Arbaeen, World Unity Axis int'l conference kicks off in Iraq

'Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) was the flag-bearer of unity among Muslims; and Quran is unity-creating book,' Najaf Najafi-Rouhani said stressing the necessity of Islamic scholars' movement toward convergence of the Islamic ummah.

The conference is participated by scholars from Iran, Iraq, Indonesia, South Africa, Nigeria, Bahrain, Yemen, Kenya, Germany, England, and the US.

It centers around themes such as 'Arbaeen and political insight', 'Arbaeen and Islamic convergence', and 'Arbaeen and Media'.

Arbaeen, an Arabic word meaning the 40th, is a mourning ceremony held 40 days after Imam Hussein, Prophet Muhammad's grandson, and his 72 followers, including 18 of family members and close relatives, were brutally martyred in Karbala on Ashura, the 10th day of the first month of the Arabic year, by the army of the second Umayyad caliph, Yazid ibn Muawiyah, in AD 680.

The mourning ceremony began and was soon established when Jabir ibn Abdullah Ansari, a close follower of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), then 77, visited Imam Hussein's grave as the Imam's first pilgrim, 40 days after Ashura.

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