As always, the question is what Muhammad was
thinking—a question that will be asked in turn about Ali
too, and, after him, about his son Hussein. What did
they intend? What did they know or not know?
Unanswerable questions all, which is why the
wrenching rift in Islam is so enduring. Despite all the
impassioned claims, all the religious certainties and fiery
oratory and ghastly massacres to come, the enduring
irony is that “absolute” truth is the one thing that can
never be established. It does not exist even in science;
how much less so in history.
All we know for sure is that in the grip of fever,
blinded by those agonizing headaches that made every
sound seem as if it were piercing into his skull,
Muhammad was no longer in any condition to impose
his will. The pen and paper never arrived, and by dawn
the next morning he was so weak he could barely move.
He knew then that the end was near because he made
one last request, and this one was granted. He was to be
washed with seven pails of water from seven diʃerent
wells, he said, and though he did not explain it, all his
wives were certainly aware that this was part of the
ritual for washing a corpse. They washed him, and once
he was in a state of ritual purity, he asked to be taken
across the courtyard to morning prayers in the mosque.
It took two men, Ali and his uncle Abbas, to support
him, one on either side of him, his arms around their