Shi'i Islam
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Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Moojan Momen, Shi'i Islam, bahai-library.com.
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Shi`i Islam

Moojan Momen

1995

Islam, Shi`i. The branch of Islam that accepted
`Ali ibn Abi-Talib, Muhammad's son-in-law, as the Prophet's legitimate
successor. The Twelver Shi`is, the branch of Shi`ism that accepted a line
of twelve hereditary successors called Imams, are the majority of modern
Shi`is. The Babi and Bahá'í Faiths arose in the Twelver Shi`i milieu in
Iran and are related in many ways to Shi`i belief, practice, and concepts.

1. History. The origins of Shi`i
Islam are controversial. Traditional Sunni and Shi`i histories differ in
many respects. These are considered by many Western scholars to be the
result of historians of the third Islamic century reading back into the
past the concerns and orthodoxies of their own time. The following account
will give something of the traditional accounts of the majority group of
the Shi`is, the Twelvers.
a. Early history. Shi`i historians tell that during the
lifetime of Muhammad, there were a number of indications that he intended
`Ali--who was his cousin, foster-brother, and son-in-law--to succeed him
as leader of the Muslim community. In particular, during the return to
Medina from his last pilgrimage to Mecca, Muhammad announced to all of
his companions: "Whoever has Me as his Lord, also has `Ali as his Lord.
O God! Be Thou the supporter of whoever supports `Ali and the enemy of
whoever opposes him." (Momen 15)
It appears, however, that the nomination of `Ali was not
sufficiently clear, for after the death of Muhammad in 632, an ad hoc
assembly of Muslims elected Abu-Bakr as Caliph. `Ali, for the sake of Muslim
unity, did not oppose Abu-Bakr but retired from public life during the
caliphates of Abu-Bakr, `Umar, and `Uthman.
After the murder of `Uthman in 656, the people of Medina
proclaimed `Ali Caliph. `Ali accepted the Caliphate but was immediately
opposed by a number of factions. The most serious opposition came from
the family of `Uthman, headed by Mu`awiyah, who claimed that `Ali had given
protection to `Uthman's murderers. The Battle of Siffin in 657 between
the armies of `Ali and Mu`awiyah resulted in a stalemate and an agreement
to submit the dispute to arbitration. `Ali's problems then intensified
when a part of his army repudiated him for having submitted to arbitration.
These seceders, the Khawarij, were defeated at the Battle of Nahrawan,
but one of them avenged this defeat by assassinating `Ali at the Mosque
of Kufih in 661.
`Ali's elder son, Hasan, succeeded to the Caliphate but
was soon forced to abdicate in favor of Mu`awiyah, who became the first
of the Umayyad dynasty of Caliphs. Thus the Caliphate passed out of the
hands of the descendants of `Ali. But there was a small group of people
who continued to believe that leadership in Islam belonged by right to
the family of `Ali. After Hasan's death in 669, these gathered around the
latter's brother, Husayn.
After Mu`awiyah's death and the accession of his son Yazid
to the Caliphate, Husayn was persuaded to leave Medina and set out for
Kufih, where he had been promised support for his claim to leadership.
But Yazid acted quickly in arresting Husayn's emissary in Kufih, intimidating
the Kufans, and intercepting Husayn on his way. Husayn was surrounded at
a place called Karbala and there killed, together with all of his companions,
in 680.
The martyrdom of Husayn became the rallying point of the
party of `Ali (Shi`at `Ali), and continues to this day to be the most important
commemoration in the Shi`i calendar. After this event, there was some disagreement
among the Shi`is over the identity of their spiritual leader, the Imam,
for the next few generations. Modern Twelver Shi`is regard the eldest son
of the each Imam to have succeeded to the Imamate. But in the lifetime
of Husayn's son, `Ali Zaynu'l-`Abidin, the majority of the Shi`is of the
time, under the leadership of Mukhtar ath-Thaqafi, gave their allegiance
to the third son of `Ali, Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya (whose mother was not
Fatimah, the daughter of the Prophet). Again, after Zaynu'l-`Abidin's death
in about 713, the next Imam is considered by modern Shi`is to have been
the latter's son, Muhammad al-Baqir. But many Shi`is supported al-Baqir's
half-brother, Zayd, who rebelled against the Umayyads in 740. The modern
Shi`i sect of the Zaydis are named after this man. They are to be found
in north Yemen. The Zaydi Imam in the Yemen was overthrown in the revolution
of 1962.
In the time of Muhammad al-Baqir's son and successor,
Ja`far as-Sadiq, who inherited the Imamate in about 735, the descendants
of Muhammad's uncle, al-`Abbas, rose in rebellion against the Umayyads
and succeeded in gaining the Caliphate to form the Abbasid dynasty. Some
Shi`is considered that their objective, which was to see someone from the
family of Muhammad leading the Islamic world, had been achieved. But many
Shi`is did not consider this situation satisfactory, and the Abbasids reciprocated
by persecuting the descendants of `Ali. As-Sadiq himself was a highly respected
figure in the Islamic world until his death in 765.
After as-Sadiq's death there was a further split among
the Shi`is because his eldest son, Isma`il, had died before him. Some held
that since as-Sadiq had first appointed Isma`il as his heir, the rightful
inheritor of the Imamate was Isma`il's son. This split is the origin of
the Isma`ili sect of Shi`ism, which is itself divided into a number of
sects: the Musta`lis who are in turn divided into Sulaymani and Da'udi
factions and are mainly found in the Yemen and India, where they are called
Bohras; and the Nizaris, who are led by the Aga Khan and are to be found
in India, Syria, Iran, Central Asia, and East Africa. The Druse are a faction
that broke away from the Isma`ilis.
The Twelver Shi`is maintain, however, that after Isma`il's
death, as-Sadiq appointed his next son, Musa al-Kazim to the Imamate. On
al-Kazim's death in 799, the Imamate passed to his son `Ali ar-Rida. For
a time there was the hope of a rapprochement between the Shi`is and the
Abbasids on the basis of ar-Rida's appointment as the heir to the Caliphate.
But ar-Rida died prematurely (by poisoning, the Shi`i historians maintain)
in 818 in northeast Iran, and nothing came of this.
The next three Imams were kept under close surveillance
by the Abbasids. They were: Muhammad at-Taqi (died 835); `Ali al-Hadi (died
868), and Hasan al-`Askari. After the death of Hasan al-`Askari in A.H.
260/A.D. 874, some said that Hasan's son, Muhammad, who was but a child,
had gone into occultation (hiding) in order to escape from his enemies
and that his life has been miraculously prolonged until the time is right
for his return as the Imam Mahdi (the Qa'im). But Ja`far, the brother of
Hasan al-`Askari, refuted this whole story, claiming that his brother had
had no children at all. Some asserted that the Imam Qa'im had not yet been
born but would be born in the Last Days and would bring justice to the
world. It is difficult to know what proportion of the Shi`is of that time
followed each of the various factions that arose.
Those Shi`is who held to the occultation of Hasan's son--i.e.
what was to become the official Twelver position--asserted that the Hidden
Imam had appointed a series of four intermediaries between himself and
the Shi`is, called the four Babs (gates) or Safirs (ambassadors). This
situation came to be called the Lesser Occultation and lasted until 329/941.
There were then no further intermediaries, and the Shi`is entered into
what is called the Greater Occultation.
This then was the main course of Shi`i history as related
in the traditional histories. At the succession of each Imam, these histories
record numerous factions and sects splitting off; only the main ones have
been mentioned above. Modern Western scholars question this traditional
account. The neat pattern of the succession of Imams with branching dissident
factions at each generation seems to have been a retrospective recasting
of history in order to satisfy theoretical considerations current in the
third Islamic century (see Momen 61-75).
b. History in medieval times. By the middle of the fourth
century A.H. (tenth century C.E.), the Shi`is had made great strides politically.
Large parts of the Muslim world were under the control of Shi`i dynasties
of one sort or another. In Iran and Iraq the Shi`i Iranian dynasty of Buyids
held sway, even controlling the Caliph in Baghdad. The Shi`i Hamdanid dynasty
ruled Syria. The Fatimids who held Egypt and much of North Africa were
Isma`ili Shi`is; in north-west Africa, the Idrisids were inclined to Shi`ism;
while Shi`is of the Zaydi sect controlled parts of northern Iran and the
Yemen. But despite this political dominance, the Shi`is were unable to
sway the religious affiliations of the urban masses in the Islamic heartlands;
and when the Shi`i dynasties fell towards the end of the tenth century,
Sunni dominance re-established itself.
In the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, Shi`ism began
to influence the Sunni world again, through the medium of Sufism. The latter
became a major movement in Islam after the Mongol invasions. Sufism had
many inter-connections with Shi`ism. Many of the leading Sufi shaykhs of
this period had Shi`i leanings in their teachings. In the fifteenth century,
a number of minor Shi`i states were set up in Khurasan and Mazandaran,
and Shi`ism also spread into India.
c. Shi`ism in modern times. The sixteenth century saw
the establishment of a Shi`i state in Iran (see below) and a number of
small Shi`i states in central India. Later in the eighteenth century, the
rulers of Oudh (Awadh) in northeast India created an important center for
Shi`ism there.
Today, the majority (88%) of Iranians are Shi`is as are
the majority of the populations of Iraq (57%), Bahrain (54%), and the Republic
of Azerbaijan (66%). Shi`is are the largest religious community in the
Lebanon (30%). There are also important Shi`i communities in Pakistan,
India, Afghanistan, Turkey, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia.

2. Shi`ism in Iran. Shi`ism had
had a following in Iran from the earliest period. The first Shi`is were,
of course, Arab residents of Medina who favored `Ali's claim to the Caliphate.
But even among these, one of the most prominent was the Iranian Salman.
Later, as the Arab armies advanced and the newly-conquered and converted
peoples were given an inferior position in the Islamic polity, Mukhtar
ath-Thaqafi (see above) is credited with being the first to attract Iranians
to the Shi`i cause on the base of full equality.
When `Ali ar-Rida was elevated to the position of heir
to the throne, his sister, Fatimah al-Ma`suma, set out to visit him in
Khurasan. On the way she died and was buried in the town of Qum. Around
this shrine an important Shi`i community arose. There were also Shi`i communities
between Qum and the Caspian coast to the north. In Khurasan around the
shrine of `Ali ar-Rida near Tus (now Mashhad) and in other towns of east
Khurasan there were important Shi`i communities. In western Iran, there
were communities of Ahl-i-Haqq, a Shi`i sect that is considered extremist
by orthodox Shi`is (because it is considered to elevate `Ali to a station
equal to or above that of Muhammad). But the rest of Iran was almost completely
Sunni in orientation.
The situation remained thus until the dawn of the sixteenth
century when the leader of the Sufi order of the Safavids conquered the
whole of Iran and made Twelver Shi`ism the state religion. Over the next
two centuries, the people of Iran were gradually converted to Shi`ism until
it became the majority religion. Although Iran came under Sunni rulers
after the fall of the Safavids, the Shi`ism of the people did not waver,
and Shi`i rule was reestablished under the Zand and Qajar dynasties in
the eighteenth century.

3. Doctrines and practices of Twelver
Shi`ism.
a. Fundamentals of the religion. Twelver Shi`is hold that
the Qur'anic verses that forbid blind imitation (taqlid) in matters
of religion refer to the fundamentals of the religion (usul ad-din).
The five fundamentals of the religion (usul ad-din) are: Divine
Unity (tawhid); Prophethood; the Resurrection; the Imamate; and
Divine Justice. They consider it obligatory that each Shi`i who has not
undertaken the necessary study should imitate (taqlid) a scholar
who is an authority on the application of religious law (furu` ad-din).

b. The Imamate. For Sunnis, the leader of the Muslims
after the death of Muhammad was a temporal leader chosen by consensus,
although hereditary succession became the norm. For Shi`is, leadership
belonged to the successor designated by Muhammad and subsequent designated
successors. The authority of each successor derived from this designation,
which made him entitled to both spiritual and temporal leadership. Whether
the holder of this station actually exercised temporal power made no difference
to his station. The Imam was the Guide (hadi) for mankind and the
Proof (hujjat) of God. In their mystical dimensions, Muhammad, Fatimah,
and the Twelve Imams ("the Fourteen Pure Ones") were a light that God created
before the creation of the material world. This light then became the cause
and instrument of the rest of creation and descended upon each of the Prophets
until it became embodied in the Fourteen Pure Ones.
The Imams are, in Shi`i doctrine, the authorized interpreters
of the Qur'an as well as the supreme arbiters of the Holy Law. Thus it
is necessary for the people of each age to recognize the Imam of the Age
in order to receive correct guidance on these matters. Indeed, in one Tradition,
Husayn is reported to have said that "God created mankind in order that
they might know Him". When asked "What is knowing God?", he replied, "It
is that the people of each age know their Imam." (Momen 158). The Qur'an
contains no direct reference to the Imamate. But the Imams have interpreted
a large number of verses of the Qur'an as referring to themselves (see
Momen 151-153).

c. Eschatology. The Shi`is, along with other Muslims,
believe in a Day of Judgment and a physical resurrection at the end of
the world. Shi`is also believe that just before the end of the world the
Hidden Twelfth Imam will appear and fill the earth with justice when it
had been filled with injustice.
There are numerous prophecies about the signs of the coming
of the Hidden Imam recorded in the books of Shi`i tradition. One of the
events that will occur is the return (q.v., raj`a) of Muhammad,
the Imams, and the prophets of old, together with all those who have either
supported Muhammad and the Imams or opposed them. The first to return after
the appearance of the Mahdi will be the Imam Husayn and Jesus Christ. There
will then be a great battle between the forces of the Imam and those of
his opponents, thus eliminating all injustice from the world.

d. Ritual elements and laws. The ritual elements in Shi`ism
are very similar to Sunni Islam. They are traditionally divided into eight:
obligatory prayer (salat or namaz); fasting (siyam
or sawm); obligatory alms (zakat); the one-fifth tax (khums),
which is not practiced by Sunnis; pilgrimage (hajj); religious war
(jihad); enjoining others to do good (amr bi'l-ma`ruf); exhorting
others to desist from evil (nahy `an al-munkar).

e. Shi`i practices. In addition there are a number of
characteristically Shi`i practices:
i. Visitation (ziyarat)--visiting the shrines of
the Imams and the family of the Imams.
ii. Temporary marriage (mut`a)--temporary marriage
for a pre-determined period and for an agreed fee.
iii. Religious dissimulation (taqiyya)--dissimulation
of one's religious beliefs while maintaining mental reservation in times
of danger to life or property.
iv. Recitals of the sufferings of the Imams and in particular
the martyrdom of Husayn (rawdih-khani,
majlis, qirayah).
These are very emotional events at which there is much wailing and beating
or flailing of chests and backs. There are also a number of other commemorations
of the sufferings of the Imams including the performance of passion-plays
(ta`ziyah), though the exact practices vary between countries.

4. Shi`i law and the `ulama. The
principal intellectual discipline in religion in the Islamic and Shi`i
world is not theology as in Christianity but rather the application of
the Holy Law. Thus the religious professionals in the Islamic world--the
"learned," `ulama'--are mainly concerned with applying the Holy Law to
the situations of everyday life. Shi`i law differs only in minor ways from
the law of other Muslim groups. Shi`is accept the authority of traditions
attributed to the Imams and reject traditions transmitted by non-Shi`is.
The `ulama are trained in Islamic religious law (fiqh)
and the principles for applying it to everyday life (usul al-fiqh).
This training is done at religious colleges called madrasas, where
the full course can last for as long as fifteen years. The most important
of these colleges in the Shi`i world are at Qum and Mashhad in Iran and
at Najaf and Karbala in Iraq.
At the end of training, the student is certified as being
able to perform ijtihad, the process of deriving judgments on points
of religious law through the processes of usul al-fiqh. Such a person
is called a
mujtahid, a rank which relatively few Shi`i `ulama reach.
In Shi`i theory, although taqlid in relation to the fundamentals
of religion is forbidden (see 3.a above), it is necessary and obligatory
that each Shi`i who has not undertaken the necessary training to become
a mujtahid must follow (taqlid) the judgment of someone who
has in matters of the application of religious law (furu` ad-din).
A mujtahid whose legal guidance is followed by a significant number
of believers becomes a marja` at-taqlid (reference point for imitation)
or, more commonly today, Ayatu'llah (sign of God).

5. Schools and sects of Twelver Shi`ism.
Although various other Shi`i sects have been described above, Twelver Shi`ism
is itself divided into a number of schools:

a. Usuli. This school is the one to which the majority
of Twelver Shi`is today belong. It is founded on certain principles (usul)
of jurisprudence that allow the `ulama to deliver judgments on almost any
question that comes before them. This school was revived in the 18th century
by Vahid Bihbihani (1706-1792), but its current practices are based on
the legal norms evolved by Shaykh Murtada Ansari (1799-1864).

b. Akhbari. This school holds that legal rulings can only
be given by the `ulama in cases where there are clear precedents established
by the Traditions (akhbar) of the Imams. It was revived by Mulla
Muhammad Amin Astarabadi (d. 1623) as a reaction to the great freedom given
to jurists by the Usuli school. During the 17th and early 18th centuries,
it became the predominant school in most parts of the Shi`i world but was
then driven back by the resurgent Usulis under Bihbihani.

c. Shaykhi. Whereas the Usuli majority and the Akhbaris
disagree about jurisprudence, the Usulis and the Shaykhis disagree about
doctrine. The Shaykhis assert that many of the doctrines that in orthodox
circles are understood literally--for example, the concepts of Heaven,
Hell, Resurrection, and the return of the Twelfth Imam--are all concepts
that are to be fulfilled at the level of spiritual imagery (see "Shaykhism.2.c"
and "Return.2").

6. The Bahá'í Faith and Shi`ism.
a. Shi`i interactions with the Babi and Bahá'í Faiths.
From the earliest days, the Shi`i `ulama have opposed the Babi and Bahá'í
Faiths. Apart from the obvious challenge to the authority of the `ulama
posed by the new religion, there were a number of doctrinal disagreements
(see "Islam.3"). Shoghi Effendi condemns the Shi`i `ulama strongly and
predicts their downfall (PDC 8-95). He refers to Bahá'u'lláh's statement
that were it not for them, the Babi Faith would have triumphed in Iran
in two years (PDC 85).

b. Bahá'í teachings concerning Shi`ism. The Babi and Bahá'í
scriptures support the Shi`i interpretation of the events of early Islamic
history by upholding `Ali's claim to the position of religious and temporal
leadership after Muhammad, as well as the succession of Imams among the
descendants of `Ali. `Abdu'l-Bahá, for example (in Lawh-i-Hizar-Bayti),
writes that the words of `Umar, the second Caliph: "The Book of God is
enough for us" (said in refutation of `Ali's claim), undermined the very
foundations of Islam and brought bloodshed and discord to the Muslim world.
They became, metaphorically, the weapon that killed the Imam `Ali; they
caused the death of the Imam Husayn at Karbala; and they even became the
bullets that pierced the breast of the Bab, the chains around the neck
of Bahá'u'lláh, and the cause of his exile.
One major point of disagreement is the Twelfth Imam. Bahá'u'lláh
and `Abdu'l-Bahá considered the story of the occultation of the Twelfth
Imam to have been a pious fraud conceived by a number of the leading Shi`is
in order to maintain the coherence and continuity of the Shi`i movement
after the death of Hasan al-`Askari (See MAS 1:7, 2:50-52; 4:90-91).

c. Shi`ism as a background for the Bahá'í Faith. The Bahá'í
Faith was born into a Shi`i environment in Iran and almost all of the early
converts were from Shi`i Islam. Thus, in the same way that a number of
Jewish institutions were grown up within Christianity, some of the institutions
of Shi`ism were carried forward into the Bahá'í Faith. Some of the teachings
of the Bahá'í Faith are also to be found in embryonic form in Shi`i Islam.
There is no need to mention in detail the more obvious
parallels such as the daily obligatory prayer, the fast, religious taxes,
and the pilgrimage since these institutions are also to be found in Sunni
Islam and indeed in other religions. However, the Shi`i practice of visiting
the shrines of the Imams and the family of the Imams, together with the
reading of Tablets of Visitation, finds parallels with the Bahá'í "pilgrimage"
to Haifa and the reading of Tablets of Visitation at the shrines there
(see "Pilgrimage and Visitation" and "Visitation, Tablets of"). Bahá'ís
also visit the graves of prominent Bahá'ís and locations associated with
Bahá'í history.
The Bahá'í teaching of the independent investigation of
truth is to be found in embryonic form in the Shi`i prohibition of taqlid,
blind imitation, in matters of the principles of religion. Based on certain
passages from the Qur'an (5:104-5; 17:36; 21:52-4), Shi`is maintain that
each person has the obligation to investigate the fundamentals of religious
truth (see 3.a above) for himself or herself. An embryonic form of the
Bahá'í teaching of the harmony of religion and science can be seen in the
Shi`i insistence that all theological statements should be compatible with
rationality as well as with revealed truth (Shii theology was much influenced
by the rationalist Mu`tazili theology). Even in areas such as the equality
of men and women, the Shi`i legal code allows women more rights in such
matters as inheritance, than Sunni law (this being probably related to
the important position of Fatimah through whom the line of Imams was descended
from the Prophet).
Some Shi`i concepts have been taken and radically re-interpreted
in the Bahá'í scripture. For example, the Bab in the Persian Bayan (q.v.)
and Bahá'u'lláh in the Book of Certitude (q.v.) re-interpret the concept
of raj`a, return (see above), to refer to a typological or archetypal
return of the Imam Mahdi, Imam Husayn, and the others as the key persons
in Babi and Bahá'í history (see "Return").
One last important area in which the Bahá'í Faith has
a significant precedent in Shi`ism is in the concept of the Covenant (q.v.).
Each Imam was considered to have appointed his successor by verbal designation.
This process is called in the Shi`i sources the formation of a "Covenant"
(ahd, mithaq).

d. Shi`i prophecy and the Babi and Bahá'í Faiths. A great
deal has been written by both the central figures of the Babi and Bahá'í
Faith and by their followers seeking to establish that the Bab and Bahá'u'lláh
fulfill the Shi`i prophecies relating to the appearance of the Hidden Twelfth
Imam and the return of the Imam Husayn. These prophecies are held to have
predicted the time, place, and manner of the coming of the Bab and Bahá'u'lláh,
as well as their names, the opposition that they would encounter, and some
of the events that would occur in that time. (Some of these prophecies
are translated in Momen 166-170).

Bibliography: For an overall view
of Shi`i Islam, see M. Momen, Introduction to Shi`i Islam: the history
and doctrines of Twelver Shi`ism (Oxford and New Haven: George Ronald,
1985. Muhammad Husayn Tabataba'i, Shi`ite Islam (tr. Seyyed Hossein
Nasr), Persian Studies Series, Albany: State University of New York Press,
1975 is a summary of Shi`i history and belief by an eminent Shi`i philosopher.
Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Shi`ism: Doctrines, Thought, and Spirituality
and Expectation of the Millennium: Shi`ism in History (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 1988) are collections of excerpts from writings
of Shi`i scholars and some academics. On the Occultation of the Twelfth
Imam see A. A. Sachedina,
Islamic Messianism: the idea of the Mihdi
in Twelver Shi`ism Albany, 1981; J.M. Hussain, The Occultation of
the Twelfth Imam London, 1982. On the concepts of martyrdom and redemptive
suffering in Shi`i Islam, see Mahmoud Ayoub, Redemptive Suffering in
Islam, a study of the devotional aspects of `Ashura in Twelver Shi`ism,
The Hague: Mouton, 1978. On Iranian Shi`ism, see A. Bausani, Persia
Religiosa Milan: Saggiatore, 1959; H. Corbin, En Islam iranien,
4 vols., Paris: Gallimard, 1971-2. On the `ulama, see R. Mottahedeh, The
Mantle of the Prophet: religion and politics in Iran London, 1986.

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