Personal Life

Following the lead of his father, Ja'far was engaged in trade^[97] and in farm- ing.^[98] He was very much in favor of investment in real estate,^[99] and he kept his investments diversified so that if one lost value, another would do well and compensate for the loss:^[100]

أق رجل جعفرا شبيها بالمتنئح⁷⁵ ل فقال ل: بتا أبا عبد هللا! كيف صرت اتحذت الأموال وئلئا متفرقة ولوكانخا ي موضع واحدكانت أير لمعونتها وأعظم لتفعها. فقال أبوعبد هللا: اتحذتها متفرقة فإن أصاب هذا المال سيء دتدلم هذا المال.^[101]

A man approached Ja'far seeming like a person who would give him advice, and said to him, “O Abu 'Abd Allah! How did it come about that you put your money in different businesses? If it were all in a single place, it would be more cost effective and beneficial." Abu 'Abd Allah said, “I put it in different businesses so that if something goes wrong with this part of my money, the other money will be secure."

He said that he liked for God to see him managing his life well^[102] and working for his daily bread so that he would not need people:

عبد الأعلى مولى آل سام قال: إستقبلنا أبا عبد هللا ي بعض طرق المدينة ي يوم صايف شديد الحر، فقلنا: جعلنا فداك! حالك عند الله عؤ وجل وقربنك من رسول هللا — صلى هللا عيه وآل وسلم — وأننا تحهد نفسك ي مثل هذا الوم؟ فقال: بتا عبد الأعلى! خرجت ي طف الرزق لأستغى عن أمثالك.^[103]

['Abd al-A'la, client of Al Sam:] I met Abu 'Abd Allah on a street in Medina on a very hot summer day.

أبو عمرو الشيباني قال: رأيت أبا عبد الله ويده مسحاة وعله إزر غلظ يعمل في

إني أحبل أن يأذي الرجل بحرنالشمس في طلب المعيشة.^[104]

[Abu 'Amr al-Shaybani:] I saw Abu 'Abd Allah holding a spade and wearing a coarse cloth around his waist, working in his orchard. The sweat was dripping from his back. I said, “May I be made your ransom! Let me take over from you.” He said to me, “I like for a man to suffer under the heat of the sun in pursuit of a livelihood.”

الضل ين أني قرة قال: دخلنا على أني عبد الله وهويعمل في حائط ل، فقلنا: جعلتا فداك! دعنا نعمل كل أونعمك الإخوان.

[Al-Fadl b. Abi Qurra:] We came upon Abu 'Abd Allah while he was working in his orchard. We said, “May we be made your ransom! Let us work for you, or let the brothers do it.” He said, “No! Leave me! I wish for God, the Mighty and Majestic, to see me working with my own hands, and pursuing what is licit through my own toil.”

أبوبصيرقال: سمعت أبا عبد الله يقول: إني لأعمل في بعض ضباس حى أعرق، وإن لي ما كفيمي، يعلم لله أني أطب الرزق الحلال.^[106]

[Abu Basir:] I heard Abu 'Abd Allah saying “I work on some of my estates until I sweat, even though I have enough to suffice me, so that God knows that I pursue a licit livelihood.”

معثب قال: قال لي أبوعبد الله وقد تزدد السعربالمدينة: كم عندنا من طعام؟ قلت: عندنا ما يكفينا أشهركثيرة.

[Muattib:]^[109] Once, when there was a price hike in Medina, Abu 'Abd Allah said to me, “How much food do we have?” I said, “We have enough for many months.” He said, “Take it out and sell it.” I said to him, “But there is no food in Medina!” He said, “Sell it.” When I sold it, he said, “Buy [food] from the people day by day.” And he said, “O Muat- tib! Make half of my family's provisions barley and half wheat. We hate to eat high quality [food] while people are eating inferior quality.”

As a businessman, he was professional and serious. He would scrutinize his agents and take them to task. In response to an excuse by an agent who had mishandled the Imam's assets but defended himself by swearing that he had not misappropriated the funds, the Imam answered:

بتا هذا! خيتانتنك وتضييعك مالى سواء إلاأن الخيانة رسهما عيك.^{[110] [111]}

Your misappropriation or mismanagement of my money are the same to me, but dishonesty is the greater evil of the two for yourself.

However, he always kept within legal and ethical boundaries:

وقال ل: تجهزحى تخرج إلى معرفإة عيالي قدكتروا. قال: فتجهزبمتاع وخرج هع التجارإلى معر. فلمئا دنوا من معراستقبلتهم قافلة خارجة من معر فسألوهم عن المتاع الدي معهم ما حال في المدينة، وكان متاع العامة، فأخبروهم أقه ليس بمعرمنه شيء. فتحالغوا وتعاقدوا على أن لاينقصوا متاعهم من رخ الديناردينارا. فلمنا قبضوا أموالهم وائعرفوا إلى المدينة دخل مصادف على أبي عبد هللا ومعه كيسان في كل واحد ألف دينار، فقال: جعات فداك! هذا رأس المال وهذا الآخررخ. فقال: إن هذا الرخ كثبر ولكن ما صنعته في المتاع؟ فحدثه كيف صنعوا وكيف تحالقوا. فقال: سبحان هللا! تحلفون على قوم مسالمين ألانبيعوهم إلارخ الديناردينار؟ ۶ أخذ أحد الكيسين فقال: هذا راس مالي ولاحاجة لنا في هذا الرخ.⁸⁸

[Abu Ja'far al-Fazari:] Abu 'Abd Allah summoned a client of his named Musadif, gave him one thousand dinars, and said, “Prepare yourself to go to Misr [that is, Misr al-Fusa] because my family has grown.” He [Musadif] loaded some goods and traveled with the traders to Misr. When they got close to Misr, they were met by a caravan leaving Misr, so they asked them about the conditions in town regarding the goods they had with them, which were goods used by the general public. They [the members of the caravan] told them [the traders] that none of it was available in Misr. They [the traders] then made a pact and agreement among themselves that they would not reduce the price of their goods below profiting a dinar for every dinar [that is, their minimum prices would be double the cost of the goods]. When they collected their money and went back to Medina, Musadif came to Abu 'Abd Allah with two bags, each filled with one thousand dinars. He said, “May I be made your ransom! This is the principal, and this is the profit.” Abu 'Abd Allah said, “This profit is too much; what did you do with the goods?” He told him about what they had done and their pact.

He [Abu 'Abd Allah] said, “Praise be to God! You make a pact against a group of Muslims to not sell them anything unless it is at a profit of a dinar for a dinar?” He then took one of the bags and said, “This is my principal, and we have no need for this profit.”

He was also a hard bargainer, to the point that it attracted attention and criticism.^[112] His reaction to such criticism was to say that it would not please God if he were defrauded of his money^[113] and that someone who is cheated is neither praised nor rewarded.^[114]

Examples of his generosity abound.^[115] As previously noted, he once gave the entirety of a gift of money sent to him by the caliph to someone in dif- ficulty.^[116] After the failure of Zayd b. 'Ah's uprising, he gave one thousand dinars to one of his disciples to distribute among the families of those killed in the fighting.^[117] At harvest time, he would order his servants to dismantle the walls around his orchard at 'Ayn Abi Ziyad^[118] on the outskirts of Medina, so that people could come through and take the fruits for free. He would thus make, at best, an annual profit of ten percent on the orchard, amount­ing to something like four hundred dinars on the equivalent of four thou­sand dinars worth of produce.^[119] He designated a section of his gardens as charity for passersby.^[120] His dinner receptions for guests were always gener­ous and even extravagant, but within reason.^[121] He bequeathed one third^[122] of his estate to family members and others, including an individual who had attempted to kill him with a broadsword when Ja'far rejected his invitation to join the rebellion of Nafs al-Zakiyya in 145.^[123] The text of two documents of manumission for slaves written by him have been preserved.^[124] His son Musa al-Kazim reported that his father continued until the end of his life to encourage Musa to be generous.^[125]

He occasionally accepted gifts and charitable donations from his follow­ers and admirers^[126] but reminded them that he personally did not need their gifts.^[127] There are reports of cases in which he accepted large gifts but then returned them to the donors as his own gift.^[128] For charitable monies, his initial response was to ask the donors or their representatives to use the funds personally for appropriate purposes.^[129]

He was strongly opposed to superstitious beliefs and practices embraced by people in his time, including amulets,^[130] astrology,^[131] and other notions.^[132] A disciple once told him that he, the disciple, had become captivated by astrology to the point that he would cancel important trips because the horoscope or the position of celestial objects deemed them inauspicious. The Imam advised him to burn his astrological books.^[133]

He also cautioned against the theological and sectarian debates of the time (known at the time as khusuma or mukhasama), which normally involved unhealthy levels of controversy and antagonism.^[134] Should one be drawn into such a debate, the Imam advised, one should engage in it only to the extent necessary and use the Qur'an as one's main—and indeed only—point of reference.^[135] However, he allowed certain able disputants and theologians in his entourage to participate in theological debates for the purpose of defending the truth.^[136]

His legal opinions would not vary depending on whether the involved party was a follower of his or whether the issue at hand affected the cause of the House of the Prophet. Once, for instance, he reiterated the common reservation in the Muslim tradition against reciting poetry instead of the Qur'an or prayers during the month of Ramadan. When his son Ismail asked whether it would make a difference if the poetry glorified the House of the Prophet, Ja'far said that it would not change the situation.^[137] When a woman willed a sum of money either to be spent on enabling someone to make the hajj pilgrimage on her behalf or to be distributed among needy descendants of Fatima al-Zaha, the daughter of the Prophet, Ja'far's response was that the money should be spent on hajj rather than the descendants of Fatima.^[138] In yet another example, the daughter of Humran b. A'yan, one of Ja'far's closest and most favored associates,^[139] imposed specific conditions on her husband in the marriage contract that Ja'far considered legally invalid, and he explicitly said so. He prefaced his opinion with this remark:

إدن لأيها خران حلئا ولايحملنا ذلك على أن لانقول الحق.^[140]

Her father, Humran, has a right [over us], but that does not prevent us from speaking the truth.

He followed the same principle in matters related to himself. Consider the following example. In the year 142, the hajj procession was headed by the current governor of Mecca, Isma'il b. 'Ali b. 'Abd Allah b. al-'Abbas. As the procession from 'Arafat to Muzdalifa began, Ja'far fell from his mule:

رأيت أبا عبد هللا وقد حج ووقف الموقف، قامئا دفع الناس متعرفين سقط أبوعبد الله عن بغلة كان علها، فعرفه الوالي الذي وقف بالناس تكل الستة — وي سنة [ائنتين ورعين ومائة [وكان الذي وقف بالناس تكل السنة إسماعيل ين على ين عبد الله ين العباس] — فوقف على أبي عبد هللا [حى يكب]. ققال ل أوعبد هللا [ورفع رأسه إيه]: لاثقف! إن الإمام إذا دفع بالناس لم كن ل أن يقف [إلا بالمزدلفة. فلم ول إسماعيل يققطد حى كب أو عبد هللا ولحق به.]^[141]

I saw Abu 'Abd Allah who had come for the hajj and attended the gath­ering [in 'Arafat]. When the people started to descend [from 'Arafat toward Mina], Abu 'Abd Allah fell from the mule he was on. The gover­nor leading the procession that year recognized him. (It was the year 142. The official who led the procession that year was Isma'il b. 'All b. 'Abd Allah b. al-'Abbas.) He stopped so that Abu 'Abd Allah could mount again. Abu 'Abd Allah, raising his head to him, said, “Do not stop! When the leader [of the procession] begins to drive the people [from 'Arafat], he may not stop until he reaches Muzdalifa.” So Isma'il proceeded slowly until Abu 'Abd Allah mounted and caught up with him.

He took the same course in matters of social etiquette:

كثا نمشي هع أبي عبد هللا وهو;ريد أن بجري ذا قرابة ل بمولود ل، فانقطع شسع نعل أبي عبد هللا، فتناول نعله من رجهل بم مشي حافيأ. فنظرإليه اين أبي يعفور، فخعل نعل نفسه من رله وخيع الشسع منها وناول أبا عبد هللا، فأعرض عنه كهيئة المغضب، بم أبي أن يقبهل. بم قال: ألاإن صاحب المصيبة أولى بالصبرعلها. فمشي حافيأ حى دخل على الرجل الذي أبي ليعزيه.^[142]

We were walking with Abu 'Abd Allah as he was going to offer con­dolences to a relative on the loss of his child. The strap of Abu 'Abd Allah's sandal broke, so he removed the sandal from his foot and walked barefoot. Ibn Abi Ya'fur^[143] saw him, removed his own sandal, removed the strap from it, and gave it to Abu 'Abd Allah. He looked the other way, seeming annoyed, and refused to accept the strap. Then he said, “Indeed, it is more appropriate for the one who suffers a calamity to endure it patiently.” He then continued to walk barefoot until he reached the man whom he had gone to console.

A non-Shi'1 who used to frequent Ja'far al-Sadiq's meetings described them as follows:

كتت أجالس أبا عبد هللا فلا والله ما ريت مجلتا أنبل من مجكه.^[144]

I used to sit in the company of Abu 'Abd Allah and, by God, I never saw a more noble company than his.

An Egyptian adherent of the doctrine of the Khawarij asked Ja'far a Quanic question through a friend who was going on the hajj. He was impressed by the answer and said to the intermediary:

لولاما أهرق جده من الدماء ما شذت إماة غيره.'^[145]

Had his grandfather not shed that much blood, I would not follow any other ('mam!^[146]

He underwent several major illnesses in his life.^[147] In the last two years of his life, he suffered from loosening of, and discomfort in, his teeth.^[148] Trav­eling, even the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, became a challenge.^[149] Earlier, he had been seriously ill for more than two years^[150] with a pain in his stom- ach^[151] and he subsequently attributed his recovery to a change of his eating habits to include rice.^[152] He once said to a Kufan disciple, “The most favor­able things that I receive from your region are rice and the viola flower."^[153]

He expressed a wish to be in Iraq for its natural blessings: to immerse him­self in the Furat (Euphrates) once a day and to enjoy a Surani pomegranate

once a day.¹²⁹ He had visited the region a number of times during his trips to the Abbasid court and was aware of its nature, customs, and culture.¹³⁰ Every part of it reminded him of his grandfather 'Ah, his children and descen­dants, and their associates who lived and died on Iraqi soil. As attested by a large number of reports,¹³¹ he visited all of the cities that were connected to his family and asked the local communities for their memories of the lives, sufferings, and tragedies of the members of the House of the Prophet who lost their lives in Iraq.¹³² On these same trips¹³³ he also visited Christian churches, praising their cleanliness.¹³⁴

129 Barqi, Mahasin, 540. For his special interest in the water of Furat, see further Kulayni, Kafl, 6:388-89; Ibn Qulawayh, Kamil al-ziyarat, 47; Tusi, Tahdhib, 6:38-39. For his praise of the Surani pomegranate, most likely an attribution to Sura, a region in Babil, see also Barqi, 544; Kulayni, 6:356; Ibn Babawayh, Khisal, 249.

130 E.g., Barqi, Mahasin, 426; Himyari, Qurb al-isnad, 170-71; Kulayni, Kafl, 1:351, 3:283, 284, 4:490, 6:341, 351, 416 (see also 4:80, 81, 5:552); Ibn Babawayh, Faqih, 1:317.

131 For a good number of these reports, some of which sound genuine and others spurious, see Majlisi, Bihar al-anwar, 97:385-434.

132 He asked, for instance, about the last hours of the life of his uncle, Zayd b. 'Ali, before he was killed in Kufa:

الذهاب. فقال: أما والله لو استعاذ هللا به حولأ لأعاذه.

['Abd Allah b. Aban:] We went to Abu 'Abd Allah and he asked us, “Do any of you have knowledge about my uncle, Zayd b. 'Ali?" One of us said to him, “I have knowl­edge about your uncle. We were with him one night in the house of Mu'awiya b. Ishaq al-Anai, when he said, 'Let us go pray in the mosque of Sahla.'" Abu 'Abd Allah said, “Did he do so?" He said, “No! Something came up that preoccupied him [and kept him] from going." He said, “By God, had he gone there and sought refuge in God for a full year, He would have granted him refuge" (Kulayni, Kafl, 3:494).

عبد الرحمن ين كثير عن أبي عبد هللا قال: مسعته يقول لأبي حمزة الئمالى: يا أبا حمزة.١ هل شهدت عش

['Abd al-Rahman b. Kathir:] I heard Abu 'Abd Allah say to Abu Hamza al-Thumali, “O Abu Hamza! Did you see my uncle the night he started his uprising?" He said, “Yes!" He said, “Did he pray in the mosque of Suhayl?" He said, “Where is the mosque of Suhayl? Perhaps you mean the mosque of Sahla?" He said, “Yes! Had he prayed two rak'as of prayer in it and sought refuge in God, God would have granted him refuge for a full year" (Tusi, Tahdhib, 6:37).

Abu Hamza al-Thumali, Thabit b. Dinar (d. 148-50) was a respected Kufan scholar and hadith transmitter known to both Sunni and Shi'i communities in Kufa. He died in 148-50. On him, see Modarressi, Tradition and Survival, 1:377-79 and the sources cited therein. Masjid Sahla was one of the oldest mosques of Kufa; it had been built in the first century. It was a Shi'i hub since its inception and, as such, a highly respected mosque among the Shi'a, then and now (see Majlisi, Bihar al-anwar, 97:434-55; see further Haider, Origins of the Shi'a, 238-39).

133 'Ayyashi, Tafsir, 3:80, where he tells a Kufan disciple who has asked him about the legality of a Muslim's praying in churches, “Pray there! How clean they are! I saw them when I was with you.”

134 'Ayyashi, Tafsir, 3:80; Tusi, Tahdhib, 2:222.

He especially liked dates^[147] and had good knowledge of their various kinds.^[148] On one of his trips to Iraq on the orders of the caliph Mansur, some of his disciples met him in Hira near Kufa. He praised the quality of the Kufan dates to them.^[149] He identified the types produced in the Hijaz, too, mentioned the names under which they were known there, and asked about their corresponding names in Iraq.^[150] He said that specific Iraqi dates were better than Hijazi ones but noted that overall the dates of the Hijaz were better than those of Iraq.^[151]

Other characteristics and practices that the sources attribute to him include his fondness for perfume, a preference he shared with his great-grandfather, the Prophet. The place in which he prayed was recogniz­able by his sweet smell.^[152] Like his father,^[153] he had one or two ivory combs that he used,^[154] and, like him, he dyed his beard with a light coat of henna.^[155] He liked domestic pigeons and had them at home.^[156]

A report says that he used to repeat the expression Wa'llah^[157] in conver- sations.^[158] He knew and enjoyed Arabic poetry;^[159] he reportedly composed verse himself^[160] and occasionally recited lines of it in his everyday exchang- es.^[161] Finally, for riding around town, he preferred a donkey—the modest, low­er-class means of transportation—over the mule,^[162] which signified higher social rank. He used mules for the hajj pilgrimage and other long trips.^[163]

Late in his life, he lost three of his children in successive years.^[164] The last of the three was his eldest son,^[165] Isma'il, who predeceased his father by one or two years and whose death left the father in deep grief.^[166] Ja'far then ordered his next-oldest son, 'Abd Allah, a full brother of Isma'il, to make up on Ja'far's behalf after he died the fasts that Ja'far could not observe himself because of a long illness.^[167]

He died in Medina in 148.^[168] He was shrouded in the two garments that he wore on his pilgrimage trips to Mecca^[169] and buried next to the graves of his father, grandfather, and grand-uncle Hasan al-Mujtaba in the main cemetery of the town, Baqi' al-Gharqad, where the site of his grave is still known.^[170] Some half a century after his death, an old associate of his who no longer lived in Medina would still be allowed to be buried in the same ceme­tery as “a client of Abu 'Abd Allah who lived in Iraq,” in contravention of the long-established tradition of the people of Medina not to allow anybody but locals to be buried in that cemetery.^[171]

Two poets, Abu Hurayra aMjli^[172] and Malik b. A'yan al-Juhani,^[173] both well-known for their sentiments toward the House of the Prophet, eulo­gized him.^[174] Pieces of these elegies have survived.^[175] As had happened in the case of his father, Muhammad al-Baqir, a light burned every night in the room in which Ja'far had lived by order of his son Musa (al-Kazim) for some thirty-odd years until around 180, when the latter was arrested and moved to Baghdad on the order of the caliph Harun al-Rashid (r. 170-93).^[176]

III.