He has said...

He has said, “One who visits al-Husayn's grave [shrine] and spends a night there will be as though he had been martyred in his company.”[^3] This statement apparently implies staying there for one night prior to spending the day at his gravesite.

Discerning this tradition will let one conclude that one who stays at the grave of the one who sacrificed himself for Islam, and who did so suffering from thirst, for a full day, ought not depart from there during the [eleventh] night the like of which had never been witnessed by the daughters of the Messenger of Allah (S) and the trust of the caliphate. They were left behind in the desert by shining moons and by the elite from among the men of honour.

Beside them lay the parts that the swords of oppression and misguidance had cut off. They were frightened, not knowing what to expect from the enemies of Allah and of His Messenger. One who pays homage to them and who spends that night at al-Husayn's grave will demonstrate through his grief and mourning his sadness for being too late to come to his aid and to earn the greatest salvation.

He would keep repeating the statement saying: Ya laytana kunna ma’akum fa nafooza fawzan azeema , “How we wish we were with you so we would earn a great achievement.”[^4] He would console the Lady of all Women (‘a) who mourned her son who was forbidden from drinking water. Tharra, the mourner, saw her once in a vision standing at al-Husayn's grave weeping, and she ordered Tharra to eulogize her son (‘a) with these lines: O eyes! Overflow and do not dry And do over the one killed at Taff cry.

They left his body in every place hit, But I could not, alas, tend to it. No, nor was he sick at all...[^5] Abu ‘Ali, al-Muhsin Ibn ‘Ali al-Tanukhi, the judge, quotes his father saying, “Abul-Hasan, the scribe, inquired once about who the son of the mourner was. Nobody in the meeting place at Karkh[^6] knew the answer besides myself.

I asked him, ‘What is the context of the question?’ He said, ‘I have a bondmaid who fasts and who recites tahajjud quite often, yet she cannot [besides] correctly pronounce even one Arabic word! Moreover, she even quotes poetry, and her accent is heavily Nabatean. Last night, she woke up terrified, trembling. Her bed was close to mine. She cried out to me, ‘O father of al-Hasan! Come help me!' I asked her what was wrong with her.

She said, ‘I performed my prayers and supplications then went to bed. I saw myself walking in one of the Karkh alleys.