with a love grounded in Islam, and do not love us with the adoration shown to idols; your attachment to us has persisted until it has become a blemish upon us. (1)

Al-Aṣmaʿī said: Ḥusayn left no surviving offspring—meaning, none of his children remained—except through his son ʿAlī. Likewise, ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn had no children except by Umm ʿAbd Allāh bint al-Ḥasan, his cousin. Marwān said to him, “I can see that your father’s line has been cut off. Were you to take some concubines, perhaps Allah would grant you children through them.” He replied, “I have nothing with which to purchase them.” Marwān said, “Then I will lend you the money.” So he advanced him one hundred thousand, after which ʿAlī acquired concubines and several children were born to him. When Marwān lay dying he instructed that this sum not be reclaimed from ʿAlī. (2)

Its chain of transmission is broken, and Marwān did not actually reach his deathbed in that manner, for his wife and her maidservants smothered him beneath a pillow.

Abū Bakr ibn al-Barqī (3) said: All of Ḥusayn’s descendants come through his son ʿAlī al-Aṣghar, who was the foremost man of his age.

It is also said that Quraysh, having previously disdained slave-concubines who bore children, came to value them after the likes of ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn, al-Qāsim ibn Muḥammad, and Sālim ibn ʿAbd Allāh were raised by such mothers. (4)

Al-ʿIjlī said: ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn was a Madinan Successor, reliable in transmission.

Abū Dāwūd said: ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn did not hear hadith from ʿĀʾishah. I heard Aḥmad ibn Ṣāliḥ say, “His age and al-Zuhrī’s age were the same.” I (the author) say: Ibn Ṣāliḥ was mistaken; ʿAlī was many years older than al-Zuhrī.