The One Who Was Left
On the afternoon of 10 Muharram 61 AH, when the fighting at Karbala ended and every man of Imam Husain’s family and companions lay martyred, there remained one man alive among them — not by accident, but by divine design.
Ali ibn al-Husain (AS) was burning with fever that day. He was approximately 23 years old. He was so ill that he could not stand to fight. He lay in the tent, aware of every death happening outside, unable to do what every instinct told him to do: go out and die with his father and uncles.
When the soldiers came to kill him too, Maulatona Zainab (AS) threw herself over him. “By Allah, you will not kill him while I am alive. If you want to kill him, kill me first.”
The soldiers paused. An order arrived from Umar ibn Sa’d, the general: “Leave the sick one.”
Through this illness — through what seemed at the time like the cruelest stroke of fate — the chain of Imamate was preserved. The 4th Imam lived. Through him, the line continued to the 5th, 6th, 7th Imams, all the way to Imam al-Tayyib (21st Imam) and the Dais who lead the Bohra community today.
The Prophet (SAW) had said: “The Earth will not be without a Hujjat (Proof) of Allah upon it.” On the afternoon of Ashura, with the sky weeping according to tradition, that Hujjat lay ill in a tent — and lived.
His Parentage — East Meets West
Imam Ali Zayn al-Abidin (AS) was born in 38 AH (658 CE) in Medina. His father was Imam Husain ibn Ali (AS) — the 3rd Imam, grandson of the Prophet. His mother was Shahrbanu — a daughter of Yazdegerd III, the last emperor of the Sassanid Persian dynasty.
This parentage is historically extraordinary. The Sassanid Persian Empire was the cultural and political superpower of its era — one of the two world powers alongside Byzantium. When the Muslim armies defeated the Sassanids in 642 CE, they brought captives from the Persian royal family to Medina. Shahrbanu was among them. The tradition holds that she was given in marriage to Imam Husain (AS) by Imam Ali (AS) himself.
The marriage means that Imam Ali Zayn al-Abidin (AS) carries in his lineage:
- From his father’s side: the Arab-Hashimite prophetic line — the Prophet, Ali, Fatema
- From his mother’s side: the Persian royal line — the ancient Sassanid dynasty
In the Fatimid Ismaili tradition, this dual inheritance is understood as a divine confluence: the Imam’s message was always meant to transcend Arab ethnicity and reach all peoples. The meeting of the Arabic prophetic house with the Persian royal house in the person of the 4th Imam is a symbol of the universal reach of the Imamate.
His titles reflect this universality:
- Zayn al-Abidin — the Ornament (or beauty) of the Worshippers
- al-Sajjad — the one who prostrates so much that his forehead became like a camel’s knee
- Dhu al-Thafanat — the owner of calluses (from extended prostration)
- Sayyid al-‘Abidin — the Master of the Worshippers
Karbala to Damascus — The Captive Imam
After the massacre of Karbala, Ali Zayn al-Abidin (AS) was taken captive along with the women and children of the Ahl al-Bayt. He was brought before Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad in Kufa on a camel, bound, with a rope around his neck.
Ibn Ziyad looked at him and asked who he was. When told he was Ali ibn al-Husain, Ibn Ziyad said: “Did Allah not kill Ali ibn al-Husain?” — meaning to mock that the 4th Imam was alive when his father had been killed.
The Imam responded calmly: “I had a brother named Ali [al-Akbar] — the people killed him.”
Ibn Ziyad: “No, Allah killed him.”
The Imam, citing Quran 32:11: “Allah takes souls at the time of their death.”
Ibn Ziyad, frustrated by this calm young man quoting Quran in chains, ordered him killed. At this point Maulatona Zainab (AS) again shielded him — “Kill us both together or leave him.” Ibn Ziyad, disturbed by the dramatic scene unfolding in his court, ordered the Imam left alive.
The captives were then sent to Damascus to face Yazid. Imam Zayn al-Abidin (AS) spoke in Damascus too — though his words are less quoted than his aunt Zainab’s. Yazid asked him who he was. He named himself, his father, his grandfather, going up the chain. Yazid fell silent.
Eventually the captives were released and allowed to return — first to Karbala to mourn, then to Medina.
Return to Medina — Teaching Through Prayer
Imam Zayn al-Abidin (AS) lived the remainder of his life in Medina, under the Umayyad political order that had killed his father. He could not speak openly about the Imamate, about the crimes of Karbala, about the spiritual authority of the Ahl al-Bayt — not without danger.
So he taught in the only way that was safe, the only way that could not be directly controlled: he prayed. He composed prayers.
The collection of his prayers, compiled by his son Muhammad al-Baqir (5th Imam) and others, became the Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya — the Scroll of the Sajjad. It is called in the Islamic tradition Zaboor Aal Muhammad — the Psalms of the family of Muhammad — and is ranked alongside the Quran and the Sermon on the Mount among the great spiritual compositions of history.
The Sahifa contains 54 major prayers (there are also appendixes with additional prayers), addressing:
- Praise of Allah and His attributes
- Blessings upon the Prophet and his family (Salawat)
- Prayer for one’s parents
- Prayer for one’s children
- Prayer for neighbors and friends
- Prayer for the people of the frontier (those defending the community)
- Prayers for repentance, for forgiveness of sins
- Prayer for the approach of Ramadan
- Prayer for Eid al-Fitr
- Prayer for Eid al-Adha
- Prayer for the Day of Arafat
- Prayer when facing difficulty, illness, sorrow
What the Imam did was this: he embedded the entire theology of the Imamate — the relationship between the believer and Allah, mediated through the Prophet and the Imams — into prayers so beautiful, so universal in their human emotion, that even those who rejected the Shia cause could not deny their spiritual depth.
Excerpts from the Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya
From Dua 47 (known as Dua Makarim al-Akhlaq — Prayer for Noble Character):
اللَّهُمَّ صَلِّ عَلَى مُحَمَّدٍ وَآلِهِ وَبَلِّغ بِإِيمَانِي أَكمَلَ الإِيمَانِ وَاجعَل يَقِينِي أَفضَلَ الْيَقِينِ وَانتَهِ بِنِيَّتِي إِلَى أَحسَنِ النِّيَّات وَبِعَمَلِي إِلَى أَحسَنِ الأَعمَال
O Allah, send blessings upon Muhammad and his family, and bring my faith to its most perfect completion, make my certainty the most excellent of certainties, and let my intention reach the best of intentions, and my deeds reach the best of deeds.
From Dua 20 (Prayer upon Honorable Moral Traits):
اللَّهُمَّ فَلَا تَجعَلنِي مِمَّن تُكِبُّهُ الأَطمَاع وَيَقتَادُهُ المَنَى وَلَا تُعَوِّدنِي الذُّلَّ فِي طَلَبِ الرِّزقِ
O Allah, do not make me one whom greed drags down and wishful thinking leads astray, and do not habituate me to abasement in seeking provision.
From Dua 31 (Prayer on Repentance):
إِلَهِي لَو بَكَيتُ إِلَيكَ حَتَّى تَسقُطَ أَشفَارُ عَينَيَّ وَانتَحَبتُ حَتَّى يَنقَطِعَ صَوتِي ثُمَّ وَقَفتُ لَكَ حَتَّى تَتَنَاثَرَ أَقدَامِي
My God, if I were to weep before You until my eyelashes fall out, and wail until my voice breaks, and stand before You until my feet collapse…
These are not abstract theological statements. They are the voice of a man who had witnessed the worst that human beings could do to each other — and who came out not with bitterness or despair, but with an extraordinary capacity for surrender, praise, and supplication.
His Life in Medina — The Generosity
Despite the political constraints of Umayyad rule, Imam Zayn al-Abidin (AS) was widely revered in Medina — even by those who did not share his theology. He was known for his extraordinary generosity: he would carry sacks of flour on his back at night, distributing food to the poor families of Medina anonymously. When he died, people discovered the calluses on his back from carrying these loads, and understood that the mystery benefactor who had fed them for years had been the Imam himself.
He would buy enslaved people, teach them Islam, and free them — hundreds of them during his lifetime. He is sometimes called the liberator (al-Muharrir) for this practice.
His Martyrdom — 25 Muharram, 95 AH
Imam Ali Zayn al-Abidin (AS) died on 25 Muharram, 95 AH (713 CE) in Medina, at approximately 57 years of age. The tradition holds that he was poisoned — either by order of the Umayyad Caliph Walid ibn Abd al-Malik or by the previous Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik.
He is buried in Jannat al-Baqi in Medina — the same graveyard where his great-uncle Imam Hasan (AS) is buried, where the Prophet’s wives and companions are buried, and where multiple Imams found their final resting place. The Wahhabi demolition of 1925 destroyed the physical structures above all these graves, but the ground itself remains sacred.
The 5th Imam in the Tayyibi chain, Muhammad al-Baqir (AS), was his son — who received the Imamate from his father and continued the chain.
His Significance in Bohra Ta’wil and Daily Life
In the Fatimid Ismaili chain, Imam Zayn al-Abidin (AS) is the 4th Imam — and his survival of Karbala is understood not as fortunate happenstance but as divine mercy and planning. Every Imam knows the time of his death and the manner of his transmission of the Imamate. The illness that prevented Ali Zayn al-Abidin from fighting at Karbala was, in the Tayyibi understanding, the protection of the divine plan for the continuation of the haqiqa through the Imam.
The Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya is read in the Bohra community — individual prayers from it are among the most beloved personal supplications a mumin can turn to. The prayer for parents (Dua 24), the prayer for good character (Dua 20), the prayer for the approach of Ramadan — these are living devotional texts, not historical artifacts.
The ziyarat of Imam Zayn al-Abidin (AS) at his grave in Jannat al-Baqi begins:
السَّلَامُ عَلَيكَ يَا زَينَ الْعَابِدِينَ السَّلَامُ عَلَيكَ يَا ابنَ سَيِّدِ الشُّهَدَاء السَّلَامُ عَلَيكَ يَا بنَ فَاطِمَةَ الزَّهرَاء
Peace be upon you, O Ornament of the Worshippers. Peace be upon you, O son of the Master of Martyrs. Peace be upon you, O son of Fatema al-Zahra.
اللَّهُمَّ ارزُقنَا صِفَاتِهِ وَاجعَلنَا مِن الَّذِينَ يَسجُدُونَ لَكَ كَمَا كَانَ يَسجُدُ O Allah, grant us his qualities and make us among those who prostrate to You as he prostrated.