The Outset of Dissension in Islam — Page 68
68 H A D RAT MIRZA BASHIR-UD-DIN MAHMUD AHMAD “There is no need to hold gatherings for this purpose. Write your complaints and send them to Hadrat ‘ Uthm a n ra. He will appoint another governor and send him here. What is the difficulty in this?” The reason he said this was because in the time of the Khulaf a ’, whenever a complaint would arise against governors, in most cases, they would be replaced out of a concern for the welfare of people. Upon hearing this reply of Qa‘q a ‘, they seemingly dispersed, but continued to conspire in secret. Ultimately, Yaz i d bin Qais, who was the leader of the Sab a’i s in Kufah at the time, sent someone with a letter to Homs and told him to bring back those who had been exiled from Kufah and whose incident has been mentioned earlier. The subject matter of this letter was that the people of Egypt have joined us; as soon as you receive this letter return immediately, without a moments delay. 61 How ironic is it that the people who were demonstrating rage and raising allegations against the Khalifah of the time - the foremost in faith and the son-in-law of the Holy Prophet sa - were those who had themselves abandoned the obligatory prayers. Is it possible that indignation for Islam should only manifest itself within the faithless? If a shortcoming or something in contradiction with the shariah truly existed in Hadrat ‘Uthm a n ra or his governors, then the people who would have expressed their anger against this would have been ‘ Al i , T al h ah, Zubair, Sa’d bin Waqq as , ‘ Abdull a h bin ‘Amr, Us a mah bin Zaid, ‘ Abdull a h bin ‘Abb a s, Ab u M u s a Al-Ash‘ar i , H udhaifah bin 61. T a r i khu t-T abar i , vol. 5, pp. 150-151, Dhikru Mas i ri Mann S a ra Il a Dh i Khashabin Min Ahli Mi s ra. . . . . , Published by D a rul-Fikr, Beirut, 2002 edition [Publishers]