They agreed...

They agreed, and the Imam climbed the pulpit and after praising God Almighty, he addressed both 'Amr ibn al-'As and al-Mughayrah, and said: "I ask you in the name of God: Do you not remember that the Prophet cursed the position of that horseman, one of whom was that fellow (meaning Mu'awiyah)?"(368) They said: "We do." Then he turned to 'Amr and al-Mughayrah and said: "Don't you know and don't you remember that the Prophet cursed 'Amr ibn al-'As for every line of his poem?"(369) They said: "By God!

You are right!"(370) Of course as the Muslim supporters of the Prophet's households were never prepared to listen to a sermon in which the Imam was reproached, abused or cursed, they immediately left the mosque after the prayer and before the sermon. So Mu'awiyah and his governors changed the procedure which was prescribed by God and His prophet, and delivered the sermon before the prayer.

Ibn Hazm writes in his book of "al-Muhalla": For the first time the Umayyad made the sermon prior to the Friday prayer. They accounted for this unlawful action of theirs by saying that as the people left the mosque immediately after the end of the prayer, they do not wait to listen to the sermon.

But the truth was that they cursed Imam 'Mi from the pulpit, and as the people disliked this action, they left the mosque, and they were indeed right in doing so.(371) In Sahih of al-Bukhari and Muslim and other reliable books of tradition it is quoted from Abu Sa'id al-Khudri as follows: I accompanied Marwan, then governor of Medina, out of the city on the Sacrificial (Qurban) or al-Fitr festival. At the spot chosen for the festival prayer, a pulpit had been put up by Kathar ibn an-Salt.

On arriving there, Marwan wanted to climb the pulpit and deliver a sermon before the prayer. I caught his robe and tried to check him from doing so, but Marwan released himself by pulling his robe Out of my hand, and quickly ascended the pulpit, and recited the festival sermon. When he descended the pulpit, I said to him: "By God! You have produced a change in the religion!" He answered: "O Abu Sa'id!

Those things with which you were familiar in the name of religion, have disappeared." I said: "By God! What I knew was much finer than these innovations and unfamiliar ways!" Marwan said: "The people never lingered our sermons. So we were compelled to place the sermon before the prayer."(372) A group of people refuses to curse O Muawiyah!