All Islamic groups pledged allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.). Until that day, there was no allegiance as general as the allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) except Shām which did not pledge to him. All Islamic groups and great companions of the holy Prophet (P.B.U.H. & H.H.) swore allegiance to the Imam (P.B.U.H.). Only a few people–less than ten–remained whom the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) brought into the mosque and asked one by one why they did not pledge allegiance including ‘Abdullāh b. ‘Umar and Sa‘d b. Abī Waqqāṣ. There were a few who did not swear allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) and the Imam (P.B.U.H.) asked them about. Each of them made an excuse and said something; some of them swore allegiance to him, some–who were a few and not many–did not and the Imam (P.B.U.H.) let them go. But prominent figures such as Ṭalḥa, Zubayr, so and so all pledged allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.). But before they pledged allegiance to him, the Imam (P.B.U.H.) addressed them as, “You should know that if I respond to you”, this means now you are insisting on me to take over the government, “I would lead you”, that if I respond to you positively, you should not assume that I would care about figures, personalities, the old bones and other famous and adorned people. Lest you assume that I would follow and imitate such and such, and I would pick their way as my own, not at all. “You should know that if I respond to you I would lead you as I know.”, Here the Imam (P.B.U.H.) means he would lead and administer the people the way he knows, recognizes, and finds about Islam. The Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) enumerated and explained his conditions for people and accepted the Caliphate. The Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) could have granted some concession for the sake of maintaining political expediencies, deferring some certain aspects of the case and such things in order to win hearts, but there, too, he insisted with complete certainty on the principles of Islam and Islamic values and this made all the enemies to line up against ‘Alī (P.B.U.H.); And the Commander of the Faithful (P.B.U.H.) faced in a campaign with the manifestation of wealth, power, and hypocrisy, with legitimate, credible, and well-known figures in another campaign, and with sanctimonious and preachy people but ignorant of the truth and the spirit of Islam, the Islamic teachings, the position and dignity of the Imam (P.B.U.H.) and those who resort to violence, brutality, and irritability.
