Al-Muzaffar said...

Al-Muzaffar said: “It means that both of them are the best and most superior of whoever died young on the Path of Allah among the inhabitants of Paradise. He (the Prophet) did not intend by it the age of youth, because both of them died at elderly ages ... Or both of them are sayyids of the people of Paradise except the prophets and the khulafa al-rashidin .

And this is because the people of Paradise will all be of the same age, and that is youth, and there will not be any old or elderly person among them.” Al-Tayyibi said, “It is possible the intended meaning is that both of them (i.e. al-Hasan and al-Husayn) were at that moment sayyids of those youth who were from the people of Paradise from that era.”[^12] All these acrobatics are obviously aimed at propping up Abu Bakr and ‘Umar.

Shaykh Ibn Taymiyyah explains why: فقال بل نبايعك أنت فأنت سيدنا وخيرنا وأحبنا إلى رسول الله صلى الله عليه و سلم ليبين بذلك أن المأمور به تولية الأفضل وأنت أفضلنا فنبايعك So, he (‘Umar) said, “Rather, we will follow you because you are our sayyid .... He wanted to make clear through it that: What is ORDAINED is to give authority to the best , and you are the best of us.

So, we will follow you.[^13] In simpler words, if it were confirmed that both al-Hasan and al-Husayn were superior to Abu Bakr, then the latter’s khilafah would be illegitimate! It was, and is always, obligatory in the religion of Muhammad to give authority and leadership to the best only . The direct implication of this is that khilafah was the exclusive right of Amir al-Muminin, after the Messenger of Allah. After all, he was, and still is, the sayyid of all Muslims after their Prophet.

Meanwhile, do the Sunni acrobatics really help their cause? There is a Sunni-only version of the riwayah , which puts a complete end to the debate. ‘Allamah al-Albani copies this hadith : الحسن والحسين سيدا شباب أهل الجنة إلا ابني الخالة عيسى بن مريم ويحيى بن زكريا وفاطمة سيدة نساء أهل الجنة إلا ما كان من مريم بنت عمران Al-Hasan and al-Husayn are the two sayyids of the people of Paradise, except the two maternal cousins: ‘Isa b. Maryam and Yahya b. Zakariyah .

And Fatimah is the sayyidah of the women of the people of Paradise except Maryam bint ‘Imran.[^14] The ‘Allamah says: صحيح Sahih ^15 So, after the Messenger of Allah and Amir al-Muminin, the only other creatures who will not be under the superiority of al-Hasan and al-Husayn in Paradise are Prophet ‘Isa, ‘alaihi al-salam , and Prophet Yahya, ‘alaihi al-salam .