Ali, a Sunni present-day historian, wrote, “The murder of...

Ali, a Sunni present-day historian, wrote, “The murder of Abu Muslim and Abdullah who helped him greatly to raise the Abbasids to power and prestige, and his treatment toward the descendants of Ali, the fourth Caliph, are the darkest records in the Abbasid history.”[^3] It was actually as-Saffah’s younger brother, al-Mansur who was responsible for the murder of Abu Salama and Abu Muslim.

The only reason behind the murder was that people such as Abu Salama Hafs bin Sulaiman in Kufa and Abu Muslim in Khurasan, were supporters of the Ahlul Bayt. Most of them were also greatly disappointed by the character of as-Saffah. [2] Abu Ja’far al-Mansur ad-Dawaniqi (137–159 A H) As-Saffah, at his dying moments, nominated his younger brother Abu Ja’far Abdullah, who on becoming the caliph in 137 AH, assumed the title ‘al-Mansur’.

Among all the Muslim monarchs, al-Mansur was the first to keep near him an executioner holding an unsheathed sword, ever ready to behead anyone instantly. About al-Mansur’s cruel nature, Allama Abdur Rabbah reports, “When al-Mansur sat in his court, the executioners will bring row upon row of people and behead them so mush so that the blood used to flow in the court and splatter on to al-Mansur’s cloak. Al-Mansur then ordered his chaplain to preach to him.

When the chaplain preached, al-Mansur used to sit with his head bowed down as if he were ashamed, but in no time another group of persons would be brought and beheaded as before.”[^4] People were brought on the ground that they were Alawid or on a mere suspicion that they sympathised with the Ahlul Bayt. Al-Mansur ordered that the progeny of Imam Hasan (a.s.) should be gathered in one place. He got them chained and threw them into a dark cell.

As they could not make out day from night, and the times for prayers, the prisoners divided the Qur’an into five parts in order to approximate the time of prayer and after finishing each part they offered prayers. There was no sanitation due to which they fell sick. When one died, the corpse was left to rot. Soon all of them died.[^5] Frequently, the progeny of Ali and Fatima and their sympathisers were gathered and al-Mansur ordered to be flogged so severely that the victims soon died.

Al-Mansur was the first person to make the victim stand and a masonry pillar raised all around him.