On Ashura in 680, Husayn, grandson of the Prophet Muhammad and
the third imam of Shiite Islam, was killed during the battle of
Karbala (in present-day Iraq), which opposed supporters of
Husayn to those of Yazid I, the Umayyad caliph. The battle and
Husayn's death is one of the founding schisms between Shiites
and Sunnis. To Shiites, Husayn's death is equivalent to the way
Christians view Christ's passion and death--a supreme act of
suffering and redemption. Husayn's death in Shiites' eyes is an
event locked neither in time nor in place, but reflective of any
Shiite community that considers itself oppressed, persecuted or
humiliated. In the early days of the Iranian revolution in 1979,
and again during the Iran-Iraq war a frequent slogan in Iranian
streets and on Iranian broadcasts read, "Every day is Ashura,
every place is Karbala, every month is Muharram." Today, Ashura
is commemorated by Shiites in the form of a ritualistically
graphic, violent and bloody celebration of martyrdom as the
faithful recreate Hu