Nasb-and-the-Nawasib

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• Muḥammad ibn al-Qāsim al-Asadī ( Maʿrifah al-Thiqāt 2/250)
• Mughīrah ibn Miqsam al-Ḍabbī ( Maʿrifah al-Thiqāt 2/293)
• Abū Ḥuṣayn ʿUthmān ibn ʿĀṣim ( al-ʿIbar fī Akhbār man Ghabar 1/167)
• Abū al-Rawā al-Dawsī ( al-Ṭabaqāt al-Kubrā 4/341).
However it is important to note that none of these people and their like have been accused of Naṣb
besides ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shaqīq due to him denigrating ʿAlī I, as will come. This clearly suggests that
what is meant when dubbing them ʿUthmānī is merely giving ʿUthmān I preference over ʿAlī I.
The second usage concerned those who exceeded the extent of merely giving preference to ʿUthmān
I over ʿAlī I to becoming disillusioned with him and using unsavoury language regarding him,
but without impugning his Dīn and exaggerating regarding the Umayyads. It has been used with this
meaning, for example, regarding Mughīrah ibn Miqsam al-Ḍabbī; al-Dhahabī mentions the following
in his biography in Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ 6/12, “He was a ʿUthmānī who to some extent despised ʿAlī
I.” The same has been said regarding ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shaqīq al-ʿUqaylī, for we find the following
regarding him in Tārīkh Madīnah Dimashq 29/161, “He was a ʿUthmānī who would undermine ʿAlī
I.” In Mīzān al-Iʿtidāl 4/120 the following appears regarding him, “A reliable narrator who despised
ʿAlī I.” In Maʿrifat al-Thiqāt 2/37 of al-ʿIjlī the following appears, “A Baṣrī scholar who despised ʿAlī
I.” For more details see: Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ 3/39.
Furthermore, regarding some of them al-Dhahabī and Ibn Ḥajr state that ‘he has a tendency of Naṣb’.
And at times the biographers would overstate their status and say that ‘he was a Nāṣibī’. Hence we
find that ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shaqīq al-ʿUqaylī is described differently in difference sources; he is described
as a ʿUthmānī in al-Ṭabaqāt al-Kubrā 7/126 and Tārīkh Madīnah Dimashq 29/161, as one who would
despise ʿAlī I in Maʿrifah al-Thiqāt 2/37, as a person who had Naṣb leanings in Mīzān al-Iʿtidāl 4/120,
as a Nāṣibī in al-Mughnī fī al-Ḍuʿafāʾ 1/342, and as one with Naṣb leanings in Taqrīb al-Tahdhīb p. 307.
The third usage concerned those who openly proclaimed hatred for ʿAlī I and exaggerated in
extolling the Banū Umayyah.
From amongst these people was Shimar ibn Dhū al-Jawshan. Abū Isḥāq has said the following regarding
him, “Shimar ibn Dhī al-Jawshan would perform the Fajr prayer with us, whereafter he would sit till
sunrise, perform Ṣalāh and supplicate thus, “O Allah you are noble and you love nobility, You know
that I am noble so forgive me.” Abū Isḥāq says, “I said to him, “How will Allah E forgive you when
you came out and helped in the assassination of the grandson of Rasūl Allah H?” He said, “What
could we do? Our leaders ordered us and we could not oppose them, and if we opposed them we would
be worse than these water donkeys.” See: al-Ishrāf fī Manāzil al-Ashrāf 1/140; Lisān al-Mīzān 3/152.
Ḥajjāj ibn Yūsuf al-Thaqafī falls under this category as well. Ibn Kathīr has said the following regarding
him in al-Bidāyah wa al-Nihāyah 9/131, “He was an ʿUthmānī and Umawī who was very drawn toward
them; he would consider opposing them to be disbelief and would due to that consider shedding
blood to be permissible. No reprimand would come in the way of him doing so.”
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