Sakina bint Husayn

Template:Short description Template:Wikidata image Sakīna bint al-Ḥusayn (Template:Langx) (between 667 and 671 CE – 8 April 671), also known as Āmina (Template:Langx), was a descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. She was the daughter of Husayn ibn Ali, the third Shia Imam, and Rubab bint Imra al-Qais. Sakina was a young child in 680 at Karbala, where she witnessed the massacre of her father and his supporters by the forces of the Umayyad caliph Yazid (Template:Reign). The women and children, among them Sakina, were marched to the capital Damascus, where they were paraded in the streets and then imprisoned.

Birth

Sakina or Sukayna (Template:Langx) was the epithet given to her by her mother,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn while her name is variously given in the sources as Āmina (Template:Langx) or Amīna (Template:Langx) or Umayma (Template:Langx). The last one is less likely, however.Template:Sfn Her father was Husayn ibn Ali (Template:Died in), the third Shia Imam and the grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad (Template:Died in). Sakina was born to the first wife of Husayn, Rubab, who was the daughter of Imra' al-Qays ibn Adi, a chief of the Banu Kalb tribe.Template:Sfn After remaining childless for some years,Template:Sfn Sakina was the first child of the couple and possibly Husayn's eldest daughter,Template:Sfn although some have reported that his eldest daughter was Fatima,Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn born to Umm Ishaq bint Talha, the widow of Hasan ibn Ali (Template:Died in), whom Husayn married to fulfil the last wishes of his brother.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Sakina was born in Medina,Template:Sfn but her birthdate is not known with certainty.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Various reports give the years 47,Template:Sfn 49,Template:Sfn or 51 AH,Template:Sfn that is, circa 671 CE.Template:Sfn The Islamicist Wilferd Madelung places her birth sometime after the 661 assassination of her grandfather Ali ibn Abi Talib, the first Shia Imam.Template:Sfn

Battle of Karbala (680) and captivity

Husayn denounced the accession of the Umayyad caliph Yazid ibn Mu'awiya in 680. When pressed by Yazid's agents to pledge his allegiance, Husayn first left his hometown of Medina for Mecca and later set off for Kufa in modern-day Iraq, accompanied by his family and a small group of supporters. Among them was Sakina, a young child at the time, aged between five and twelve.Template:Sfn Their small caravan was intercepted and massacred in Karbala, near Kufa, by the Umayyad forces who first surrounded them for some days and cut off their access to the nearby river Euphrates.Template:Sfn As a young child, Sakina is often the narrator of Karbala in Shia ritual commemorations,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn and a common narrative in commemoration of the massacre is that Sakina threw herself in front of Husayn's horse when he was leaving for the battlefield to spend a few more seconds with her father before he was killed.Template:Sfn When Husayn was beheaded, the Umayyad soldiers pillaged his camp,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn and severed the heads of Husayn and his fallen companions, which they then raised on spears for display.Template:Sfn Another common commemorative narrative is that Sakina's earrings were violently torn from her ears during the pillage.Template:Sfn The women and children were then taken captive and marched to Kufa and later the capital Damascus.Template:Sfn The captives were paraded in the streets of Damascus,Template:Sfn and then imprisoned for an unknown period of time.Template:Sfn Out of modesty, Sakina may have asked Sahl ibn Sa'd, a companion of Muhammad, to convince the soldier carrying his father's head to walk at some distance to avoid the gazes of the onlooking crowds in Damascus.Template:Sfn The prominent Twelver traditionist Majlesi (Template:Died in) describes in his a dream he attributes to Sakina, in which she saw her grandmother Fatima (Template:Died in), daughter of Muhammad, mourning in the heaven while holding the blood-stained shirt of Husayn.Template:Sfn The captives were eventually freed by Yazid.Template:Sfn They were allowed to return to Medina,Template:Sfn or were escorted there.Template:Sfn

Personal life

Sakina was of marriage age at Karbala by some accounts, according to which Husayn had earlier allowed his nephew Hasan ibn Hasan (Template:Died in) to decide which cousin he would marry, Sakina or Fatima.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The first marriage of the young Sakina was to Abd-Allah ibn Hasan,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn another cousin, who was killed in Karbala. This marriage was probably not consummated,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn and she never remarried by some Shia accounts.Template:Sfn In particular, only this childless marriage to Abd-Allah is mentioned by the Twelver scholars al-Mufid (Template:Died in) in his biographical and by Tabarsi (Template:Died in) in his .Template:Sfn Alternatively, some Shia and Sunni authors write that Sakina later married Mus'ab ibn al-Zubayr, the Zubayrid governor of Iraq, who was killed in 691 by the Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (Template:Reign).Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The couple had a daughter, named Fatima, who died in childhood.Template:Sfn These authors include the Shia jurist Ibn Shahrashub (Template:Died in) in his biographical and the Sunni historian Ibn Khallikan (Template:Died in) in his .Template:Sfn Caliph Abd al-Malik proposed to Sakina after the death of her husband Mus'ab but was turned down,Template:Sfn and she apparently rejected marriage proposals by men of power for political reasons.Template:Sfn She later returned to Medina from Kufa, where the couple lived. Quoted by the Sunni jurist Ibn Qutayba (Template:Died in) in his biographical , there is a tradition that some Kufans wanted her to stay but she reproached them for killing her grandfather Ali ibn Abi Talib, her father Husayn, her uncle, and now her husband Mus'ab.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The caliphate of Ali (Template:Reign) indeed ended with his assassination in Kufa.Template:Sfn

Sakina later married Abd-Allah ibn Uthman ibn Abd-Allah, according to Ibn Shahrashub and the Shia historian Ibn al-Kalbi (Template:Died in). The couple had three children, named Uthman, Hakim, and Rubayha.Template:Sfn When Abd-Allah died, Sakina by some accounts married Zayd ibn Amr,Template:Sfn the grandson of the third caliph Uthman ibn Affan (Template:Reign).Template:Sfn She died as his widow, according to the Islamicist Rizwi Faizer.Template:Sfn Alternatively, she may have married Ibrahim ibn Abd al-Rahman ibn Awf after Zayd died. Neither of the last two marriages is said to have lasted and both are reported in and .Template:Sfn Various other accounts state that either or both of Zayd and Uthman divorced her,Template:Sfn and some add Asbagh ibn Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan in Egypt as another husband. He reportedly died even before Sakina arrived there.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn While it was not uncommon among her tribe of Quraysh for a woman to marry several times, the modern linguist Albert Arazi suggests that the reports of her many marriages are tendentious.Template:Sfn Some have similarly argued that such reports are defamatory and contradictory, possibly fabricated by those opposed to the Alids, who are the descendants of Ali ibn Abi Talib.Template:Sfn

Activism and poetry

Sakina is described by early biographical sources as beautiful,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn generous,Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn wise,Template:Sfn and modest ().Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn Her social standing was high,Template:Sfn and she is listed as a trustworthy () narrator of hadith by the Sunni traditionist Ibn Hibban in his .Template:Sfn She was visited by the Quraysh elders,Template:Sfn and attended the meetings of their tribal council.Template:Sfn She was also highly critical of the Umayyads.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn Whenever her grandfather Ali ibn Abi Talib was cursed from the Umayyad pulpits, Sakina returned their curse,Template:Sfn according to al-Isfahani and the Sunni historian Ibn Asakir (Template:Died in).Template:Sfn There are also controversial reports that she was not veiled in public,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn that she insisted in her marriage contracts on her autonomy and on her husband's monogamy,Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn that she took one of her husbands to court for violating this clause,Template:Sfn and that a hairstyle carried her name.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The Moroccan feminist writer and sociologist Fatema Mernissi (Template:Died in) thus considers Sakina as a symbol against forced hijab,Template:Sfn while the Egyptian biographer Aisha Abd al-Rahman (Template:Died in) regards such reports fabricated by the anti-Alids; among them were the Umayyads.Template:Sfn

Sakina was also noted for her eloquence and poetry.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn She is said to have hosted at her house poets whom she listened to and offered her feedback and monetary reward () from behind a curtain or through a maid.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The guests may have included the contemporary poets al-Farazdaq (Template:Died in), Jarir ibn Atiya (Template:Died in), and Kuthayyir (Template:Died in).Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn She also reportedly arbitrated disagreements among poets or their supporters.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Such reports are scattered in the early sources, including the biographical by the Sunni scholar Ibn al-Jawzi (Template:Died in) and , a collection of poems by the early historian and musicologist Abu al-Faraj al-Isfahani (Template:Died in). At the same time, the credibility of these reports has been questioned by some Shia authors, including the prominent Twelver theologian al-Hilli (Template:Died in). Yet some others have suggested that such reports may refer not to Sakina bint Husayn but to Sakina bint Khalid ibn Mus'ab Zubayri.Template:Sfn In particular, an elegy is ascribed to her in memory of her father Husayn, which ends as follows.

O my eyes, occupy yourself in weeping all your life; weep with tears of blood, not for a child, family or friends, rather for the son of the Apostle of God. Pour out your tears and blood.Template:Sfn

Death and shrine

File:Umm Kulthum bint Ali and Sakinah bint Hussein.jpg

Gate to the shrine attributed to Sakina in the Bab al-Saghir cemetery in Damascus

Sakina died in Medina on 5 Rabi' al-Awwal 117 AH (8 April 735) at the age of sixty-eight and during the reign of the Umayyad caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik (Template:Reign),Template:Sfn according to Ibn Asakir and the Sunni historian al-Baladhuri (Template:Died in).Template:Sfn This is also reported by the Sunni biographer Ibn Sa'd (Template:Died in) and by the Sunni traditionist al-Nawawi (Template:Died in).Template:Sfn Other given dates in the early sources are 92 AH (710-1) and 94 AH (712-3). Another report states that she died in Kufa at the age of seventy-seven, though Mernissi finds this unlikely.Template:Sfn Yet there are also reports that she died in Mecca, Damascus, or Egypt.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Sakina was buried in al-Baqi cemetery, but there is also a shrine attributed to her in Cairo, Egypt.Template:Sfn There is yet another tomb in the Bab al-Saghir cemetery in Damascus and another one existed in Tiberias, Palestine. Both are falsely attributed to Sakina, according to the historian Yaqut al-Hamawi (Template:Died in), who considers Medina to be her resting place.Template:Sfn