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Escaping The Plague
In the interpretation of `Ali ben Ibrâhim about God's saying: Bethink
thee (O Muhammad) of those of old, who went forth from their habitations
in their thousands, fearing death, and Allah said unto them: Die; and then
He brought them back to life. Lo! Allah is a Lord of Kindness to mankind,
but most of mankind give not thanks(Al-Baqarah:243), and that is there
was a plague in the lands of Shem (Canaan) in some villages and districts,
so many people went out of there for their fear and escaping the plague
and they all went out to a desert far away and they all died in one night
and they remained there until that their bones would be pushed away from
the road by the feets of travellers, then God resurrected them and sent
them back to their homes and lived then after for long time until they
buried each other, this is what was told in Tales of Prophets for Al-Jazâ'iri.
In it also reported by Al-Bâqir (PUH) and Al-Sâdiq (PUH) about
God's saying "Bethink thee (O Muhammad) of those of old, who went forth
from their habitations in their thousands..etc" they (PUT) said: they are
the people of one of the towns in the lands of Shem from the Israelites,
and they were seventy thousand families and the plague used to strike them
for now and then, and when they feel it, the rich people would go out of
the town and the poor people remained for their weakness, so death would
perish those who stayed, so those who went out would say: if we stayed
we would be doomed by now, and those who stayed would say: if we just went
out we wouldn't have so much dead people among us, so they all agreed that
next time when plague reaches the town they all shall go out of the town,
so when they felt that the plague is near they all went out fearing death,
and they wandered in the lands until they reached a ruined town that was
perished by the plague before so they settled in it and then God said to
them: Die all of you, so they all died and turned to bones, and then a
prophet passed by that was called Hazqeel (Ezekiel), and when he saw them
he cried and said: O Lord, if You want You would resurrect them at once,
so God resurrected them for him.
In a narration for Al-Sâdiq (PUH): the day of Nayruz [a persian
holiday at the beginning of spring] is the day when God resurrected those
who went out of their lands in thousands fearing death, and God said to
them: Die, and then He resurrected them, and this is because a prophet
asked his Lord to resurrect the people who went out from their lands, and
then they died by their appointed time..etc, and in that narration also
mentioned that God inspired to him to pour some water on them, and so he
did and they lived, and they were thirty thousand, so pouring water at
the day of Nayruz became a usual habit that none knows its reason except
of those who are in deep knowledgement, and the day of Nayruz is the first
day of spring in every year, and the prophet that resurrected them by permission
of God is Ezekiel (PUH) as mentioned before and his name was mentioned
in lot of narrations, and there might be lot of occasions with others than
him, and the repetition of stories with being different each time from
each other is possible, because the number in some stories is seventy thousand
and in others it is thirty thousand, and what is understood from such narrations
is that it is not allowed to escape from the plague, because destiny is
something written and it is of no use to escape from death.
But there are many tidings that order people to escape from the plague,
yes and there is a prophetic narration (Hadith) that tells: escaping from
the plague is like escaping from the invasion, and it is reported that
Al-Sâdiq (PUH) answered about that that it was mentioned about some
people in their headquarters in the face of the enemy and if they had escaped
from the plague then the enemy would takeover the land of muslims, so this
is a special case and it is not to be measured with and it is not a base
to work with and oppose others. For Ezekiel, the prophet that God resurrected
by his hand thousands of death people, lot of amazing tidings and strange
conditions, and it is mentioned that Dâwud (David) the owner of the
Zabur (book of psalms) (PUH) went into a cave in Jerusalem and he found
there Ezekiel (PUH) worshipping his Lord and his skin was dried out upon
his bones, so he said the peace, and he answered: I hear a voice of someone
satisfied and soft, who are you? He said then: I am David, then he (Ezekiel)
said: the one who has that much of women and that much of maids (and he
mentions numbers)? He answered: yes, while you are in such agony, then
Ezekiel said to him: I am not in agony, and you are not into gifts, until
we both go into paradise. As reported by Abu-Hamza Al-Þumâli
from Al-Bâqir (PUH) he said: when the king of the coptic people went
out to knock down the temple in Jerusalem, all people gathered around Ezekiel
and complained about it, he then said: maybe I will speak to my Lord tonight,
so when it was night then he prayed to his Lord and then God inspired to
him: I've abandoned them before you and doomed them, and then God inspired
to the angel of air to hold their breathes, and so he did and all of them
were dead, so then in the morning Ezekiel went to his people and told them
about the doom of their enemy, and they went out to look at them and they
found them dead. They say that Ezekiel got surprised and said to himself:
what virtues Solomon ben David the prophet had and I'm given such thing
like this? He (Al-Bâqir PUH) said: then he got an ulcer in his liver
and he got annoyed for it, so then he prayed to God and humiliated himself
in front of God and sat on ashes so then God inspired to him: take the
fig and rub your chest with it, and so he did and the pain went out, and
maybe the rubbing of chest with the fig was with the green fresh branch
of it, or it might be the fruit itself and only God knows.
Next: Ishmael, Other Than The Son of Abraham (PUT)