Studying Shīʿī Hadith and History
“I saw the Messenger of Allah in a dream. He came to me so I said: “O Messenger of Allah! They have differed over the tashahhud. So-and-so says it is one way, another says it is a different way, Ibn Masʿūd says it is yet another way!” [1] Khuṣayf al-Jazarī (d. c. 136) Introduction … Continue reading Recovering ʿAlī’s Historical Positions: The Case of the Tashahhud
Introduction Qāḍī Abū Yūsuf, the famous student of Abū Ḥanīfa (d. 150) who went on to become the chief judge of the Abbasid empire, has a small section in his important work Kitāb al-Kharāj where he collects historical reports concerning the distribution of the six portions of khums as mentioned in the relevant verse of … Continue reading The Historical Controversy over Khums as Depicted in an Early Work: The Kitāb al-Kharāj of the Qāḍī Abū Yūsuf (d. 182)
يا هذا كيف بليت بك؟ وأي ريح هبت إلي بك؟ سمعت الحسن بن صالح يقول: سمعت جعفر بن محمد يقول: حب علي عبادة، وأفضل العبادة ما كتم “O man - how did we cross paths and what wind blew you to me?! … I heard Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad (al-Ṣādiq) say: ‘Love of ʿAlī is worship, … Continue reading A Re-Evaluation of the Tafḍīl of ʿAlī in Early Islam (Pt. 1)
Introduction One of the most important monographs on the history of early Shīʿīsm in western academia is the 1993 work by Hossein Modarressi, “Crisis and Consolidation in the Formative Period of Shīʿīte Islam”. Written by an erudite scholar who combines both traditional ḥawza learning and secular academic training, the book has been extremely influential in … Continue reading Critiquing “Crisis”: The Portrayal of Al-ʿAskarī as an Example (Pt. 1)
Introduction Why did the overwhelming majority of Hadith narrators and learned scholars in the Imami community, many sincere individuals among them, prominent even before the beginning of the ghayba (occultation), coalesce around the belief in the existence of a hidden Imam whom they had not personally seen? It is this faction, after all, which became … Continue reading Belief during the Ghayba: al-Zurārī’s Correspondence with the Hidden Imam
Shiitic Studies 