CALIPHATE

caliphate, sect. b, s _2 ad init._). hosain is the hero of the passion play which is performed annually (e.g. at kerbela) on the anniversary of his death by the shi'ites of persia and india, to whom from the earliest times the family of ali are the only true descendants of mahomet. the play lasts for several days and concludes with the carrying out of the coffins (_tabut_) of the martyrs to an open place in the neighbourhood. see sir wm. muir, _the caliphate_ (1883); sir lewis pelly, _the miracle play of hasan and hosein_ (1879). hasan ul-basri [abu sa'ud ul-hasan ibn abi-l-hasan yassar ul-basri], (642-728 or 737), arabian theologian, was born at medina. his father was a freedman of zaid ibn thabit, one of the _ansar_ (helpers of the prophet), his mother a client of umm salama, a wife of mahomet. tradition says that umm salama often nursed hasan in his infancy. he was thus one of the _tabi'un_ (i.e. of the generation that succeeded the helpers). he became a teacher of basra and founded a school there. among his pupils was wasil ibn 'ata, the founder of the mo'tazilites. he himself was a great supporter of orthodoxy and the most important representative of asceticism in the time of its first development. with him fear is the basis of morality, and sadness the characteristic of his religion. life is only a pilgrimage, and comfort must be denied to subdue the passions. many writers testify to the purity of his life and to his excelling in the virtues of mahomet's own companions. he was "as if he were in the other world." in politics, too, he adhered to the earliest principles of islam, being strictly opposed to the inherited caliphate of the omayyads and a believer in the election of the caliph. his life is given in nawawi's _biographical dictionary_ (ed. f. wustenfeld, gottingen, 1842-1847). cf. r. dozy, _essai sur l'histoire de l'islamisme_, pp. 201 sqq. (leiden and paris, 1879); a. von kremer, _culturgeschichtliche streifzuge_, p. 5 seq.; r. a. nicholson, _a literary history of the arabs_, pp. 225-227 (london, 1907). (g. w. t.)