The tenth of Muharram

For three days at Karbala, Yazid's army cut off water to the camp of the Prophet's grandson and his 72 companions. On the tenth of Muharram, 61 AH, they came for them. By evening the whole household lay dead in the sand.

Al-Husayn ibn Ali ibn Abi Talib set out from Mecca for Kufa in early Dhul-Hijjah 60 AH (September 680 CE) at the invitation of the leaders of the city, who had written to him hundreds of letters begging him to come and lead them against the caliphate of Yazid ibn Muawiya. Husayn accepted the invitation. He set out with his household, his wives, his children, his sisters, and a party of about 72 armed companions, most of them relatives.

Yazid, when he heard of Husayn's departure, ordered his governor of Iraq Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad to intercept him. Ubaydullah executed Husayn's cousin Muslim ibn Aqil, whom Husayn had sent ahead to Kufa. He terrorised the city into withdrawing its support. He sent an army of 4,000 under Umar ibn Sa'd to block Husayn's approach.

Umar ibn Sa'd intercepted Husayn's caravan on the plain of Karbala on 2 Muharram 61 AH (2 October 680 CE). He forced Husayn's caravan to halt in a place with no water, well away from the Euphrates. He surrounded them.

Over the following six days, negotiations went back and forth. Husayn refused to pledge allegiance to Yazid. He offered other terms, to return to Mecca, to go to a frontier of the Islamic world, to speak with Yazid directly. Every offer was refused. Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad sent orders from Kufa that Husayn must pledge allegiance to Yazid or be killed.

On 7 Muharram, Umar ibn Sa'd's army cut off water access to Husayn's camp from the Euphrates. For three days, the seventh, the eighth, the ninth of Muharram, Husayn's camp had no water. Women and children were audibly thirsty. Infants could not nurse because their mothers had no milk. Husayn's men tried to reach the river at night; all attempts were driven back.

On the evening of the ninth, Husayn was told by Umar ibn Sa'd's messenger that the attack would come at dawn. Husayn asked for a delay of one night, so his companions might spend it in prayer. Umar granted the delay. Husayn gathered his companions in his tent that night. He asked them to leave under cover of darkness. He told them: my enemy wants me, not you. Take my household and go to safety.

They spent the night in prayer, reciting the Quran, and preparing their weapons. Some sharpened swords. Some slept a little.

Ashura came at dawn. Husayn led the fajr salat. He mounted his father's horse. He rode out toward the enemy line and spoke to them one last time. He reminded them of who he was. He recited his lineage. He asked them: do you know who I am? Do you know I am the grandson of your Prophet? Do you know Allah has forbidden shedding my blood?

Some of the men in Umar ibn Sa'd's army wept. Al-Hurr ibn Yazid al-Riyahi, the commander who had originally intercepted Husayn's caravan, defected to Husayn's side that morning. He was killed later in the day among Husayn's companions. But the rest of the army came on.

The battle lasted from mid-morning to late afternoon. Husayn's 72 companions fought in pairs and small groups, one after another. They were killed one after another. The classical sources preserve their names and their moments. His half-brother al-Abbas ibn Ali, the standard-bearer, tried to bring water back from the Euphrates for the children. He reached the river but the enemy cut off his arms. He held the water-skin in his teeth. They shot him in the neck.

Husayn's teenage son Ali al-Akbar was killed. His nephew Qasim ibn al-Hasan, a boy of thirteen, was killed. His infant son Ali al-Asghar was in Husayn's arms when Husayn raised him toward the enemy and asked for water. An archer shot the infant through the throat. Husayn caught the blood in his palm and threw it toward the sky.

By late afternoon Husayn was alone. He was wounded in dozens of places. He fell from his horse. Shimr ibn Dhil-Jawshan came forward, cut off his head, and displayed it to the army. The women and remaining children of the household were taken as prisoners. The horses of the enemy trampled Husayn's body in the sand.

The women and the surviving son of Husayn, Ali ibn al-Husayn, called Zayn al-Abidin, who had been too ill to fight, were taken as prisoners from Karbala to Kufa to Damascus. Husayn's sister Zaynab, in the court of Yazid in Damascus, delivered what the Arabic tradition preserves as one of the greatest political speeches of Islamic history. She addressed Yazid on his throne with her brother's severed head in front of her. She said, among other things: "O Yazid, do you think that Allah's mercy is far from us because you have killed us? By Allah, our defeat is a victory that the sons of Umayya cannot undo."

Yazid released the survivors. They returned to Medina. The Umayyad caliphate lasted another seventy years, but Yazid's own name has been cursed by every Muslim school of thought for fourteen hundred years.

Ashura is commemorated every year on the tenth of Muharram by every school of Islam. It is the founding scene of Shia self-understanding and the founding statement of Islamic political conscience: hayhata min-adh-dhilla, "far from us is humiliation."

What the story teaches

Karbala is remembered by Muslims for a specific reason. It is the answer to a question that political power always poses: when the caliph is Yazid, when the state is tyrannical, when compliance would be safe and defiance would be fatal, what does the grandson of the Prophet ﷺ do? Husayn's answer, delivered with the whole household of the Prophet at his side, was to refuse the pledge and die on his feet. He knew he would die. He was not tricked into the march. He set out for Kufa with his infant son already dressed for the road, knowing what waited. What he preserved in that death is what the ummah has held onto ever since, the principle that the caliphate is not owed automatic allegiance, that tyranny does not become legitimate by winning, that the honour of the Prophet's household cannot be signed away for the sake of quiet. Every Muslim child today who learns to recite ya Husayn is being taught, whether they know it or not, the founding law of Islamic political conscience: when the state becomes what Yazid became, a Muslim does what Husayn did.