And to imagine that this word serves the purpose of...

And to imagine that this word serves the purpose of expressing all individuals is completely irrelevant because the sentence لا تصل على أحد is sufficient for such inclusion and purpose and there is no need to mention it once again.

Moreover, the word ابدا in Arabic refers to time and not individuals such as: ولا أن تنكحوا ازواجه مِن بعده أبداً “Nor that you should marry his wives after him ever;… (Ahzab 33:53)” Therefore the essence of the first sentence is: Never seek forgiveness and mercy for anyone of the hypocrites whether at the time of reciting salat or otherwise.

And now we will discuss the second sentence: ولا تقُم على قبره The meaning of this sentence in connection with the previous sentence is as such: ولا تقُم على قبر أحدا منهم أبداً Because the adverbs which are present in معطوف عليه are also applicable for معطوف.

Therefore it cannot be said that qiyam (standing) refers to the qiyam at the time of burial because it is presumed that qiyam at the time of burial for each one is not subject to repetition and the word ابدا too is commendable in this sentence which shows that this action is worthy of repetition. The reply to the supposition that this word is applicable for all individuals was given in the previous sentence since with the presence of احد it is needless to express that once again.

By paying attention to these two points in the words لا تصل and لا تقم one can say: God has prohibited the Holy Prophet (s) from seeking any kind of mercy for the hypocrites whether by means of reciting salat upon the dead body or merely by means of du'a and from any kind of standing over their graves whether at the time of burial or after the burial. This means that these two actions i.e.

‘seeking forgiveness’ and ‘standing’ is permissible and worthy for the grave of a believer in all the instances and one of such instances is standing for ziyarat and recitation of Qur’an for a believer who has been buried there for years. Now we shall discuss the virtue and excellence of ziyarat of graves from the viewpoint of traditions.

Traditions and ziyarat of Graves From the Islamic traditions which the authors of Sihah and Sunan have narrated, we derive the conclusion that the Holy Prophet (s) had prohibited, due to a temporary reason, the ziyarat of graves and later on allowed the people to make haste for ziyarat .