established, in particular those ideas which do not
agree with their creed. However, I did not want to miss the
chance of having all these books which I had never seen in all
my life. I said to my friend and the rest of the people that I
had a long journey ahead of me, passing through Damascus,
Jordan and Saudi Arabia, and on the way back my journey
would be even longer for I would travel through Egypt and
Lybia until I reached Tunisia, and beside the weight of these
books was the fact that most of the countries prohibit the
entry of these books to their territories.
Al-Sayyid said, "Leave us your address and we will send
them to you." I liked the idea and gave him my personal card
with my address in Tunis on it. Also, I thanked him for his
generosity, and when I was about to leave him he stood up
and said to me, "May Allah grant you safety and if you stand
by the grave of my forefather the Messenger of Allah please
pass my greetings to him."
Everybody, including myself, were moved by what al-
Sayyid had said, and I noticed that tears were coming from
his eyes, then I said to myself, "God forbid that such a man
could be wrong or a liar; his dignity, his greatness and his
modesty tell you that he is truly a descendant of the
Prophet." I could not help myself but to take his hand and
kiss it, in spite of his refusal.
When I stood up to go, everybody stood and said farewell
to me, and some of the young lads from the religious school
followed me and asked me for my addresses for future correspondence,
and I gave it to them.
We went back to al-Kufa after an invitation from a friend
of Munim, whose name was Abu Shubbar, and stayed in his
house where we spent a whole night socializing with a group
of intellectual young people. Among those people were
some students of al-Sayyid Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr who
suggested that I should meet him, and they promised to
arrange an interview with him on the day after. My friend
Munim liked the idea but apologized for not being able to
be present at the meeting because he has a prior engagement
in Baghdad. We agreed that I would stay in Abu Shubbar's
house for three or four days until Munim came back.
Munim left us shortly after the dawn prayers and we went
to sleep. I benefitted so much from these students and was
surprised about the variety of subjects they study in the
Religious School. In addition to the Islamic studies which
include Jurisprudence, Islamic Law (Shariah) and Tawheed
(Islamic Theology); they study Economics, Sociology, Politics, History,
Languages, Astronomy and a few more subjects.