psyah
May 22, 2012, 6:47am
48
Re: Hazrat Abu Bakr Siddique r.a
I do not know any Shia from any part of world who would keep their sons name Abu Bakr, Umar, or Uthman today because today it is only the personalities of the khulafa that comes to mind when these names are taken. This was not the case back in the times we are talking about. The list of the martyrs of Karbala has names like Yazeed included in it. At the same time Yazid’s army commander who beseiged Madina and attacked Mecca was Husayn ibn Numayr. Many important Shia in those days are Muawiya, Umar, Yazeed because those were common names then and taking one of those names did not necessarily have the affiliation witht the names of khulafa like it is today. Ali ibne Hussain named his own son Abdul Rehman despite the Kharijitte killer of Imam Ali being Abdul Rehman ibne Muljim.
Even in todays times it is not possible to judge a name. For example if a father names his child Ahmad then has he done so because that is the name of the Prophet he believes in? or has he named him after Ahmad the musician? or Ahmad the cricketer? or it could be the case of that person liking the sound of the name Ahmad. Or perhaps the person liked the literal meanings of the word Ahmad. And of course there is a possibility that he has a friend or he has met somebody nice with the name Ahmad. So there are many possibilities. In real life I know a hindu guy who named his son Tariq because he liked the sound of it. I had a Muslim friend in Pakistan with the name Anil because his father was impressed from Anil Kapoor the Bollywood hero. There are political reasons at play too such as in Saddam’s Iraq where parents were paid to name their children Saddam and on the birthday of the president all the little Saddams would get prizes from the government!
Abu Bakr being the first name is one thing, I sat in a taxi in Indonesia and the driver name badge read Osman bin Affan (literal meaning, Osman son of Affan). I asked if this was his name. He said yes he was named this because this was a famous Islamic personality. Classic case of being lost in translation.
I’m gonna squeeze one last post in here … Pathan Bhai … this may well be true for the vast majority of people today … but I don’t think it is true for Sayyiduna Ali (RA) to have named his children on those reasons other than “he (RA) admired the people (RA) who are famous with those names”