“The most merciful of you is Abu Bakr and the most severe of you in
religion is Umar and the most intelligent among you for reciting the Quran is
Ubayy and the most truthful of you from the aspect of modesty is Uthman and
the most knowledgeable of you about lawful and unlawful is Maaz bin Jabal;
most knowledgeable of you about the laws of inheritance is Zaid Thabit; and
indeed every Ummah has a trustworthy one and the trustworthy one of this
Ummah is Abu Ubaidah Jarrah.”
Allamah Amini says: This baseless statement is from Khalaf Bazzaz, who
was a trustworthy, reliable, pious, accomplished man, but at the same time, was
addicted to liquor! Are you not amazed? Abu Ja’far Nufaili says: He was from
the folks of Sunnah (narrator of traditions) if that problem was not present in him,
he would have been nominated as successor of Ahmad bin Hanbal. It was said:
“O Aba Abdullah, he drinks liquor.” He replied: “It is reported to me, but by
God, he is trustworthy and reliable in our view, whether he drinks or not.”1
This report is a true testimony regarding the fact that the matter of Khalaf
Bazzaz being addicted to liquor had been reported to Imam of Hanbalis, and
those who have taken and reported this report from him, it is only in rapture of
love and attachment made them carefree and fearless to narrate this report, and
not intoxication of liquor (Khalaf Bazzaz fabricated this report while intoxicated
with liquor and its narrators narrated it due to intoxication of love)!
Khatib Baghdadi,2 in order to purify the reputation of this trustworthy
narrator from the blemish of liquor, narrated the report from Muhammad bin
Ahmad bin Rizaq from Muhammad bin Hasan bin Ziyad Naqqash that: I heard
from Idris bin Abdul Karim Haddad that he said: Khalaf bin Hisham drank liquor
and presented justification, so his nephew (sister’s son) one day recited Surah
Anfal to him till he reached the verse:
لِيَمِينَ اللهُ الْخَبِيثَ مِنَ الطَّيِّبِ
“That Allah might separate the impure from the good.”3
Then he said: O uncle, when Almighty Allah separated the impure from the
pure where does liquor stand? Khalaf looked at his toes for a long time, then he
said: “With the impure.” He said: “Then do you agree to be a part of filthiness?”
He replied: “Dear son, go home and throw away all the liquor there.” And he
gave up drinking. So Almighty Allah bestowed him the bounty of keeping fasts
and he kept fasts as long as he lived after that.
If dreams are true, what a nice thing this purification is; if it is logical and
from the point of view of Imam Ahmad that he said: He is reliable and honest,
whether he drinks liquor or not, is better, because this is a valueless point of view
not supported by any evidence; and Shariah, reason and logic do not support it, as Almighty Allah says:
يَأَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا إِنْ جَاءَكُمْ فَاسِقٌ بِنَبَإٍ فَتَبَيَّنُوا
“O you who believe! if an evil-doer comes to you with a report, look carefully into it.”4
But it is matter of great regret that its chain is invalid and weak due to
presence of Muhammad bin Hasan Naqqash, because Talha bin Muhammad
regarded him a liar and Darqutni considered him weak; Abu Bakr declared him to
be a narrator of false reports; and Barqani said that all his traditions are false.
And I thank the one, on whom the fabrication of this report ends that these
people have not mentioned Maula Ameerul Momineen Ali (a.s.), who is much
above than all the qualities mentioned in this fabricated tradition; because he is
much above them as his merits are much higher that a merit should be mentioned
with them.
At this point we don’t argue against the text of the report and regarding
qualities bestowed to these people; as there might be something in this report
based on proof and evidence; thus some witness that Abu Bakr was most kind hearted man of the Ummah: burning of Faja(5)(6) and overlooking the vile deeds of
Khalid bin Walid towards Bani Hanifah and his shameless deeds with Malik bin
Nuwairah and his wife; not paying attention to the claim of Lady Fatima Zahra
(s.a.).
Although we would overlook his invalid verdict and false tradition – as
opposed to verses of inheritance and especially verses, which mention inheritance
of prophets – he tried to prove that prophets do not leave inheritance. Moreover,
Lady Fatima Zahra (s.a.) and her cousin were not ignorant about the report,
which only Abu Bakr narrated.
All this was preplanned between him and his supporters. And Ameerul
Momineen (a.s.) was the most just person of the Ummah and the gate of the city
of the knowledge of the Prophet and Lady Fatima Zahra (s.a.) was the beloved
daughter of the Prophet and the Messenger of Allah (s.a.w.a.) had imparted all
the knowledge and awareness to Fatima and he knew that she would soon have to
undergo circumstances in which the Caliph would usurp her property under a
false pretext and an argument would erupt between her and Abu Bakr.
This caused a split in the Ummah till Judgment Day, some follow the
daughter of the Prophet and some are inclined to those, who usurped her rights,
that is why it was obligatory that Holy Prophet (s.a.w.a.) should have taught this issue to his daughter before Abu Bakr.