Rafed English
site.site_name : Rafed English

THE TWO . YOUNG souls in their concealed march from Kufa, travelling during nights, lost their way in the desert. Once they were arrested and imprisoned but the pitiful guard of the prison, allowed them to escape and at last they were found by the goodhearted lady, the wife of Harith, who was already in search of the innocents to win the rich reward. The good-hearted lady hid the children in her house and Harith returned late in the night complaining to his wife saying that day and night, he was in search of the children of Muslim but could not find them. The lady asked I Iarith:-

"What will you gain after shedding the blood of the innocents of the House of the Holy Prophet ?"

Harith replied:

"What thou askest me, knowest thou I will get the rich reward- from the Amir?"

The lady kept quiet and Harith went to bed but at midnight the innocents saw their father in a dream telling them:

"Worry not my dear ones! very soon you will meet me!"

Both the children awoke crying:

"Father dear! where art thou? We are wandering as helpless fugitives."

Hearing the cry of the innocents, Harith awoke and asked his wife as to whose cry was that, that came from one of the rooms. The good lady could no longer conceal the fact and the moment Harith came to know of the presence of the innocents in his very house, he jumped with joy and getting into the room dragged those two young souls out of their beds saying:-

"1 killed myself in your search the whole day for you and you are here in my own house."

The brute kept the innocents tied to a post the whole night and at dawn I Iarith took them to the bank of the Euphrates and the good lady accompanid them pleading for them. When Harith wanted to behead them, the children cried to the good lady addressing her as 'Mother dear!' The poor lady was already imploring the brute of her husband not to lay his hands on the helpless innocents. But the heartless brute would not listen to the implorations from the lady. When he raised his sword, the lady ran to intervene and stop the stroke, and got her two hands severed. It is reported that the two innocents prayed to the brute to allow them to offer their last prayers to w hich the brute consented and no sooner the holy souls had finished their supplication to the Lord, then I Iarith wanted to behead them. The elder brother implored saying:

"0' man! listen to me, behead not my younger brother before me for my mother when me parted from her last, handed him over to me. Oblige me thou by beheading me first."

With a stroke of the sword the head of the elder one of the two innocents fell and Harith threw the body into the river, and then turning to the younger one, he did the same. It is said that w hen the first body, i.e., of the elder brother was thrown into the river, the younger one cried to it saying:

"Brother dear! Tarry thou a little, I also come with thee."

It is said that the body of the first innocent floated stationary in the waves of the river until the body of the second one joined it and both floated away together.

Adapted from the book: "Husain; The Saviour of Islam" by: "S.V. Mir Ahmed Ali"