Ithna Ashariyah: Difference between revisions

The succeeding imamate of al-Sadiq 's descendants, from [[Musa al-Kazim]] (d. 799), the seventh imam, to [[Muhammad al-Mahdi]] (disappeared in 874 to return as the Mahdi, “divinely guided” leader of the ummah [community], at the End of Time), the twelfth and last imam, was the most difficult period for the Ithna ʿAshariyah. The imams lived either incarcerated or under surveillance for suspected activities against the caliphate. The Shiʿa were faced with unrelenting ʿAbbasid atrocities and had little or no access to their imams. Under those conditions, the imams appointed their nuwwab (personal deputies), who conveyed their teachings and collected religious dues, such as the khums (originally a fifth of the spoils of war) and zakat (alms), from their followers. This deputyship gradually evolved into the influential religious institution among the Shiʿa that culminated in the [[wilaya]] (comprehensive guardianship) of the qualified mujtahid (or faqih; jurist-theologian) under the Qajar and post-Qajar jurists.

During al-Kazhim 's imamate, the concept of an imam in ghaybah (occultation), who continued to direct his community 's affairs through his trusted associates, found theological and legal expression in the hadiths attributed to the imams al-Baqir and al-Sadiq. The requirement of taqiyah (prudential concealment of one 's true belief) as a strategy of survival in the midst of the hostile majoritarian Sunnis also became more pronounced among the Shiʿa at this time.

The occultation of the twelfth imam is divided into two forms: the Short (or Lesser) Occultation and the Complete (or Greater) Occultation. During the Short Occultation (874–941), the last imam appointed some of his prominent followers as his “special deputies” to carry on the function of the imamate in religious and social affairs. During the Complete Occultation (941–), the learned jurists among the Shiʿa were believed to have been appointed by the twelfth imam as his “general deputies” to guide believers pending his return.

The period of the general deputies has been dominated by two concerns: first, stabilization of the theological imamate of the twelve imams; and second, consolidation of the juridical and functional imamate of the leading Shiʿi scholars who, being de facto leaders of the Shiʿa, were solely responsible for directing their social and religious life. Whereas the former concern provided the Twelver community with its distinctive creedal identity based on the doctrine of divine justice and infallible leadership of the imams, the latter was instrumental in providing authoritative religious praxis and hierarchical intellectual and spiritual organization to ensure the continuity of the minority community spirit living at times under hostile Sunni power.

==Shi’i Scholarship==

The establishment of the [http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/buyids Buyid dynasty] (932–1055) and its patronage of Shi’ism, despite its support for the continuation of the Sunni caliphate as symbolic of the unity of the majority of the Muslims, created favorable political and social conditions for the Shiʿa. It was intellectually the most productive period of the Ithna ʿAshariyah. Prominent scholars representing the rationalist trend of the Baghdad theologians wrote major works vindicating the imamate of the Hidden Imam. Baghdad was also the point of convergence for the two important centers of Shiʿi hadith, [[Kufa]], and Qom. Qom remained an important center for other cities of Shiʿi learning in Khurasan.