Pain and suffering define the world. Sacrifice can hold pain and suffering in quiescence, to a greater or lesser degree and greater sacrifices can do that more effectively than lesser. The person who wishes to alleviate suffering, who wants to bring about the best of all possible futures, will make the greatest of sacrifices, of everything that is loved, to live a life aimed for the good. He will pursue the path of ultimate meaning.
There are many examples of sacrifices where individuals or group of people gave their lives away for the principles. Socrates, Jesus Christ and Hussain Ibne Ali have inspired the millions.
The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates, after a lifetime of seeking the truth and educating his countrymen, faced a trial and was found guilty. His crime was refusing to recognise the gods acknowledged by the state, and importing strange divinities of his own.
Socrates repeats his claim that formal accusations of corruption and impiety shall not destroy him, but that he shall be harmed by the prejudiced gossip and slanders of his enemies. He tells the court of being unafraid of death, because his true concern is in acting ethically. That people who fear death are showing their ignorance, because death might be a good thing, but that most people fear death as an evil thing, when they cannot possibly know death to be either good or evil. Moreover in a conflict of obedience to such authorities, obeying divine authority supersedes obeying human authority. I am your grateful and devoted servant, but I owe a greater obedience to the God than to you, and, as long as I draw breath and have my faculties, I shall never stop practicing philosophy
In the event, friends, followers, and students encouraged Socrates to flee Athens, action which the citizens expected. Yet, on principle, Socrates refused to flout the law and escape his legal responsibility to Athens. Faithful to his teaching of civic obedience to the law, Socrates executed his death-sentence, and drank the hemlock, as condemned at trial.
Approximately after 400 years history was repeated itself. According to the canonical gospels, Jesus preached in Jerusalem, especially in the Temple Courts.
Some Christians often blame the Jews for the death of Jesus. But this blame should probably be limited to the Jewish religious leaders, who had managed to keep some of their power by cooperating with the Romans. These leaders saw the crowds that gathered around Jesus, and they knew that many people were calling him the Messiah. They feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching. But their ultimate fear probably went deeper, because if growing numbers of people believed that Jesus was the Messiah, he could eventually become a serious threat to their authority.
Karbala’s tragedy is one of the few where men, women and children allowed themselves to be subjected to hunger, thirst and death
These religious leaders initially hesitated to arrest Jesus because they were afraid of the crowd. But at some point they decided that they had to get rid of him. Eventually they were able to seize him late at night when there was no crowd to defend him. After interrogating him until early morning, they turned him over to the Romans and accused him of claiming to be a king. Under Roman law, anyone who claimed to be a king was guilty of rebellion against the emperor. The normal punishment was crucifixion. But the crucifixion couldn’t take place until the Roman governor Pontius Pilate gave the final order for it, and the gospels indicate that he was reluctant to do so. Apparently he realised that Jesus was innocent. Actually, he had the power to release Jesus if he really wanted to. But in his role as governor he often needed the collaboration of the Jewish leaders. And in the end, he was more concerned with placating them than with saving Jesus. Thus the gospels put nearly all of the blame for the crucifixion on the Jewish leaders.
But some scholars think that just as much blame, or even more, should be placed on the Romans. Crucifixion was a Roman method of punishment, and it is a basic fact that Roman soldiers, not Jews, put Jesus on the cross. A compromise view is that, Jewish leaders and Romans, played major roles. There will probably always be disagreement about who should get the most blame. In any case, the crucifixion can be explained as a natural result of the prevailing political circumstances in Palestine.
History has witnessed numerous massacres of innocent people, but after 600 years of Jesus Christ, the people of Arabia had witnessed the tragedy of Karbala. Karbala’s tragedy is one of the few where men, women and children voluntarily allowed themselves to be subjected to hunger, thirst, death and captivity on the burning sands of Karbala because they believed that Hussain Ibne Ali stood for righteousness.
Charles Dickens writes: “If Hussain had fought to quench his worldly desire, then I do not understand why his sister, wife, and children accompanied him. It stands to reason therefore, that he sacrificed purely for Islam.” The day of Ashura introduced even more powerful rule to this world. That right is the might. Now, the blood of the innocent could win over the sword of a tyrant.
Edward G. Brown, the professor of Arabic and Oriental Studies at the University of Cambridge writes: “The day of Ashura is a reminder of the blood-stained field of Karbala, where the grandson of the Apostle of God fell at length, tortured by thirst and surrounded by the bodies of his murdered kinsmen, has been at any time since then sufficient to evoke, even in the most lukewarm and heedless, the deepest emotions, the most frantic grief, and an exaltation of spirit before which pain, danger and death shrink to unconsidered trifles.”
Twenty five hundred years later, human history remembers Socrates’ decision and takes comfort from it. If you cease to utter falsehood and live according to the dictates of your conscience, you can maintain your nobility.
Two thousand years later, Jesus Christ is ruling the hearts of millions of Christians and people from different faiths.
Fourteen hundred years later, Husain Ibne Ali has become the beacon of courage against oppression. Young and old, women, men, children and infants — inseparable despite the hunger, thirst, heat, torture, and death they were subject to — still unyielding, and their hearts and souls with righteousness chose death rather than evil and weakness. Such are the principles that feed and nurture the hearts of Muslims who over the past 1400 years have been reviving the epic of Karbala. His sacrifice is for all groups and communities, an example of the path of righteousness. In order to keep alive justice and truth, instead of an army or weapons, success can be achieved by sacrificing lives.
In Pakistan’s recent history, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto accepted the death plenty without going on his knees; Benazir Bhutto was brutally assassinated just because she was fighting for the restoration of democracy, and under the current situation Mian Nawaz Sharif came back to the country and accepted jail sentence when he had the opportunity to stay abroad. History will decide his fate whether he is guilty or innocent.
These impressions we live by today, are the same as those our ancestors lived by earlier, and those that generations to come will live tomorrow, because these impressions never become antiquated.
The writer is a traveller and freelance writer based in UK. He has previously written for @the nation @Dawncom @Dunya News @The Asians, Twitter @SyedIHusain
Published in Daily Times, October 4th 2018.