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So glaring a mismanagement of national affairs emboldened the clerical order, whose members were now hurling with malignant zeal anathemas from their pulpits, and were vociferously inciting superstitious congregations to take up arms against the upholders of a much hated creed, to insult the honor of their women folk, to plunder their property and harass and injure their children. "What of the signs and prodigies," they thundered before countless assemblies, "that must needs usher in the advent of the Qa'im? What of the Major and Minor Occultations? What of the cities of Jabulqa and Jabulsa? How are we to explain the sayings of Husayn- ibn- Ruh, and what interpretation should be given to the authenticated traditions ascribed to Ibn- i- Mihriyar? Where are the Men of the Unseen, who are to traverse, in a week, the whole surface of the earth? What of the conquest of the East and West which the Qa'im is to effect on His appearance? Where is the one- eyed Anti- Christ and the ass on which he is to mount? What of Sufyan and his dominion?" "Are we," they noisily remonstrated, "are we to account as a dead letter the indubitable, the unnumbered traditions of our holy Imams, or are we to extinguish with fire and sword this brazen heresy that has dared to lift its head in our land?" (36:1) To these defamations, threats and protestations the learned and resolute champions of a misrepresented Faith, following the example of their Leader, opposed unhesitatingly treatises, commentaries and refutations, assiduously written, cogent in their argument, replete with testimonies, lucid, eloquent and convincing, affirming their belief in the Prophethood of Muhammad, in the legitimacy of the Imams, in the spiritual sovereignty of the Sahibu'z- Zaman (the Lord of the Age), interpreting in a masterly fashion the obscure, the designedly allegorical and abstruse traditions, verses and prophecies in the Islamic holy Writ, and adducing, in support of their contention, the meekness and apparent helplessness of the Imam Husayn who, despite his defeat, his discomfiture and ignominious martyrdom, had been hailed by their antagonists as the very embodiment and the matchless symbol of God's all- conquering sovereignty and power.
(36:2)
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