Glory be to Allah! By Allah, had a man from Daylam asked you for this, you would have been obliged to grant it.
[Qays ibn al-Ashʿath also said, “Comply with what they have requested of you, for—by my life—(1) they will rouse themselves against you with battle at dawn.”]
And that is exactly what happened. When al-ʿAbbās returned, al-Ḥusayn said to him, “Go back and hold them off for the rest of this evening, so that we may spend the night in prayer to our Lord, calling upon Him and seeking His forgiveness. Allah knows how I love to stand in prayer before Him, to recite His Book, to ask His pardon, and to supplicate Him.”
That night al-Ḥusayn gave his final instructions to his family. At the beginning of the night he addressed his companions: he praised and extolled Allah, invoked blessings upon His Messenger with eloquent, moving words, and then said, “Whoever among you wishes to return to his family this very night—I give him leave, for these people seek only me.”
[Malik ibn al-Naḍr said, “I am burdened with debt and have dependents.” Al-Ḥusayn replied, “Night has enveloped you; take it as your mount (2). Let each of you take the hand of a man from my household, then travel across the open land, under cover of this darkness, to your towns and cities. These people want only me; once they seize me they will abandon the pursuit of anyone else. Go, therefore, until Allah—Exalted is He—grants relief.”
His brothers, his sons, and the sons of his brother answered, “There is no life for us after you, and may Allah never show us anything we would loathe concerning you.”
Al-Ḥusayn said, “O sons of ʿAqīl! The loss of your brother Muslim is enough for you; go, for I give you leave.”
They replied, “What will people say of us—that we abandoned our elder, our leader, and our cousins, the best of uncles, without loosing an arrow, thrusting a spear, or striking a sword on their behalf, simply out of desire for this worldly life? Never, by Allah! Instead, we ransom you with our lives, our wealth, and our families; we shall fight alongside you until we meet your fate. May Allah curse life after you.”
Muslim ibn ʿAwsajah al-Asadī spoke in like fashion, as did Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd Allah al-Ḥanafī, who said, “By Allah, we will not forsake you until Allah knows that we have safeguarded, in your person, the trust of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. By Allah, if I knew that I would be slain for you a thousand times, and that Allah would thereby avert death from you and from these young men of your Household, I would welcome it—so how could I hesitate when it is but a single death!”
Many of his companions expressed the same sentiment, saying, “By Allah, we will not leave you; our lives are ransom for you. We shall shield you with our throats, our foreheads, our hands, and our bodies. If we are killed, we will have fulfilled our duty.” (3)]
His brother al-ʿAbbās said, “May Allah never show us the day of your loss; we have no desire for life after you.” One after another, his companions echoed the same resolve.
Abū Mikhnaf relates: Ḥārith ibn Kaʿb and Abū al-Ḍaḥḥāk told me on the authority of ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn: “I was sitting on that evening whose dawn would witness my father’s death, while my aunt Zaynab was nursing me. My father had withdrawn to his tent with his companions, and with him was Ḥuwayy, the freedman of Abū Dharr al-Ghifārī, repairing my father’s sword, while my father kept saying:”