KALAAM IBN BATTUTAH (WHAT IS SAID BY IBN BATTUTAH)
Second: The best act that is ever done at this night is to visit the holy tomb of Imam Ali ibn Abi-Talib(a.s.). As will be mentioned in the section of Ziyarat, three formulas of Ziyarah will be mentioned for visiting the tomb of Imam Ali Ameer al-Momineen(a.s.) at this night.
Abu-’Abdullah Muhammad ibn Battutah, a famous Arab writer and explorer, who lived six centuries ago and is considered a Sunni master scholars, mentions the holy mausoleum of our master Imam AliAmeer al-Momineen(a.s.) in his famous book comprising all his views and adventures during his journeys and entitled al-Rihlah. In this book, he mentions that on his way back from Holy Makkah, he passed by the holy city of Najaf. He further says, “All the inhabitants of this city are Rafidah.This mausoleum (of Imam Ali) has shown many miraculous signals. One of these miraculous signs was that at the twenty-seventh night of Rajab, which they call laylat al-mahya (The Night of Staying Up), handicapped individuals from Iraq, Khurasan, Persia, and even Rome are gathered near the holy mausoleum. As they become thirty or forty persons, they are placed above the holy tomb after offering the Isha’ Prayer while the people are waiting how they will stand up sound and healthy. As they are engaged with prayers, invocations, supplications, and Quranic recitations, all those handicapped people stand up sound and healthy at nearly midnight, shouting, ‘There is no god save Allah, Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and Ali is the Intimate Saint of Allah.’
To them, this fact is beyond dispute. I have heard it from trustworthy people. Although I have not presented myself there at that night, I have met, in the School of Guests, three handicapped men from Rome, Isfahan, and Khurasan. When I asked them, they answered that they missed the night of the twenty-seventh of Rajab; therefore, they were waiting for the next year so as to witness the night.
This Night of Staying Up gathers a huge number of people who establish a great market (trade fair) that lasts for ten days.”
In fact, one must not disbelieve such reports. The miraculous matters that have been shown at these holy mausoleums are innumerable and I have received some of them through authentically, uninterrupted chains of authority. The most recent of these miracles took place in Shawwal, AH 1340 when all people witnessed an undeniable miraculous sign from the holy mausoleum of our Imam, the eighth of the Guiding Imams, Ali ibn Musa al-Rida(a.s.), the hope of the disobedient. Three hemiplegic women besought Almighty Allah in the holy shrine of Imam al-Rida(a.s.) after physicians had despaired of their recovery. Immediately, their recovery was manifested before the sights of all the attendants at the holy shrine as obviously as sunlight. It has been further reported that everybody submitted to this miraculous recovery including the physicians who had known the reality of these women’s states after they investigated the matter so accurately. Some of them, however, wrote the history of this event in a book so as to convey this miracle to the next generations. However, unless brevity has been decided in this book, the story would be mentioned as a whole.