Imam Muhammad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Zayd
Imam Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Zayd
Al-Muʾayyad Billāh — Peace Be Upon Him
He is Imam al-Muʾayyad Billāh Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Zayd ibn ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Sibt ibn ʿAlī — the prayer and peace of God be upon them. He rose up to uphold the Book of God and to revive the obligations of God in the year 199 AH, immediately after the death of Imam Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm. He dispatched the excellent ones of the People of the House and their loyal followers to the farthest reaches of the earth.
Imam al-Murtaḍā li-Dīn Allāh Ibrāhīm ibn Mūsā al-Kāẓim ibn Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq went out to Yemen at his dispatching. Yemen submitted to him after a battle in which — it is reported — fifteen thousand of the ʿAbbāsid armies were killed. For that he was called “the Butcher” (al-Jazzār). He also demolished the dam of al-Khāniq at Ṣaʿdah.
ʿAbbāsid soldiers reported killed in the battle for Yemen, led by Imam al-Murtaḍā Ibrāhīm ibn Mūsā al-Kāẓim on behalf of Imam Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Zayd.
After great battles, al-Maʾmūn captured Imam Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad. Al-Maʾmūn treated him hospitably in his lodging — though it is said that he later poisoned him. He died while in his eighteenth year.
There may be found, in the course of this versified poem, the tanwīn (nunation) of a proper name qualified by “ibn” (son of) which is annexed to another proper name — done for the necessity of the verse. Among the best of poetic licences is the returning of a thing to its origin, as is the case with what is barred from taking nunation normally; for they have said: when a thing departs from its origin, it is returned to it by the slightest occasioning factor.
This is not obscure; we merely intended clarification for whoever found it confusing. It has occurred in the speech of the Arabs and the speech of the Imams, as in the saying:
A maiden from Qays ibn Thaʿlaba —
noble are her maternal uncles and the paternal kinsfolk.
— cited in Al-Mughnī
And as in the saying of Imam Sharaf al-Dīn (peace be upon him):
And Saʿd ibn Muʿādh — the honour is of such a kind that —
at his death the Throne of God, its Builder, quaked.
— Imam Sharaf al-Dīn (Peace Be Upon Him)