Sermon of al‑Gharra'

This article is an introduction to the Sermon of al‑Gharra'; to read its text see Text:Sermon of al-Gharra.

The Gharrāʾ Sermon is one of the most famous sermons of Nahj al-balagha. It is called "al-Gharra" (meaning the radiant or luminous sermon) because of its extraordinary eloquence and rhetorical power. Ibn Abi l-Hadid counts this sermon among the miracles of Imam Ali (a).

Although its words are simple, it employs most rhetorical and literary devices, such as analogy, rhyme, metaphor, and allusion. According to Sharif al-Radi, the compiler of Nahj al-balagha, the people who heard this sermon trembled with fear and wept.

The main content of this sermon revolves around four themes: (1) the human being and his destiny; (2) the censure of attachment to the world; (3) the exhortation to piety and the description of the qualities of the God‑wary; and (4) the depiction of events after death.

In the section concerning the human being and his destiny, which is regarded as the most important theme of the sermon, topics such as human death, the blessings bestowed upon him, human heedlessness, worldly life, man’s capacity to learn a lesson, and the transience of the world are discussed.

According to Abu Nu'aym al-Isfahhani in Hilyat al-awliya' wa tabaqat al-asfiya', Imam Ali (a) delivered this sermon while a person’s body was being lowered into the grave, and the family of the deceased was wailing and weeping.

Sayyid 'Abd al-Zahra Husayni Khatib, the orator and author of Masadir Nahj al-balagha wa asanidih, holds the view that there is no need to examine the chain of transmission of this sermon for authentication, because its text possesses such eloquence and rhetorical excellence that no one other than the infallibles could have expressed it. In addition to Nahj al-balagha, portions of this sermon have also been transmitted in works such as Tuhaf al-'uqul and Hilyat al-awliya' wa tabaqat al-asfiya'.

Sayyid 'Abd al-Zahra Husayni Khatib believes that in al-Iqd al-farid, another sermon of Imam Ali (a) was mistakenly called Khutbat al-Ghara'. Similarly, in Taysir al-matalib fi Amali Abi Talib, sermon 185 of Nahj al-balagha is referred to as Khutbat al-Ghara'. Sayyid Sadiq Musawi, in his book Tamam Nahj al-balagha, considers sermon 237 of Nahj al-balagha to be part of Khutbat al-Ghara'.

The numbering of this sermon varies across different editions of Nahj al-balagha: in al-Mu'jam al-mufahras and Subhi Salih it is 83, in Fayd al-Islam, al-Khu'i's commentary, Mulla Salih, and Ibn Abi l-Hadid it is 82, in Ibn Maytham it is 80, in 'Abduh it is 79, in Mulla Fath Allah it is 84, and in Fi Zilal it is 81.