This Day in History

Date: 01 May 2021 - 20:30

News ID: ۸۹۷۹۵

(May 2)

Today is Sunday; 12th of the Iranian month of Ordibehesht 1400 solar hijri; corresponding to 19th of the Islamic month of Ramadhan 1442 lunar hijri; and May 2, 2021, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
1402 lunar years ago, on this day in 40 AH, the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS), the First Infallible Successor to Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), was struck a fatal sword blow on the head by the renegade, Abdur-Rahman Ibn Muljam, while engaged in the Morning Prayer in the Grand Mosque of Kufa, and attained martyrdom two days later. As the first cousin, ward, son-in-law and divinely-decreed vicegerent of the Seal of Messengers, Imam Ali (AS) needs no introduction, the more so in view of his matchless characteristics such as faith, piety, patience, prudence, valour, magnanimity, knowledge, wisdom, ethics, eloquence, and justice. He single-handedly led Islam to victory in almost all the early battles imposed on the Prophet and the young Muslim community by the Arab infidels and the Israelite hypocrites. When usurpers seized the caliphate on the passing away of the Prophet, he patiently endured the calamity for the sake of Islamic unity, since his resorting to the sword would have made most neo-Muslim Arabs revert to paganism. When 25 years later, the caliphate came begging at his door, he reluctantly took up the reins of political rule of the Islamic state and for the next four-and-a-half years, until his untimely martyrdom, he strove to establish the model government of social justice, the like of which the world is yet to see.
661 solar years ago, on this day in 1360 AD, Yongle Emperor, the 3rd ruler of the Ming Dynasty who unified China during his 22-year long reign (1402-1424), and patronized Muslims, was born as Zhu Di.
610 lunar years ago, on this day in 832 AH, the eminent Iranian astronomer and mathematician, Ghiyas od-Din Jamshid Kashani, died under suspicious circumstances in Samarqand at the age of around 50 years. 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.
502 solar years ago, on this day in 1519 AD, Italian painter, draftsman, sculptor, architect, and engineer, Leonardo Da Vinci, died at the age of 67. He was a genius who designed buildings, bridges, canals, forts and war machines. He kept notebooks sketching his ideas that show his fascination with birds and flying, including such fantastic designs as flying machines, which Islamic scientists in Baghdad, Cairo and Cordoba (in Islamic Spain), had experimented centuries before him. He is also best known for the paintings "Mona Lisa” and "The Last Supper.”
80 solar years ago, on this day in 1941 AD, Britain again invaded Iraq to oust the nationalist government of Prime Minister Rashid Aali al-Gilani, who had staged a coup to end British influence by removing from power Abdullah bin Ali, the regent of the 6-year old king, Faisal II, whose grandfather Faisal I of Hijaz was installed as king in 1921 after crushing the wishes of the Iraqi people by the British who a year earlier had crushed the popular uprising of 1920 led by Ayatollah Shaikh Kashef al-Gheta and Ayatollah Mirza Mohammad Taqi Shirazi.
76 solar years ago, on this day in 1945 AD, during World War II, the German capital Berlin was captured by the Soviet Union which hoisted the red flag over the Reichstag.
64 solar years ago, on this day in 1957 AD, controversial US Senator, Joseph McCarthy, died. During the early years of Cold War, he led an Inquisition-like Senate Committee, which on the pretext of countering communist activities in the US, suppressed critics of the American political and social system by jailing authors, journalists, and even artists. This era is known as McCarthyism in US history.
42 solar years ago, on this day in 1979 AD, the great contemporary Iranian Islamic thinker, Ayatollah Morteza Motahhari, was martyred at the age of 60 by the Forqan terrorist outfit.He had a profound understanding of the social, political, and cultural topics of importance of the contemporary era. This brilliant Islamic thinker changed thoughts and attitudes by focusing on the dynamism of Islam for salvage of mankind in accordance with the progress in scientific and other fields. His speeches, articles, and books in different domains elaborate on Islamic topics and have been translated into different languages.
39 solar years ago, on this day in 1982 AD, during the Falklands War in the British-occupied Malvinas Islands of Argentina, a British submarine sank the Argentine cruiser "General Belgrano”, resulting in the death of 600 sailors. British commander Terence Thornton Lewin, had persuaded Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to order the sinking.
17 solar years ago, on this day in 2004 AD, the infamous Yelwa massacre occurred in Nigeria when the Christians brutally massacred over 630 Muslim nomads including women, children and old men. The Christians surrounded Yelwa town, and according to Human Rights Watch, over the next two days 660 Muslims were massacred, including the patients in the al-Amin clinic. Twelve mosques and 300 houses went up in flames. Young girls were marched to a nearby Christian town and forced to eat pork and drink alcohol. Many were raped, and 50 were brutally killed.
13 solar years ago, on this day in 2008, cyclone Nargis struck Burma, killing over 138,000 people and leaving millions of people homeless.
11 lunar years ago, on this day in 1431 AH, prominent scholar and jurist, Ayatollah Mohammad Hussain Ahmadi Faqih Yazdi, passed away at the age of 60. He was laid to rest in the holy shrine of Hazrat Ma’soumah (SA).
10 solar years ago, on this day in 2011 AD, leader of the CIA-created al-Qa’eda terrorist outfit, Saudi national Osama bin Laden, was killed by US special forces in Abbottabad, Pakistan, ending an almost decade-long manhunt for him. Osama, a multimillionaire, was used by Washington in the 1980s to supply arms to the mujahideen during the occupation of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. He again proved handy to American interests in the 1990s, in creating the Taleban to take over Afghanistan and tarnish the image of Islam with brutalities resembling medieval European laws. When he fell out with his backers, he was dumped and framed for the highly suspicious 9/11/2001 incidents in New York, as a pretext for the US invasion and occupation of that country. Osama’s body was thrown into the sea by the Americans in order to erase any trace of him after his death.
6 solar years ago, on this day in 2014 AD, Iranian classical musician, Mohammad-Reza Lotfi, renowned for his mastery of the "Tar” and "Setar”, died at the age of 87.