Today is Tuesday; 1st of the Iranian month of Tir 1400 solar hijri; corresponding to 11th of the Islamic month of Zil-Qa’dah 1442 lunar hijri; and June 22, 2021, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
2238 solar years ago, on this day in 217 BC, the seesaw Battle of Raphia took place in what is now Gaza, Palestine, in which Ptolemy IV Philopator of Egypt defeated Antiochus III the Great of the Seleucid Empire that spanned Iraq, Iran and parts of Turkey. It was fought near modern Rafah as one of the largest battles between the two Hellenistic kingdoms, the successor states of Alexander of Macedon’s short-lived empire, for control of Syria, and hence known as the Syrian Wars of the ancient world. Ptolemy had 70,000 infantry, 5,000 cavalry, and 73 African war elephants, while Antiochus had 62,000 infantry, 6,000 cavalry, and 102 Asian war elephants. This is the only known battle in which African and Asian elephants were used against each other, and Ptolemy’s elephants which were from what is now Eritrea could not bear the smell, sound and view of their Indian counterparts as well as their greater size and strength and caused panic in their own ranks, before the Egyptian cavalry moved in to defeat the Seleucids. Ptolemy’s victory secured Syria for Egypt, but it was only a respite, since at the Battle of Panium in 198 BC Antiochus defeated the army of Ptolemy’s young son, Ptolemy V Epiphanes and recaptured Syria and Judea.
1294 lunar years ago, on this day in 148 AH, Imam Reza (AS), the 8th Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), was born in Medina, two weeks after the martyrdom of his grandfather, Imam Ja’far as-Sadeq (AS). His father was Imam Musa al-Kazem (AS) and his mother was the pious lady, Najma. At the age of 35 the mantle of divinely-decreed leadership came to rest on his shoulders following martyrdom in Baghdad of his infallible father in the year 183 AH. For the next 17 years he ably guided the ummah from his base in Medina, which alarmed Mamoun, the 7th self-styled caliph of the usurper Abbasid regime, who forced him to come to distant Khorasan where the city of Merv (currently in Turkmenistan) was his capital. Here the Imam’s name was forcibly announced as Heir Apparent although Mamoun was twenty years his junior. The plan was to confine the Imam to the court and thereby drive a wedge between him and the ummah. However, to the bewilderment of the caliph, when the Imam’s popularity increased, he had him martyred treacherously through a fatal dose of poison in 203 AH at the age of 55. Imam Reza (AS) was laid to rest in the suburbs of the city of Tous, which soon grew into “Mashhad-ar-Reza” or simply Mashhad, meaning the Martyrdom Place of Imam Reza (AS), and is a world famous centre of pilgrimage today.
1105 solar years ago, on this day in 916 AD, Amir Saif od-Dowla, the Hamdanid ruler of Aleppo and most of Syria, was born. Named Ali, he was the son of Abu’l-Hayja Abdullah bin Hamdan, and was a staunch follower of the Prophet’s Ahl al-Bayt. He was the younger brother of Nasser od-Dowla the Amir of Mosul. He distinguished himself in battles against the Byzantines and could be called the Warden of the Marches of the Islamic frontier of those days by checking the bid by the Christians to plunder Syria. Saif od-Dowla was a man of letters and surrounded himself with prominent intellectual figures, notably the great Arabic poets, al-Mutanabbi and Abu Firas Hamdani, as well as the noted Iranian Islamic philosopher Abu Nasr Farabi. Saif od-Dowla himself was a poet; his delicate short poem on the rainbow shows high artistic ability.
1021 lunar years ago, on this day in 321 AH (934 AD), Iranian adventurer Ali ibn Buyeh conquered Fars and chose Shiraz as capital, thus establishing the Buwaihid dynasty. In the next few years (late 930s), his younger brother Hassan conquered parts of western and central Iran, and soon took control of Rayy (943), near modern Tehran. Two years later, the youngest brother, Ahmad conquered Iraq and made Baghdad his capital, receiving the honorific title of “Mo’iz od-Dowla”. Ali took the title of “Emad od-Dowla”, and Hassan the title of “Rokn od-Dowla”. The family was from the Daylam region on the Caspian Sea in Gilan, and is also called Daylamites. They were devout followers of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). Besides rebuilding the holy shrines of the Infallible Imams in Iraq, they patronized several leading Imami scholars. At its greatest extent, the Buwaihd dynasty encompassed most of today’s Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and Syria, along with parts of Oman, the UAE, Turkey, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Abbasid caliph was reduced to a figurehead, and sometimes the Buwaihid rulers used the title of Shahanshah for themselves. The dynasty ruled for some 130 years and was replaced by the Turkic Seljuqs who swept into Iran and Iraq from Central Asia.
1006 lunar years ago, on this day in 336 AH, renowned theologian, Mohammad Ibn Mohammad Ibn Nu’man al-Ukbari, famous as Shaikh Mufid, was born in the town of Ukbar, north of Baghdad. He has left behind numerous compilations in almost all branches of Islamic sciences, some of which are: “al-Irshad”, “Ahkam an-Nisa”, and “Tashih E`teqadat al-Imamiyah” – the last named is a critical and edited version of his one-time teacher, Ibn Babwaih Shaikh Sadouq’s “al-E’teqad”. He trained a great number of scholars, including the celebrated pair of brothers, Seyyed Murteza and Seyyed Radhi – the compiler of the famous book “Nahj al-Balagha” – as well as Shaikh at-Ta’efa Abu Ja’far Tousi, the founder of the famous seminary of holy Najaf.
592 solar years ago, on this day in 1429 AD, the eminent Iranian astronomer and mathematician, Ghiyas od-Din Jamshid Kashani, died under suspicious circumstances in Samarqand at the age of around 50. He was born in Kashan and went to Samarqand at the invitation of the Timurid scientist-ruler, Ologh Beg, to set up the famous observatory. He produced a Zij entitled the “Khaqani Zij”, which was based on Khwaja Naseer od-Din Tusi’s “Zij-e Ilkhani”. He also produced tables on transformations between coordinate systems on the celestial sphere, such as the transformation from the ecliptic coordinate system to the equatorial coordinate system. He wrote the book “Sullam as-Sama” on the resolution of difficulties met by predecessors in the determination of distances and sizes of heavenly bodies such as the Earth, the Moon, the Sun and the Stars. He also invented a mechanical planetary computer which he called the Plate of Zones, which could graphically solve a number of planetary problems, including the prediction of the true positions in longitude of the Sun and Moon, and the planets in terms of elliptical orbits; the latitudes of the Sun, Moon, and planets; and the ecliptic of the Sun. In one of his numerical approximations of “P” (pronounced pie), he correctly computed 2 P to 9 sexagesimal digits. This approximation of 2 P is equivalent to 16 decimal places of accuracy. This was far more accurate than the estimates earlier given in Greek mathematics of 3 decimal places by Archimedes, Chinese mathematics of 7 decimal places by Zu Chongzhi and Indian mathematics of 11 decimal places by Madhava of Sangamagrama. The accuracy of Jamshid Kashani’s estimate was not surpassed until Ludolph van Ceulen computed 20 decimal places of “P” nearly 200 years later.
494 solar years ago, on this day in 1527 AD, Fathollah, the Muslim general of the Sultan of Demak drove away the Portuguese occupation forces from Sunda Kelapa, and renamed the town Jayakarta, which now known as Jakarta is the capital of Indonesia. Fathollah is a national hero in Indonesia.
428 solar years ago, on this day in 1593 AD, the Battle of Sisak or Kulpa Bozgunu in Turkish, was fought in Croatia on the confluence of the Rivers Sava and Kupa between Ottoman regional forces of Hasan Pasha Predojevic, a notable commander of the Eyalet of Bosnia, and a combined Christian army from the Habsburg lands, mainly the kingdom of Croatia and Austria. Earlier in 1591 and 1592 the Ottomans had two failed attempts of capturing the Sisak fortress, sieging forces on 22 June. The ensuing battle resulted in a defeat for the regional Turkish forces, triggering the Long War between the Ottoman and the Hapsburg Empires that lasted for 13 years.
388 solar years ago, on this day in 1633 AD, Italian astronomer, mathematician, and physicist, Galileo Galilei, was forced to renounce his scientific remarks and beliefs before the Church officials. Influenced by the Latin translations of the Arabic works of Islamic scientists, such as Iran’s Abu Rayhan Berouni, he wrote a book in the year 1632 in rejection of Ptolemy’s beliefs on the solar system, supporting the fact that the Earth orbits around the Sun. A year later, the Pope summoned him to Rome and termed his writings as blasphemous, and gave him the option of denying what he said or death.
216 solar years ago, on this day in 1805 AD, Giuseppe Mazzini, Italian politician and activist for the unification of Italy, was born. His efforts helped bring about an independent and unified Italy in place of the several separate states, many dominated by foreign powers that existed until the 19th century.
81 solar years ago, on this day in 1940 AD, France formally surrendered to Nazi German leader, Adolf Hitler, by signing a treaty, according to which Marshal Henri Petain was instated as the premier of France with Germany’s support. But, General Charles de Gaulle, with the support of French troops overseas, formed the French government in exile to continue the struggle for liberation of France.
80 solar years ago, on this day in 1941 AD, during World War II, Germany launched Operation Barbarossa against the Soviet Union, after occupying several east European countries. German troops advanced till the outskirts of Moscow, but were bogged down with the arrival of the winter. The Soviets also resolutely resisted and gradually forced the German troops to retreat.
76 solar years ago, on this day in 1945 AD, the World War II battle for Okinawa officially ended. It was the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War Theater resulting in the death of 12,520 Americans and 90,000 Japanese soldiers, plus 130,000 civilians killed in the 81-day campaign.
40 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA), formally dismissed Abol-Hassan Bani Sadr from the president’s post, a day after the Majlis (parliament) impeached him for his political incompetency and dalliance with anti-revolutionary groups, with 177 affirmative votes, 12 abstentions, and 1 negative vote. Earlier on June 10, the Imam had relieved him of the post of Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces because of his failure to check the advance of the Ba’thist forces. The Iranian nation hailed the move. Upon Bani Sadr’s deposal, his friends, the MKO terrorists, stepped up subversive activities, including the terrorist explosions of 27 June that led to the martyrdom of Chief Justice Ayatollah Seyyed Mohammad Hussaini Beheshti and 72 officials. On July 29, Bani Sadr, with his mustache shaved off and disguised as a chador-wearing woman, fled the country for France, along with MKO terrorist ringleader, Masoud Rajavi, aboard an aircraft piloted by an anti-revolutionary.
40 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, on the instructions of the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA), the Islamic Propagation Organisation was established for enlightening people at home and abroad with the dynamism of Islam, through preaching, publishing of books, holding of seminars, and related ideological and cultural work to strengthen the beliefs of the people.