Nasb-and-the-Nawasib

O Amīr al-Muʾminīn! Allah has continued to shower his favours upon the
household of Amīr al-Muʾminīn and has always supported his oppressed
Khalīfah. They have continued to curse Abū Turāb in these holy places and
Amīr al-Muʾminīn should also curse him in these holy places. 1
All of this had caused some of the scholars to exercise caution and not mention
the name of ʿAlī I explicitly in the aspects of knowledge which they narrated
to the Khulafāʾ, i.e. due to them knowing how severely disillusioned they were
with him.
Al-Amīr al-Ṣanʿānī 2 states:
وقد روي أن رواة الحديث وأهل العلم في بعض أيام بني أمية-‏ وهي أيام عبد الملك وولته كالحجاج
وبعض بلدانهم-‏ كانوا ل يقدرون على إظهار الرواية عن علي رضي الله عنه لشدة عدوانهم له ولمن ذكره
It has been reported that some transmitters of ḥadīth and people of
knowledge, during a time in the era of the Umayyads (the time of ʿAbd
al-Malik ibn Marwān and some of governors like Ḥajjāj), did not have
the courage to explicitly narrate the narrations of ʿAlī I, due to their
immense acrimony for him and for whoever he mentioned. 3
What al-Ṣanʿānī has mentioned was not specific to the era of ʿAbd al-Malik.
Rather it continued during the rule of many others besides him, intensifying and
1 Tārīkh al-Ṭabarī 4/118; al-Kāmil fī al-Tārīkh 4/374; al-Bidāyah wa al-Nihāyah 9/224. The rest of the
narration states that Hishām was disturbed by what he said and told him, “We have not come to revile
anyone or curse him. We have merely come to perform Ḥajj.”
2 Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl ibn Ṣalāḥ ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥasanī, Abū Ibrāhīm al-Ṣanʿānī. A great
Mujtahid and a prolific author. He belonged to his Imāmah household in Yemen. His was born in
Kaḥlān in 1099 A.H. and was known, just like his predecessors, as ‘al-Amīr’. He suffered various trials
at the hands of the fanatics and the laity due to him opposing the norm and approbating what was
supported by evidence. He passed away in Ṣanʿāʾ in 1182 A.H. Some of his books are: Subul al-Salām,
Tawḍīḥ al-Afkār, Irshād al-Nuqqād ilā Taysīr al-Ijtihād. See: al-Badr al-Ṭāliʿ 2/133; al-Aʿlām 6/38; Muʿjam
al-Muʾallifīn 9/56.
3 Tawḍīḥ al-Afkār 1/369.
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