Ibn Shahr-Ashub in Manaqib, Shaykh Majlisi in Bihar, Ibn Asam in Futuh and Khwarizmi reported:
And Husayn (A) walked until he reached Khuzaymiya, where he spent a day and a night. When morning came, his sister Zaynab bint Ali came to him and said: “O brother, should I tell you what I heard last night?” He said: “What is this, O sister?” She said: “I went out at night and heard a voice saying:
Oh eyes, shed tears,
And who will weep for the martyrs after me?
For people who are led by destiny (manaya)
To the fulfillment of what is promised to them.”
Then Husayn (A) said to her: “O my sister! Whatever is predestined will be fulfilled.”
Here we see that Zaynab (A), the sister of Husayn (A), heard a voice reciting verses at night, but in reality, not in a dream. The content of these verses is close to what Imam Husayn (A) heard in Salabiyya, so we have combined them into one topic.
Reported in Ibn Sa’d’s Tabaqat, Baladuri’s Ansab al-ashraf, Ibn Asam’s Futuh, Abu Faraj’s Maqatilu talabiyyin, Ibn Tawus’s Luhuf, and other sources:
Then he reached Salabiyya in the afternoon and fell asleep there. Suddenly he woke up and said: “I heard a voice that said: ‘People are walking, and fate (manaya) is walking towards them.'” Or in Ibn Tawus’ version: “You are in a hurry, and fate (manaya) is hurrying with you to Paradise.”
Of course, these are different events, but the messages that the voice conveys here to Zaynab (A) and to Imam Hussein (A) are similar in content, they contain the same news. What is it?
We see that the caravan is gradually approaching the land of disaster and sorrow, and in just a few days Zaynab (A) will see the bodies of these shining righteous people scattered on the hot sand, severed limbs and blood flowing on the ground. She will witness the greatest disaster, the likes of which humanity has never seen.
The voice speaks of people led by fate. In the original, the word manaya is used here, meaning fate associated with death. That is, manaya or maniya is not just fate, but a fate that leads a person to death. In English, this word can also be translated as “fate” or simply as “death.” The voice says that this fate, this manaya, is coming to them, and not they going to it. Manaya awaits them in the promised place, between Nawawis and Karbala, where hungry wolves will break free from their chains to fill their bellies with their sacred flesh.
The manaya that drove them was the actions of the enemy and their preparations, with their mountains of iron and piles of spears and arrows. Although this voice was a message of the secret about the events of the near future, it also contained a message about the nature of the caravan’s movement. It was not moving on its own, but was moved, and it was moved by fate, fate, inevitable death on the edge of swords, spearheads and arrows. Manaya is nothing other than what the enemy planned and prepared.
The words “people who are led by fate to fulfill what they have been promised” clearly indicate that the caravan was not those who dared to defy death and set out with weapons to some goal. Rather, fate led them, and they did not lead fate. Destiny in the sense of fatal fate (manaya) sought them, and they did not seek it – except to protect themselves from enemies.
In other words: the enemy was driving manaya towards the caravan. And in the caravan there were only those who were the embodiment of dignity, greatness and pride. Therefore, they could not surrender to this manaya until they brought death upon those who were driving it upon them – with such a crash that will eclipse the centuries of history.
Hence the words of Imam Hussein (A) at Karbala:
“The illegitimate son of the illegitimate (Ibn Ziyad) put between the choice of the sword or humiliation. So down with humiliation! Allah, and His Messenger, and the believers, and the good and pure bosoms, and the exalted morals, and the proud souls rejected this, so that we would prefer the submission of the lowly to the death of the noble.”
And Imam Hussein’s (A) response to Zaynab’s (A) message about the voice was: “O my sister! Everything that is predestined will come true.” That is, all this happens according to the will and plan of Allah Almighty, and the Imam’s heart is the abode of this will: it does not contradict it, does not differ from it, and does not lag behind it.
When Imam Hussein (A) was leaving Mecca, and Muhammad ibn Hanafiyyah began to object to this, he said: “The Messenger of Allah (S) came to me and said: “O Hussein! Go out, for Allah has willed that you be killed.” Muhammad ibn Hanafiyyah said: “Then why are you taking women with you?” He said: “The Messenger of Allah (S) said: “Allah wants to see them taken captive.” (Luhuf, p. 45)
There is nothing evil, imperfect or insufficient in the Plan of Allah. His Plan is absolute perfection and complete harmony.
When Zaynab (A) was brought among the captives after Karbala to the slave of the Umayyad monkeys Ibn Ziyad, and he said to her: “How did you see what Allah did to your brothers and family?”, she said the famous words: ma raytu illa jamila – “I did not see anything except beauty.” And this is so because the Creator intended Ashura before His eye as a guide and proof for the worlds, and He arranged it in such a way that in this story there is nothing but beauty. There is no limit to this love, tragedy and light. The beauty of Karbala is endless, and it is made a light for all people for all time, until the Day of Judgement. “I saw nothing but beauty”…
And then she said to Ibn Ziyad: “These were people for whom Allah had prescribed death, and they rushed to the places of their murder.” That is, what happened to them was taklif, it was an obligation, and they accepted this obligation by their own choice.
In order to fulfill a plan, the beginning and end of which we, ordinary people, do not know (but the Imam knows), Allah wanted to see Husayn (A) killed, and the women of the prophetic family taken captive. And they accepted this taklif, this obligation, by their own choice. Allah wanted to see them killed and captured – and they loved to be killed and captured, because Allah wanted it. For in what Allah wants is only and exclusively absolute and perfect good, which is such that each of us would die from the flow of happiness that would have captured him if he suddenly saw the whole Plan of Allah in all its perfection and harmony… Where everything is related to everything and corresponds to everything, where every detail and every atom is in absolute harmony with another detail and atom. A billion days are balanced by a billion nights, a billion sorrows – by a billion joys, all the darkness – by all the light…
And at the same time, the presence of an incomprehensible and shining Plan of Allah over this tragedy did not mean that Imam Hussein (A) had to voluntarily expose himself to swords. The Messenger of Allah (S) told the Commander of the Faithful Ali (A) in advance that he would die from a blow from the “most unfortunate of the unfortunate” on his holy head, and blood would stain his beard. This does not mean that the Commander of the Faithful (A) himself then threw himself under the sword of Ibn Muljam al-Muradi, the curse of Allah on him, and strove for this with with great zeal! The same is true of the Commander of Martyrs, Husayn ibn Ali (A): the enemy pursued and surrounded him, and manaya led to the fulfillment of what was promised.
