Friday Speeches Mosque Zoul-Hijja 20 , 1423h

“An I not more precious to you than your own-selves? This is what the Messenger(p.) said to introduce to the Muslims the Imamate of Ali (a.s.) being a continuation of the Message in the movement of Islam. When they agreed, the Prophet told them: “He of whoever I am the master, Ali is his master” By this, the Messenger was declaring not only the imamate of Ali, but the fact that Ali was linked with an eternal bond to the Messenger, and that the Muslims have to consider him as their master in everything he says, for it comes from a mind that was the mind of the Message; a heart that carried all the humanistic emotions of the message and a life that was wholly dedicated to Allah and His Messenger, leaving nothing for himself throughout.

If we study Allah’s command to His Messenger to complete the religion by conveying what he was told, we would notice that Ali was chosen by God and announced by the Messenger. For, as evident from the Ayat of invocation, it is Ali whom Muhammad considers his soul mate. He is also the Keeper of his knowledge and the man who fought for the cause of Islam as a whole throughout his life. It is he who sold himself to God…

Furthermore, when we study the great heritage that the Imam left us, we would find that his knowledge and understanding of the Islamic message whether spiritually, legally, economically socially or politically has enabled him to set a platform for his rule, that was lacking in the case of those who came before him.

Thus, for those who denied that the Quranic text commanded the Muslims to pledge loyalty to Imam Ali as their caliph, and for those who said that it is a matter of consultation, and suggested two rulers one from each side, we ask: is it possible to pledge loyalty to anyone without knowing what he interns to do?

From there onwards many things went wrong, for they were not based on an agenda so that the Muslims could hold the ruler accountable.

Even the prophet, who was not chosen by the people, used to stand before the Muslims to say: “You can not hold anything against me for I did not make lawful except what the Quran did, and I did not prohibit except what the Quran did”

If this was the example of the Prophet, who was accountable to no one but God, should not we conclude that our rulers should be held accountable by the people?

This problem of rulers not feeling the necessity of presenting their agenda to the people and not feeling that they are responsible before them, further aggravated and became one of the major problems the nation suffers from. The nation became accustomed to supporting the ruler without knowing his agenda and without holding him accountable if he commits mistakes. Thus, the world of Islam become the world of dictatorships where no individual has the right to ask the ruler about what he did or criticize him. We only praise our rulers even if they are not qualified to rule and their only qualification is loyalty to the foreign power that appointed them.

Let us reed what the Imam said about what his agenda to rule and what ruling in Islam is. Let us listen to what he says to the people first and how he then holds himself accountable before God: “ O’ (people of) differing minds and divided hearts, whose bodies are present but wits are absent. I am leading you (amicably) towards truthfulness, but you run away from it like goats and sheep running away from the howling of a lion. How hard it is for me to uncover for you the secrets of justice, or to straighten the curve of truthfulness” … Then he talks to Allah to ease

off the feelings of pain and sorrow he used to feel. For he had big ambitions to lead the people towards the course of justice and right, and they were hardly responsive. They even exhibited ingratitude and a willingness to dissent, although they knew that the man who was talking to them wanted nothing for himself and has always been in the forefront in the entire struggle for Islam, as well as among the first to believe and pray.

“O’ my Allah you know that what we did was not to seek power nor to acquire anything from the vanities of the world. We rather wanted to restore the signs of Thy religion and to usher prosperity into Thy cities so that the oppressed among Thy creatures might be safe and Thy forsaken commands might be established. O’ my Allah! I am the first who leaned (towards Thee) and Who heard and responded (to the call of Islam). No one preceded me in prayer except the Prophet.

You certainly Know that he who is in charge of honor, life, booty,(enforcement of) legal commandment and the leadership of the Muslims should not be a miser as his greed would aim at their wealth, nor be ignorant as he would then mislead them with his ignorance, nor be of rude behavior who would estrange them with his rudeness, nor should he deal unjustly with wealth thus preferring one group over another, nor should be accept a bribe while taking decisions, as he would forfeit (others) rights and hold them up without finality, nor should he ignore sunnah as he would ruin the people.

This is the Imam(a.s.)’s platform… a platform of justice and dedication that sets outs the qualities that any ruler should enjoy. He does not seek to rule, nor cares about any prestige. He feels that it is a duty that Allah has decreed, Had it not been so, it would not have been better than the sneezing of a goat: “Behold, by him who split the grain (to grow) and created living beings, if people had not come to me and supporters had not exhausted the argument and if there had been no pledge of Allah with the learned to the effect that they should not acquiesce in the gluttony of the oppressor and the hunger of the oppressed I would have cast the rope of Caliphate on its own shoulders, and would have given the last one the same treatment as to the first one. Then you would have seen that in my view this world of yours is no better than the sneezing of a goat.

Thus is not to say that Ali was ignorant of the dirty games of politics and how his enemies plotted and practiced covert actions, and ploys, but he was not seeking power. He had a message to deliver and that is why used to say: that is why he insisted and emphasized the need to be truthful and faithful, and never break a promise or an alliance.

The Imam talks about the times to come, and probably our time is one of those times, to say that in these times people will not know Islam and Quran except by name. Their mosques are architecturally well founded, but the souls of those who visit ate devastated. They constitute a favorable environment for persecution, strife and sin.

We have reached these times and we can only ask Allah that He guides us for remain faithful to His message and aware of the teachings of Islam.

To follow the course of Ali is costly, for to love Ali is to fight any injustice, falsehood or persecution.

To love Ali is to follow his course… To become one of his Shiites through our actions and not through our words. In this regard, his grandson Imam Al-Baqir said: “No one will become one of our followers (Shiites) unless he fears Allah and obeys Him. He ought to known by his piety humbleness, truthfulness and trustworthiness”… It is not enough to say I love Ali and not abide by what this love implies. The Messenger is better than Ali and even in the case of the Messenger one has to follow his teachings; the teaching of Islam…” “I swear by Allah that whoever is a friend of Allah is our friend and whoever takes Allah’s as his enemy is our enemy. By Allah our following cannot be attained except by piety”.

Are we going to be true followers of the Imam in ourtime and in all times.

Israel continues to carry out its plan to eradicate the Palestinian women, children, elderly and other civilians alike…

And America justifies these massacres as acts of self-defense. But it does not ask the Israelis to withdraw from the Occupied Lands, which they consider a condition to freeze the Intifada…

As for the American project proposed by the Quartet Committee, it is still being subject of continuous Israeli amendments that render it meaningless… Thus America is now killing the Palestinian people by Israeli hands, and the Arabs do not take any decisive stands that condemns these savage crimes, for many of them are occupied with how to coordinate their steps with the American war that wants to destroy Iraq and its injured people. Furthermore.. They do not take any pressurizing stand against this war while all the nations of the world in both the East and the West have stood against… Although they know quite well that America does not wish to rescue the people of Iraq and rid them from the tyrant it itself imposed on them and prevented them from overthrowing him. It wants to rearrange the region in the way that serves its strategic interests ,to quote the American secretary of state. It also plans to exert pressure on several international powers, to prevent the emergence of any new pole that could counterbalance the American power whether politically or economically.

We believe that this international campaign against the American policy of aggression on the region should grow, especially among the Arab and Muslims peoples who ought to rebel against the agencies that prevent them from expressing freely their rejection of American hegemony that despises the nations and does not respect their opposition to the war that is justified by pretenses no one could be convinced of.

The entire world is asking… If America is sincere, why does not America threaten Israel by stopping its aid if it does not disarm its mass destruction weapons?

To our brothers in the Iraqi opposition we say: A believer does not get bitten by the same animal twice; why do we put our hand where it has been bitten several ties?

What are the guarantees you got from the American officials who supervised your conference?

How do you plan to found an Iraqi popular government with the Americans talking about a military American government?

These are friendly questions that we ask not to score points but to avoid catastrophic results?

To the Arab countries that failed to reach an agreement on how to face the situation politically and security-wise and to the countries of the Islamic conference whose summit will be held on America’s biggest military base in the region, we say: Can you really oppose that American decision or are you just going to say some words that will soon vanish in the air, before even the summits ends.

To the Lebanese we say: The coming situation needs a state that respects itself and plans for the shaking future ahead. This race between politicians and officials over bigger pieces of cake should end. The country can no longer bear your periodical differences and reconciliation that only reconciles between your conflicting interests without taking those of the people into consideration.