هذا الحسين وهذه أنواره

فاحت على زواره أعطاره

هذا الحسين وهذه أنواره

لاحت على زواره أسراره

الشيخ صالح الجعفري -

Today, I saw the face of sayyidna Abu Bakr al-Siddique, and I saw sayyidna Umar wrapped in a cloak, sayyidna Ali riding a horse with sword in hand, and sayyidna the prophet Solomon, may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon them all, and endless praise and thanks to Allah for allowing me to see their faces. But before I get to explaining how this happened, and no it wasn’t in a dream or vision, and you will see them too inshaAllah, let me begin my story from its very beginning, and tell its details just how I heard them from my closest relatives, and show you what I saw, all in its proper order.

Our story begins with the battle, or massacre, of Karbalaa, in which the small force led by the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson al-Husayn was defeated by the Umayyad army of the caliph Yazid, to whom al-Husayn’s severed head was brought to see, before it was buried in Damascus. At this point, his sister the sayyida Zaynab and others of his family left to settle for Egypt. Some of the Prophet’s descendants were even hunted and killed there by Umayyad agents, and we’ll get to two of them soon. When the Shiite Fatimids took control of Egypt and Palestine, they brought the head of al-Husayn to Cairo, as well as the bodies of other Ahlul Bayt, descendants of the Prophet, peace be upon him.

I wrote about most the Ahlul Bayt that are buried in Egypt earlier , describing all the most famous ones and my visits to them, but I left out one very important descendant, Al-Hasan al-Anwar (the most radiant), because I had not visited him that day. Who is al-Hasan al-Anwar? He is the son of Zaid al-Ablaj, son of al-Hasan, son of Fatima al-Zahraa, daughter of the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon them all. His daughter is al-sayyida Nafeesa, one of the most famous and beloved of the Ahlul Bayt in Cairo, and I talked about her in my above-mentioned post.

I have a relative here in Cairo, who has taken the Khaliliyya Tariqa, and visits all the Ahlul Bayt here regularly. One day, a structure in the building that houses the tomb of al-Hasan al-Anwar collapsed, and as soon as this relative heard that reconstruction was being carried out there, he rushed into the reconstruction site, found his way inside the building, and filled a plastic bag with sand from deep under the ground, meters below the surface, around the tomb. He took this sand home and until now he has it, and years since, it still possesses the most powerful and beautiful scent, the same scent that covered the streets of that area when the building collapsed. He also has a stone from when the marbling at sayyidna al-Husayn’s tomb was being changed, and its scent is different from the one of al-Hasan al-Anwar.

This was years ago, but now we come to something new, something amazing. The headquarters of the above-mentioned Khaliliyya Tariqa are in a city called Zagazig, about 1.5 hrs away from Cairo. One of the shaykhs of the order, being the son of the founder Abu Khalil, used to always point at a certain house in the city on his way to the mosque and say, “many blessings will appear from this house, many blessings will appear from this house.”

That house, to which he pointed, belonged to a local government official. Two and a half years ago, this man saw, in a waking vision, a man appear to him and say, “I am Yahya al-Mutawwaj (the Crowned) son of al-Hasan al-Anwar, son of Zaid al-Ablaj, son of al-Hasan, son of Fatima al-Zahraa, wife of Ali ibn Abi Talib and daughter of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), and I am buried beneath your house”. This Yahya is known as “al-Mutawwaj bil Anwar al-Muhammadiyya“, Yahya “who is crowned by Muhammadan lights”. He and his daughter, Zaynab al-Jawhara (the Jewel), were killed by Umayyad agents, and their tombs had never been discovered.

Yahya told the owner of the house to dig him out and give him a proper burial, so he and his family dug in their house for more than a year until they found him six meters underground, his body as fresh as the day it was buried more than a thousand years ago, producing a most beautiful scent. They took it out, they prayed the funeral prayer over it, and re-buried it properly. Then the owner of the house, undertook under his own expense, to make that room in which he was buried more befitting of its inhabitant, by building a beautiful white dome over it, and covering the walls with white marble, in order to honor the person buried there.

One day he woke up, only to find that many forms have formed all over the marbles on his walls- the lines and spots on the marble had formed well-defined images- there was a 3-dimensional Kaaba, the name “Muhammad” in ancient Kufic script, and many human figures. Yahya al-Mutawwaj appeared to him again and explained to him who every person was- there was Abu Bakr, Umar, Ali, the Prophet Solomon, Nafeesa, al-Husayn, and many others, and he pointed at one large figure and said, “this is Zaynab al-Jawhara, my daughter, and she is also buried under your house” but as he did not give him permission to dig her out, they have left her alone; they await permission, or idhn, to dig her out and bury her, and many people have requested to be there when the permission comes.

Zaynab al-Jawhara appears, however, when dhikr is done at the house, and can be seen by all.

Then my relative’s two daughters went to Zagazig and visited the house. They recognized the powerful scent there instantly- it was identical to the scent from the sand of the tomb of al-Hasan al-Anwar, Yahya’s father. And there was no perfume used in that place, and no incense, but this same powerful smell has covered that house ever since they dug up the body.

They brought me back pictures of all the images taken, with their cellphones, from the marble walls- and they are absolutely clear. There was the face of Abu Bakr al-Siddique, looking straight at you, and there was the figure of Umar ibn al-Khattab, sitting, wrapped in a cloak. There was Ali ibn Abi Talib, riding a horse, and the Prophet Solomon, wearing a very long turban and holding the staff mentioned in the Qur’an. There is sayyida Nafeesa and sayyida Zaynab bint Ali, facing each other, with their faces veiled except their eyes. And there was Zaynab al-Jawhara, in a very large image, but curiously her head is not covered, and her hair is arranged as if she was a bride. I saw these myself, and I intend to post them here once I am able to send them from the phone to my computer, so you can see them for yourselves.

Al-Jazeera also sent reporters there, and they said they would like to bring in a German expert to analyze the images. The owner of the house said, “bring your expert, and bring someone to try to wash out the images, and if they wash out in any way, or if your expert says they’re false, feel free to hang me! I have nothing to gain from this, and have spent a large share of my fortune on fixing this place to suit those resting in it.”

And so Allah has chosen to reveal new signs to His servants. May Allah whelm His greatest sign, His messenger Muhammad, with peace and blessings, and likewise whelm his pure family, wives, descendants, and companions.

And may He allow me to visit this crowned son of the Prophet and his jewel of a daughter, but until then I offer them this humble gift:

هذا المتوج قد لاحت أسراره

من النبي محمدٍ أنواره

من صلبه الجوهرةُ المصونةُ

لكل عاشقٍ هناك تظهرُ

هذا المتوج قد لاحت أسراره

فاحت على زواره أعطاره