This Day in History (October 20)

Date: 19 October 2018 - 21:15

News ID: ۵۸۶۸۹

Today is Saturday; 28th of the Iranian month of Mehr 1397 solar hijri; corresponding to 10th of the Islamic month of Safar 1440 lunar hijri; and October 20, 2018, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
1351 lunar years ago, on this day in 99 AH, Sulayman ibn Abdul-Malik, the 7th ruler of the usurper Omayyad regime, died at the age of 43 after a reign of 2 years and nine months in Qenshirin, near Aleppo on his way to invade the Byzantine Empire, following the unsuccessful siege of Constantinople by his brother, Maslamah. He was gluttonous with insatiable appetite for large quantities of food, in addition to being a womanizer. An intensely jealous person, he publicly disgraced Musa Ibn Nusayr, the governor-general of North Africa and Spain for not delaying the triumphal entry into Damascus of the rich spoils of Spain until he could take over the caliphate from his ailing brother, Waleed I. He subsequently had two of Ibn Nusayr’s sons executed and sadistically presented the head of one of them to the wretched father. He also had the governor of Khorasan and Transoxiana, Qutayba Ibn Muslim, killed in battle for advising Waleed to exclude Sulayman from the list of succession. He used to openly praise the founder of the Omayyad usurper regime, Mu'awiyah ibn Abu Sufyan, saying he had never come across anyone so unabashed in cruelty, crime and oppression
1111 lunar years ago, on this day in 329 AH, Iranian statesman and historian, Abu Ali Mohammad Amirak Bal’ami, passed away. Born in Lashjerd near the Khorasani city of Marv (presently in Turkmenistan), he was the son of Abu’l-Fazl Bal’ami (also called Bal’am-e Buzurg or the Elder), and was appointed vizier of the Iranian Samanid Empire during the reign of Amir Abdul-Malik I. He kept holding the office under the next ruler, Mansour I. His most famous work is "Tarikh-e Bal’ami”, which is a Persian translation of the famous Iranian historian Abu Ja’far Mohammad bin Jarir Tabari’s monumental Arabic work "Tarikh ar-Rusol wa’l-Mulook” (History of Prophets and Kings). It contains supplementary material, some of which is found nowhere else. It is the oldest Persian prose work after the Shahnamah of Daqiqi.
437 lunar years ago, on this day in 1003 AH, famous Persian poet and scholar of India, Shaikh Abu’l-Faiz, known by his penname "Faizi”, died from asthma at the age of 49. He was the "Malik-ush-Shu'ara” (Poet Laureate) of the court of the Moghal Emperor Jalal od-Din Akbar Shah, and was elder brother of the equally famous court historian Abu’l-Fazl. He composed significant poetic works in Persian and his Divan comprising "qasida” (eulogy), "ghazal” (lyric), "ruba’i” (quatrain), and "marthia” (elegy), is entitled "Tabashir as-Subh”. In pursuance of the literary practice then in vogue, he produced "Panj Ganj” (Five Treasures) in the "khamsa” style of poetry in imitation of the celebrated Iranian poet Nizami Ganjavi. He thus wrote "Nal va Daman”, "Markaz ul-Advaar”, "Sulaiman va Bilqis”, "Haft Kishvar” and "Akbarnamah”. These are respectively answers to Nizami's "Layla va Majnoun”, "Makhzan ul-Asraar” "Khosraw va Shirin”, "Haft Paykar” and "Iskandarnamah”. Faizi also wrote a series of reports on political and cultural conditions of the sultanates of the Deccan (southern India), as well as on the Safavid Empire of Iran. Among his other works is an exegesis of the Holy Qur’an, and translation from Sanskrit into Persian of the famous mathematical work "Lilavati”.
386 solar years ago, on this day in 1632 AD, English mathematician, astronomer and architect, Christopher Wren, was born. After the 'Great Fire'  that destroyed most of London, he presented a scheme to rebuild the city, though only partially realized, still boasts of such architectural landmarks as St. Paul's Cathedral. He invented a "weather clock” similar to a modern barometer, as well as new engraving methods. He died at the age of 90.
299 solar years ago, on this day in 1719 AD, German mathematician and philosopher, Gottfried Achenwall, was born. He founded the science of statistics. He also conducted extensive studies in philosophy and left behind several works in this scientific course. He died in 1771.
220 solar years ago, on this day in 1798 AD, the Muslim people of Cairo staged an uprising against the French occupation forces of Napoleon Bonaparte, offering 3000 martyrs for the freedom of their country. Inspired by the ulema, the people held a large protest gathering at the famous al-Azhar University that was subjected to attacks by the French military. This led to a battle between the unarmed people who overpowered and killed many French soldiers. The French occupiers retorted with brute forces, killing some 3,000 defenseless people, including many religious scholars. The French soldiers threw the bodies of martyrs into the River Nile.
191 solar years ago, on this day in 1827 AD, the Battle of Navarino in Greece resulted in the defeat of a combined Turkish and Egyptian armada by the British, French, and Russian naval forces in the port of Navarino in Pylos. As many as 6,000 Muslim soldiers lost their lives while 60 warships were sunk. The revolt in the Ottoman Province of Yunanistan that had begun in 1821 with the support of leading European Christian powers ended in 1829 with the formal separation of this province and it's renaming as Greece. In short, the Greek Revolt turned into the genocide of Muslims and within a few years all traces of four centuries of Turkish rule of Greece were removed through barbaric crimes by the Christians, who destroyed mosques, converted many into churches and even massacred or expelled ethnic Greek Muslims.
176 lunar years ago, on this day in 1263 AH, prominent Iranian author, Mullah Ja’far Shariatmadar Astarabadi passed away in Tehran at the age of 66 and his body was taken to holy Najaf in Iraq for burial. He was a product of the famous Najaf Islamic seminary. He left for Iran during the siege of the holy city of Karbala by the Ottoman General Davoud Pasha. He was an expert on Arabic literature and an accomplished poet. Among his books is "al-Masabih" on principles of Islamic Jurisprudence.
159 solar years ago, on this day in 1859 AD, US philosopher, John Dewey, was born. An advocate of the Pragmatic School of Thought, he authored several books including "The Public and Its Problems", and "Reconstruction in Philosophy". He died in 1952.
127 solar years ago, on this day in 1891 AD, British physicist, James Chadwick, who as one of the evil minds behind London’s manufacture of the atom bomb, was born. He worked on the scattering of alpha particles and on nuclear disintegration. By bombarding beryllium with alpha particles, he discovered a neutral particle in the atom's nucleus in 1932, and named it neutron, while investigating the prototype of weapons of mass destruction. Ironically for his destructive work, he was given the Nobel Prize and later knighted in 1945. He died in 1974.
118 solar years ago, on this day 1900 AD, Albanian Muslim poet and writer, Na'eem Frasheri, passed away at the age of 54 in Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire, which he served as an official in the ministry of culture. A prominent figure of the Albanian National Awakening he is widely regarded as the national poet of Albania. His father was a Bey from Frasher, and he hailed from a family with long connections to the Bektashi Shi'ite Sufi order, founded by the 13th century Iranian mystic, Haji Bektashi Vali of Naishapour, who had settled in Anatolia or what is now Turkey during the days of Seljuqid Sultanate of Roum. Frasheri's earliest writings were poetry and the very first poems he wrote were in Persian. In all, he authored twenty-two major works: four in Turkish, one in Persian, two in Greek and fifteen in his native Albanian. His patriotic poems and highly popular lyric poetry were strongly influenced by Persian literature. He also translated Homer's Iliad, and wrote articles on didactics and Islamic practices. Through his writings, Frasheri exerted a strong influence on Albanian literature and society. Today, the government of Albania has depicted his picture on the obverses of the Albanian 500 leke banknote and the 200 leke banknote. He was survived by his only son, Mahdi Frasheri.
115 solar years ago, on this day in 1903 AD, prominent theologian and jurisprudent, Ayatollah Seyyed Ismail Noori Tabarsi, passed away in holy Kazemain in Iraq. Born in the town of Noor in Iran’s Mazandaran Province near the Caspian Sea, after preliminary studies, he travelled for higher studies to Iraq, where the famous seminary of holy Najaf, he attended the classes of such leading ulema as the Ayatollahs Shaikh Morteza Ansari, Mirza Habibollah Rashti, and Mirza Mohammad Hassan Shirazi – famous for his fatwa against tobacco consumption to save Iran’s economy from British exploitation. Besides teaching at the seminary he wrote several books, such as the 3-volume "Kifayat-al-Muwahhidin” in Arabic, and the Persian language "Ismat-al-Wilayah”, on imamate.
68 solar years ago, on this day in 1950 AD, jurisprudent and exegete of the holy Qur’an, Ayatollah Shaikh Ja’far Nizari Naqdi, passed away in holy Najaf, Iraq, at the age of 64. A student of famous scholars such as Ayatollah Shaikh Ahmad Kashef al-Gheta and Ayatollah Seyyed Mohammad Kazem Yazdi, on the latter’s instructions he was stationed for a time in al-Ammarah in southern Iraq to enlighten the local tribes of the teachings of Islam. He is the author of several books, such as "al-Anwaar al-Alawiyya wa’l-Asraar al-Murtazawiyya” on the God-given merits of the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (PuH), the 1st divinely-designated vicegerent of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).
58 lunar years ago, on this day in 1382 AH, Source of Emulation, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Abdul-Hadi Shirazi, passed away at the age of 77 in Kufa and was laid to rest in the mausoleum of the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS). Born in holy Samarra to the scholar Seyyed Ismail Shirazi, he completed his higher religious studies in the famous Najaf Seminary where his teachers included Ayatollah Mohammad Kazem Akhound Khorasani and Ayatollah Shaikh ash-Shari’ah Isfahani. He attained ijtehad and issued a famous fatwa against communism, which was spreading in Iraq. He was teacher to such famous students as Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Ja’fari, Ayatollah Hussain Wahid Khorasani and Ayatollah Mohammad Reza al-Muzaffar. He wrote several books, including "Dar al-Islam”.
7 solar years ago, on this day in 2011 AD, Leader of Libya, Muammar Mohammad Qadhafi and his son, Mutassim, were killed shortly after the Battle of Sirte while in the custody of NTC fighters. Brought to power through a military coup in 1969 by the CIA against King Idris who was abroad for medical treatment, Qadhafi terrorized Libya for 42 years until his violent ouster by his own masters – the US and the West – who have since destabilized the country.
(Courtesy: IRIB English Radio – http://parstoday.com/en)