” Anyone who contemplates upon the Taff event will clearly...

” Anyone who contemplates upon the Taff event will clearly realize that the sacrifices offered in it are greater than those offered during the Battle of Badr even though the latter was the first military victory achieved in Islam.

The reason is that the Muslims had then braved death under the protection of the flag of the Prophet (S) and were supported by angels numbering three thousand strong, while the Prophet (S) kept filling their ears with his calls for victory, urging them to assault their enemy. The Muslims, hence, faced the tyrants from Quraish feeling confident of subduing them. As regarding the Taff event, the suffering undergone during it was much more painful, and the agony was greater.

The tides of death clamoured, the war uncovered its fangs, and Banu Umayyah surrounded the grandson of the Prophet (S) [and his tiny band] from all sides. Oppression spurred it to action, So it came mounting its tyranny; Throngs that filled the earth, Overwhelming every ravine and highway. He trampled upon the beasts when He found no route to escape. The birds did not leave their nests.

Yet the band that sided with the truth did not lose heart, meeting those dangers without counting on any support or expecting any help. All essential supplies were cut off from them. Even water, the most plentiful of anything, and which was free for all, was denied them. Women and children were terrified on account of the imminent peril. The children's cries because of their thirst filled everyone's ears. Yet they faced mountains of steel with open arms and relentless determination.

All what those pure souls were concerned about was fighting Banu Umayyah. They spilled their pure blood only in defense of their honour, something which was abandoned by others. The government of the descendants of Harb became like a dog licking its nose, so the surface of the earth was in the end cleansed of their shame.

One poet belonging to (‘a) did well when he said: Had not all sublime merits been grouped in us, The Battle of Taff would have sufficed, When we rose like lions while our foes Like beasts of burden came to throng.

They came in seventy thousand strong; So ask those among them who did survive: If they met us though we brought only seventy.[^4] The Taff battle, then, is an Islamic victory over the jahiliyya that was revived through the actions of the Umayyads and their fellows who did not seek the shining light of Tawhid and Prophethood.