To this we said...

To this we said, "Sir, when someone starts writing on some topic, he first gathers relevant material and then he fully examines the matter, otherwise the writer has no right to touch upon the topic at all." Consider the libraries of the Shi'as. Row well stocked they are! Examine our own library.

It contains about five thousand volumes and most of the books are written by Sunnis: this is the collection of books in a small city like Najaf; strange how Egypt with its many large libraries is devoid of Shi'a literature! Of course, these people know nothing about the Shi'as, but never hesitate in writing anything about them that they wish. It is even stranger that the fellow Sunni brothers of Iraq living in our neighborhood are unaware of the Shi'as!

Only a few months ago a promising Shi'a boy of Baghdad wrote in a letter that recently he happened to go to Dalyam (just adjacent to the Baghdad district). Most of the people there are Sunnis. The correspondent became intimate with them and attended their assemblies. Since the people of Dalyam were unusually impressed by the excellent behaviour and high morals of the stranger, they warmly welcomed him.

But when they came to know that the person in whom they were taking so much interest was a Shi'a, their wonder had no bounds. "We were under the impression that the people of this sect were deprived of even the smallest light of civilisation and culture - quite wild, totally savage!" Such were their whims and speculations.

At the end of the letter this young boy appealed to my conscience that, through the endeavours of my pen, I should remove the misunderstanding in the minds of such people and introduce a true picture of Shi'aism. After some time the same youth went to Syria to spend the summer there. From there he went to Egypt. From Cairo he wrote another letter, telling me that the condition of Egypt was not different from that of Dalyam. He wrote: "Here also the same views about the Shi'as are common.

So, it is requested that you may perform your duty of informing them of the truth. Believe me, the views that the common people of Islam have formed about the Shi'as are intolerably obnoxious." And this is not all. The false imputations, which are being continuously published in the journals of Egypt, Syria, etc. are no less grievous; those under attack are as innocent as Joseph, but unfortunately ignorance and fanaticism have no remedy.