Lions of the day and Hermits of the Night

News ID: ۲۳۷۳۷۵

جمعه - ۱۹ فروردين ۲۰۱۰ / 2010 19 January

(By Pilot Colonel Ali Mohammad Naderi)
In 1364, as I was going to the fifth base of Omidieh, Moslem combatants were getting ready to attack Faw port. We had to prepare ourselves for their support. It was Thursday evening and we had spent a very busy week. At that time, Martyr Babaee was the deputy operations commander of the Air Force and Haj Mostafa Ardestani was his assistant. Martyr Ardestani turned to Abbass and said, "Abbass! If you agree, we'll leave together tonight and do some, religious ceremonies" Martyr Babaee agreed with him. I was not aware of this matter so I asked, "Could you tell me what the matter is? Haj Mostafa took a look at me and said, "We will take you along. I'm not telling you now. You yourself will notice".

As the sun was setting, we ate a brief dinner and got ready to move. They had already prepared a lantern. At first, I thought our destination was a friend's or acquaintance's home but carrying a lantern seemed questionable for me. I had asked about the destination once and I refused to ask questions again.
We got into the car and started to move along Mahshaher road. When we passed through Mahshahr, we continued to move towards Bushehr, and went along up to some distance. After a period of time, we got out of the asphalt road and took the dirt road. It was the winter and it had already poured down. The road was so slippery and made it difficult for us to move ahead.
We managed to reach the destination, which was a shrine, with difficulty. It was a distant shrine with an old muddy place. There was a pond in front of it, which had been full of rainwater.
We lit the lantern and performed our ablutions beside the pond. It was very cold. We went into the shrine. We said our prayers and sat in a corner. At first Martyr Babaee reminded us of Ali's oppressions in a loud agreeable voice and. That night, their beautiful movement which looked like that of Ali's in that dark distant spot made me ponder deeply.
I remembered the lord of the virtuous, Ali who prayed silently for his needs in the middle of Madineh's palm groves. I was in an odd mood. I had never been in such a mood in my whole life. They were really an apparent example of day's lions and night's hermits. They didn't waste time when they wanted to fight with the enemy, they roared like a lion and made the mean enemy tremble. When they finished their daily fighting missions, they prayed silently for their needs and they began to purify themselves from sins.