Addressing a mourning ceremony held at Imam Khomeini’s shrine on the occasion of Arba’een, Seyyed Hassan Khomeini said that the meaning of the phrase "Hihat min al-Zilah", which is the message of Karbala, is that we do not give in to humiliation.
We should also prove this by our words and actions, he added.
Imam Hossein (‘a) sacrificed everything due to revive the relgion at a sensitive juncture of history, the scholar said. Therefore, we also shouldn’t hesitate in order to pay any high price for the divine values.
It is not the case that any cost should be important for us to assert and revive the right and restore the divine values and religion.
He explained various historical possibilities about the ‘Arbaeen Day day and said:
The event that historians are almost unanimous about in relation to Arba’een is that on the 20th day of Safar in the year 61 Hijri, Jabir bin Abdullah Ansari, one of the great companions of the Prophet (PBUH) who lived long until Imam Baqir (‘a) understood the presence of those dignitaries,
He went to Karbala with one of his friends named "Atiyya Aufi" and succeeded in visiting the holy shrine of the doyen of the martyrs
If we turn the pages of history, we will see that since the time of the infallibles and truthful successor of the holy prophet, there has been a lot of emphasis on this pilgrimage;
‘Arbaeen has been widely accepted as one of the signs of a believer and a main maneuver of the Shia movement, the oppressed and the religious.
Seyyed Hassan Khomeini said that doctorial regime of Saddam had announced that whoever went on the Arbaeen pilgrimage would be executed and strictly prevented it.
Recalling the role of Shia scholars in reving and keeping alive the ‘Arbaeen tradition, Seyyed Hassan Khomeini said that one of the people who went on that journey and was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment is the late Martyr Ayatollah Seyyed Mohammad Bagher Hakim. Of course, he later manages to escape.
Seyyed Hassan Khomeini noted that the late Haj Agha Mustafa Khomeini, beloved son of the Imam, also used to walks from Najaf to Karbala with his contemporary scholars.
The remarks come as millions of Muslims from around the world have gone on the Arba’een pilgrimage toward Iraq’s Karbala, where Imam Hossein was martyred, to take part in the mourning ceremony of Prophet Mohammed (PBUH)’s grandson.
People take part in mourning processions on Wednesday on the occasion of Arba’een, which marks the end of a 40-day mourning period for the martyrdom of Imam Hussein (AS), the third Shia Imam, and his 72 companions in the Battle of Karbala in southern Iraq in 680 AD.
According to early estimates, more than 30 million people, including Iranians, have taken part in the procession in Iraq.
The on-foot journey starts days before the Arba'een as devotees take various routes toward the holy shrines in Karbala. One of the major routes is an 80-km-long one between the holy Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala.
The pilgrims pay tribute and renew their allegiance to Imam Hussein (AS), the all-time icon of fighting injustice, oppression and despotism, during the annual event.
Pilgrims are welcomed and served by Moukebs (also Mowkibs), makeshift tents erected along the paths, that offer everything that pilgrims may need during the journey for free.
The Moukebs offer free food, drinks, accommodation, medicine, and other services to the pilgrims.
According to Iraqi media reports last week, this year there are nearly 13 thousand Moukebs ready to assist the pilgrims.