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SERMON 217
About the excesses of the Quraysh
O' my Allah! I beseech Thee to take revenge on the Quraysh and those who are
assisting them for they have cut asunder my kinship and over-turned my cup and
have joined together to contest a right to which I was entitled more than anyone
else. They said to me: "If you get your right that will be just but if you are
denied the right that too will be just. Endure it with sadness or kill yourself
in grief." I looked around but found no one to shield me protect me or help me
except the members of my family. I refrained from flinging them into death and
therefore closed my eyes despite the dust kept swallowing saliva despite (the
suffocation of) grief and endured pangs of anger although it was more bitter
than colocynth and more grievous than the bite of knives.
as-Sayyid ar-Radi says: This utterance of Amir al-mu'minin hasalready
appeared in an earlier Sermon (171) but I have repeated it here because of the
difference of versions.
* * * * *
Here by those whom Allah led from darkness into guidance the reference is to the
persons whom Amir al-muيminin was addressing. Ibn Abiيl-Hadid writes in this
connection:
The reference here is not to his own self because he had never been an
unbeliever so as to have accepted Islam after that but in these words he is
referring to those group of people whom he was addressing. (Sharh Nahj
al-balaghah vol. 11 p. 108)
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