The most important agent that brings dignity throughouthistory, the most important teacher of dignity, is Husayn (as).The most important base for dignity is spiritual independence.All of religion is about the secret of helping one to obtainindependence. God didn’t allow His Husayn (as) to be sacrificed for something small. God didn’t put Karbala for teaching a simple, unimportant, lesson. I ask that you don’t limit Imam Husayn’s (as) movement to just confronting oppression. Confronting oppression was a small part of it. Why do we want to confront oppression? Because an oppressor takes our dignity from us. Naïve people may claim I’m saying confronting oppression isn’t important! I’m even saying that everything good isn’t important if there is no independence, dignity and pure intention for getting close to God in it. You recite the Qur’an, pray, go on Hajj and so on. All these good deeds will not be accepted without there being dignity and independence, as this is interpreted in religion as having a pure intention. Independence in religion means having a pure intention [and acting only for God]. Is a deed without a pure intention accepted? No, so it isn’t valuable. Why don’t some people like hearing these things? If one confronts oppression but is an abject person who doesn’t protect his own and other people’s dignity, his confronting oppression has no value. What kind of confronting oppression is that? What value does it have? The main and most important reason for Aba Abdillah al-Husayn’s (as) martyrdom was to preserve dignity. He said, “Never to humiliation.” The main reason for Karbala was dignity. Sometimes it is said that the main reason for Ashura was to enjoin doing good and forbid doing evil. This may be seen in Aba Abdillah al-Husayn’s (as) will, “My uprising is to reform the nation of my grandfather. I want to enjoin doing good and forbid doing evil.” This is completely correct. The Imam moved out for this, but they stopped the Imam. They said he could no longer enjoin good and forbid evil. The Imam’s motto in the beginning was, “Enjoining good and forbidding evil.” But then his motto turned into, “Never to humiliation.” You don’t want to correct yourself, fine. You won’t help for enjoining good and forbidding evil, fine. You want your caliph to be like that, fine. But I, Husayn, won’t accept humiliation!  The main point of this uprising was dignity. Everything we say about Ashura and Karbala, when we read elegies, beat our chests, repeat mottos or anything else, these all should be about dignity first and then about other topics. Dignity and having affection for Aba Abdillah al-Husayn (as).When we are expressing our affection for Aba Abdillah al-Husayn, we should remember to protect Imam Husayn’s dignity and know that Imam Husayn wants us to be dignified as well. When confronting oppression, you should say why you’re confronting oppression. The reason is because an oppressor destroys people’s dignity. In the process of confronting oppression, not only will you preserve your own dignity, you will also preserve other people’s dignity as well. Consider when Imam Ali (as) killed Amar bin Abdiwad, but he preserved his dignity [by not taking away his armor]. God is witness, even if you’re a believer who prays but you don’t pay attention to this secret, it’s not clear what will happen to you in the end! Something else may happen Show Less >>