The Preliminary Meeting of the International Congress for the Commemoration of Sayyid Murtada ‘Alam ol-Huda Was Held
The preliminary meeting of the international congress for the commemoration of Sayyid Murtada was held in ‘Allameh Majlesi Hall located in the Dar al-Hadith Scientific-Cultural Institute on Thursday, January ۷th ۲۰۱۶, hosting the scholars, researchers, professors and students. The meeting started at ۹:۰۰ A.M. with recitation of the Qur’an and it ended at ۱۱:۳۰ A.M. after unveiling of the commemorative stamp of Sayyid Murtada.
At the beginning of the meeting, Hojjat ol-Islam wa al-Muslemin Mahdi Mehrizi, the scientific secretary of the congress, besides commemorating the millennium of the demise of Sayyid Murtada, report on the activities of the Congress.
He said that since the summer of ۲۰۱۲ the serious attempts for holding the congress started. The activities included the arrangements for the correction of all of Sayyid Murtada’s works based on the sound standards of revising texts. He predicted that the collection of Sayyid Murtada’s works, equipped with the pronunciation guide and the indexes, will be published in ۳۵ volumes. Mehrizi also said that in addition to publishing Sayyid Murtada's thoughts and opinions and also a number of relevant dissertations and theses, there has been a call for articles, through which two hundred articles have been received in Farsi and Arabic. About ۱۲۰ of the articles have been approved by the reviewers.
In the following, the head of the congress, Ayatollah Reza Ostadi spoke. In a part of his speech, he said: from ۴۱۳ to ۴۳۶ AH, Sayyid Murtada led the Shiites and the followers of Ahl ul-Bayt PBUT. Sayyid Murtada was qualified with showing reverence for science, being initiative, being institutor, enjoying great popularity among Shiites and Sunnis, and enjoying integrity. Some Shiite scholars have written books which were correction or completion of the works of other outstanding scholars; however, Sayyid Murtada was not like that.
Ayatollah Ostadi explained about Sayyid Murtada's characteristics and said that Sayyid Murtada was an expert in all the fields and he enjoyed integrity in all the current fields of the seminary sciences, and most of the elders and scholars were his students.
Ayatollah Ostadi further added that spirituality was Sayyid Murtada's another outstanding characteristic. The author of Majma' ol-Bayan has almost mentioned Sayyid Murtada in about ۴۰ occasions. Sheikh Tusi would not have mentioned such praises about Sayyid Murtada, if he had not been such an outstanding figure.
Ayatollah Ostadi continued that whenever Khwajah Nasir al-Ddin Tusi made a reference to Sayyid Murtada in his classes, he saluted him reverently. The other current scholars also showed much respect toward him. In Lisaan al-Mizaan, Ibn-i Hajar considered Sayyid Murtada as pioneering figure who changed his house to a place for education, training and scholarly disputes. He changed his house to a university. He was such an exalted figure and in his own age, he was the head in various fields; but the most important thing for him was science, knowledgeability, and spirituality.
The meeting continued with the presentation of two articles by Dr. Rasul Ja'farian and Ali Sadra'iniya, whose articles were titled respectively as: "The interaction of the Hillah school of thought with Sayyid Murtada's viewpoints", and "New findings about Sayyid Murtada based on manuscripts and ancient printed books". After that, Dr. Sayyid Hassan Islami reported on writing a book titled as Sayyid Murtada's Thoughts.
The preliminary meeting of the international congress for the commemoration of Sayyid Murtada ended with unveiling of the commemorative stamp of Sayyid Murtada, titled as "Commemoration of the Millennium of Sayyid Murtada". Ayatollah Mohammadi Reyshahri, Ayatollah Karimi Jahromi, Ayatollah Feyz Gilani and Mohandes Mehri, the executive manager of the Post office, were present at the unveiling ceremony.
On the sidelines of the meeting, there was an exhibition of some of Sayyid Murtada’s scientific works (manuscripts, pictorial copies, and printed copies) and a number of dissertations identified in connection with Sayyid Murtada.
