Imam Nasir Al Atrush (D. 304AH)
Imam al-Nāṣir li-l-Ḥaqq al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī al-Uṭrūsh
The Helper of the Truth — Peace Be Upon Him
He is Imam al-Nāṣir li-l-Ḥaqq, Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿUmar al-Ashraf ibn ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (may God be pleased with them) — called al-Uṭrūsh.
From his grandfather the Prophet ﷺ, that he said to ʿAlī:
“O ʿAlī, there will be among your children a man called Zayd the Wronged; he will come on the Day of Resurrection with his companions upon noble steeds of light, crossing over the heads of all creation like flashing lightning, and behind them — following in their footsteps — a man called Nāṣir al-Ḥaqq, until they halt at the gate of Paradise.”
— The Messenger of God ﷺ
The Commander of the Faithful ʿAlī (peace be upon him) also announced news of him in his sermon at Kufa and his sermon at Nahrawān.
Imam Abū Ṭālib said: He (peace be upon him) was tall of stature, inclining toward a brown complexion, and he had a deafness resulting from a blow — hence the epithet al-Uṭrūsh: the deaf one.
His rising was in the year 284 AH. He called people to the worship of God among the Jīl and the Daylam, and God granted victory at his hands.
Polytheists who embraced Islam at his hands — a million souls brought into the faith, whom he then taught the principles of Islam.
Imam al-Manṣūr Billāh (peace be upon him) said in Al-Shāfī:2
“He used to come forward between the two battle lines, girded with his Qurʾān and his sword, saying: ‘I am the son of the Messenger of God, and this is the Book of God; so whoever responds to this — well and good; otherwise, then this.'”
— Imam al-Manṣūr Billāh, in Al-Shāfī (1/858)
The allies and the opponents both agreed that he is among the Imams of guidance who upheld equity. Muḥammad ibn Jarīr al-Ṭabarī said in his history:3 “The people had not seen the like of the justice of al-Uṭrūsh, the excellence of his conduct, and his establishment of the truth.”
Ibn Ḥazm said: “This al-Uṭrūsh was excellent, of good doctrine, just in his rulings; he governed Ṭabaristān.”
Soldiers of misguidance killed in a single battle at Nūrūd on the seashore — between those slain by the sword and those drowned in the sea.4
One of the enemies made for him while he was alone and had no weapon. He took hold of part of a great rock, and God softened it for him. The place of his noble hand there is sought as a blessing through its trace.
One of the kings set out toward him to make war. His companions busied themselves with that. He came out to them one day and said: “You have been spared the matter of the man; I have dispatched against him an army.” They said: “And when did you send them?” He said: “Last night I prayed two rakʿas, then I supplicated to God against him.” Then the report came that God had destroyed him. His miracles are many and famous.
It is said that the writings of Imam al-Nāṣir exceed three hundred. Among them:
- Kitāb al-Bisāṭ
- Al-Mughnī
- Kitāb al-Musfir
- Al-Ṣafī
- Kitāb al-Bāhir — compiled by some scholars of his age according to his doctrine
- Kitāb Alfāẓ al-Nāṣir — arranged by a contemporary scholar who attended his teaching session and wrote down his utterances; contains of the various sciences what dazzles the minds
- Kitāb al-Tafsīr — comprising a thousand verses of poetry from a thousand odes
- Kitāb al-Imāma
- Kitāb al-Amālī — much excellent material on the merits of the People of the House
- And many others — total exceeds three hundred works
On the authority of ʿAlī ibn Jaʿfar, from his brother Mūsā ibn Jaʿfar, from his father Jaʿfar ibn Muḥammad, who said: The Messenger of God ﷺ said:
“Whoever performs his ablution fully, performs his prayer well, pays the alms of his wealth, guards his tongue, restrains his anger, and renders sincere counsel to the People of the House of his Prophet, has perfected the realities of faith, and the gates of Paradise are flung open for him.”5
In refuting the Mujbira (the predestinarians) concerning the saying of God Most High: “And they harm none thereby except by God’s permission (idhn)” [al-Baqara: 102] — he said: They and their predecessors were only afflicted by way of their non-Arab accent and the paucity of their acquaintance with the Arabic language.6 He then proceeded with the discussion in clarifying the meanings of that in the language, the gist of which is that al-idhn in the language of the Arabs is used in three aspects: command (al-amr), knowledge (al-ʿilm), and leaving free (al-takhliya).
The Author notes: we bring forth the like of this only as an alert to what lies beyond it; otherwise, it is nothing but a sip from an ocean.
He died at Āmul, on the night of Thursday with five nights remaining of Shaʿbān in the year 304 AH. His soul departed (peace be upon him) while he was prostrating — and he was seventy-four years of age. On the night in which he died, a radiant light was observed from the house in which he was, extending to the vault of the sky.
Imam Abū Ṭālib (peace be upon him) said: He used to urge the people to support al-Hādī Yaḥyā ibn al-Ḥusayn, saying: “Whoever is able to support him and is near him, his support of him is obligatory upon him; and whoever is able to support me and is near me, let him support me.”
His shrine is at Āmul in Ṭabaristān. Concerning his shrine and the shrine of Imam al-Hādī ilā al-Ḥaqq, it has been said:
Turn aside to a grave at Ṣaʿda — and weep for one entombed at Āmul;
And know that whoever takes the two of them as his guide —
will attain wherever he hopes.
More exalted than this is the saying of the Messenger ﷺ, as Imam Abū Ṭālib related:7
“Whoever visits a grave from among our graves — we the People of the House — then dies in the same year in which he visited, God will appoint over his grave seventy angels who will glorify God for him until the Day of Resurrection.”
— The Messenger of God ﷺ, related by Imam Abū Ṭālib
- Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī the litterateur and poet
- Abū al-Qāsim Jaʿfar
- Abū al-Ḥusayn Aḥmad
Scholarly References & Annotations
Al-ṭarash (with vowels): the mildest form of deafness; and al-uṭrūsh: the deaf one — resulting in his case from a blow.
Kitāb al-Shāfī by Imam al-Manṣūr Billāh (peace be upon him), (1/858), Maktabat Ahl al-Bayt edition.
Tārīkh al-Ṭabarī (8/257).
Imam al-Manṣūr Billāh ʿAbdullāh ibn Ḥamzah (peace be upon him) said in Al-Shāfī (1/857): Al-Nāṣir advanced with his armies from the Jīl and the Daylam — who did not have of the implements of war what the Khurāsānians had — and they met at a place between Wāriq and Shālūs known as Nūrūd on the seashore. He struck at the Khurāsānians and God granted him victory; they fled in the foulest rout and were killed in the worst killing. The number of those killed reached twenty thousand — between those slain by the weapon and those drowned in the sea: when they stood firm, the weapon took them, and when they fled, they drowned.
Al-Bisāṭ 22; Al-Intiṣār ʿalā ʿUlamāʾ al-Amṣār (1/203); Hidāyat al-Rāghibīn ilā Madhhab al-ʿItra al-Ṭāhirīn 132; Al-Thamar al-Mujtanāt 90.
Al-alkan: one who does not articulate Arabic properly because of the foreignness of his tongue. The Mujbira held that idhn means divine will (irāda) and volition (mashīʾa); the aspect of the Imam’s reply is his establishment of its three meanings in Arabic — command, knowledge, and leaving free — of which the soundest applicable meaning is knowledge or leaving free — noted by the Author (peace be upon him).
Amālī Abī Ṭālib, Eighth Chapter, p. 86, Maktabat al-Ḥayāt edition; Kitāb al-Shāfī by Imam ʿAbdullāh ibn Ḥamzah (peace be upon him), (1/159, 160), Maktabat Ahl al-Bayt edition; Sharḥ al-Risāla al-Nāṣiḥa 355.