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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Iraq
Index
The Haidar Khana Mosque, Baghdad
Courtesy Matson Collection
Close-up of the minaret of the Haidar Khana Mosque, Baghdad
Courtesy Matson Collection
Shia Muslims hold the fundamental beliefs of other Muslims
(see Islam
, this ch.). But, in addition to these tenets, the
distinctive institution of Shia Islam is the Imamate--a much more
exalted position than the Sunni imam, who is primarily a prayer
leader. In contrast to Sunni Muslims, who view the caliph only as
a temporal leader and who lack a hereditary view of Muslim
leadership, Shia Muslims believe the Prophet Muhammad designated
Ali to be his successor as Imam, exercising both spiritual and
temporal leadership. Such an Imam must have knowledge, both in a
general and a religious sense, and spiritual guidance or
walayat, the ability to interpret the inner mysteries of
the Quran and the sharia. Only those who have walayat are
free from error and sin and have been chosen by God through the
Prophet. Each Imam in turn designated his successor--through
twelve Imams--each holding the same powers.
The Imamate began with Ali, who is also accepted by Sunni
Muslims as the fourth of the "rightly guided caliphs" to succeed
the Prophet. Shias revere Ali as the First Imam, and his
descendants, beginning with his sons Hasan and Husayn, continue
the line of the Imams until the twelfth, who is believed to have
ascended into a supernatural state to return to earth on Judgment
Day. Shias point to the close lifetime association of the Prophet
with Ali. When Ali was six years old, he was invited by the
Prophet to live with him, and Shias believe Ali was the first
person to make the declaration of faith in Islam. Ali also slept
in the Prophet's bed on the night of the hijra or
migration from Mecca to Medina when it was feared that the house
would be attacked by unbelievers and the Prophet stabbed to
death. He fought in all the battles the Prophet did except one,
and the Prophet chose him to be the husband of his favorite
daughter, Fatima.
Among Shias the term imam traditionally has been used
only for Ali and his eleven descendants. None of the twelve
Imams, with the exception of Ali, ever ruled an Islamic
government. During their lifetimes, their followers hoped that
they would assume the rulership of the Islamic community, a rule
that was believed to have been wrongfully usurped. Because the
Sunni caliphs were cognizant of this hope, the Imams generally
were persecuted during the Umayyad and Abbasid dynasties.
Therefore, the Imams tried to be as unobtrusive as possible and
to live as far as was reasonable from the successive capitals of
the Islamic empire.
During the eighth century the Caliph Mamun, son and successor
to Harun ar Rashid, was favorably disposed toward the descendants
of Ali and their followers. He invited the Eighth Imam, Reza
(A.D. 765-816), to come from Medina (in the Arabian Peninsula) to
his court at Marv (Mary in the present-day Soviet Union). While
Reza was residing at Marv, Mamun designated him as his successor
in an apparent effort to avoid conflict among Muslims. Reza's
sister Fatima journeyed from Medina to be with her brother, but
took ill and died at Qom, in present-day Iran. A major shrine
developed around her tomb and over the centuries Qom has become a
major Shia pilgrimage and theological center.
Mamun took Reza on his military campaign to retake Baghdad
from political rivals. On this trip Reza died unexpectedly in
Khorasan. Reza was the only Imam to reside or die in what in now
Iran. A major shrine, and eventually the city of Mashhad, grew up
around his tomb, which has become the most important pilgrimage
center in Iran. Several important theological schools are located
in Mashhad, associated with the shrine to the Eighth Imam.
Reza's sudden death was a shock to his followers, many of
whom believed that Mamun, out of jealousy for Reza's increasing
popularity, had the Imam poisoned. Mamun's suspected treachery
against Imam Reza and his family tended to reinforce a feeling
already prevalent among his followers that the Sunni rulers were
untrustworthy.
The Twelfth Imam is believed to have been only five years old
when the Imamate descended upon him in A.D.874 at the death of
his father. Because his followers feared he might be
assassinated, the Twelfth Imam was hidden from public view and
was seen only by a few of his closest deputies. Sunnis claim that
he never existed or that he died while still a child. Shias
believe that the Twelfth Imam never died, but disappeared from
earth in about A.D. 939. Since that time, the greater occultation
of the Twelfth Imam has been in force and will last until God
commands the Twelfth Imam to manifest himself on earth again as
the Mahdi or Messiah. Shias believe that during the occultation
of the Twelfth Imam, he is spiritually present--some believe that
he is materially present as well--and he is besought to reappear
in various invocations and prayers. His name is mentioned in
wedding invitations, and his birthday is one of the most jubilant
of all Shia religious observances.
The Shia doctrine of the Imamate was not fully elaborated
until the tenth century. Other dogmas were developed still later.
A characteristic of Shia Islam is the continual exposition and
reinterpretation of doctrine.
A further belief of Shia Muslims concerns divine justice and
the individual's responsibility for his acts, which are judged by
a just God. This contrasts with the Sunni view that God's
creation of man allows minimal possibility for the exercise of
free will.
A significant practice of Shia Islam is that of visiting the
shrines of Imams both in Iraq and in Iran. These include the tomb
of Imam Ali in An Najaf and that of his son Imam Husayn in
Karbala since both are considered major Shia martyrs. Before the
1980 Iran-Iraq War, tens of thousands went each year. The
Iranians have made it a central aim of their war effort to wrest
these holy cities from the Iraqis. Other principal pilgrimage
sites in Iraq are the tombs of the Seventh and Ninth Imams at
Kazimayn, near Baghdad, and in Iran, the tomb of the Eighth Imam
in Mashhad and that of his sister in Qom. Such pilgrimages
originated in part from the difficulty and expense in the early
days of making the hajj to Mecca.
Commemorating the martyrdom of Husayn, killed near Karbala in
A.D. 680 during a battle with troops supporting the Ummayad
caliph, there are processions in the Shia towns and villages of
southern Iraq on the tenth of Muharram (Ashura), the anniversary
of his death. Ritual mourning (taaziya) is performed by
groups of men of five to twenty each. Contributions are solicited
in the community to pay transportation for a local group to go to
Karbala for taaziya celebrations forty days after Ashura.
There is a great rivalry among groups from different places for
the best performance of the passion plays.
In the villages, religious readings occur throughout Ramadan
and Muharram. The men may gather in the mudhif (tribal
guesthouse), the suq (market), or a private house. Women
meet in homes. The readings are led either by a mumin (a
man trained in a religious school in An Najaf) or by a mullah who
has apprenticed with an older specialist. It is considered the
duty of shaykhs, elders, prosperous merchants, and the like to
sponsor these readings, or qirayas. Under the monarchy
these public manifestations were discouraged, as they emphasized
grievances against the Sunnis.
Two distinctive and frequently misunderstood Shia practices
are mutah, temporary marriage, and taqiyah,
religious dissimulation. Mutah is a fixed-term contract
that is subject to renewal. It was practiced by the first
community of Muslims at Medina but was banned by the second
caliph. Mutah differs from permanent marriage in that it
does not require divorce to terminate it. It can be for a period
as short as an evening or as long as a lifetime. The offspring of
such an arrangement are the legitimate heirs of the man.
Taqiyah, condemned by the Sunnis as cowardly and
irreligious, is the hiding or disavowal of one's religion or its
practices to escape the danger of death from those opposed to the
faith. Persecution of Shia Imams during the Umayyad and Abbasid
caliphates reinforced the need for taqiyah.
Shia practice differs from that of the Sunnis concerning both
divorce and inheritance in that it is more favorable to women.
The reason for this reputedly is the high esteem in which Fatima,
the wife of Ali and the daughter of the Prophet, was held.
Like Sunni Islam, Shia Islam has developed several sects. The
most important of these is the Twelver or Ithna-Ashari sect,
which predominates not only in Iraq but in the Shia world
generally. Broadly speaking, the Twelvers are considered
political quietists as opposed to the Zaydis who favor political
activism, and the Ismailis who are identified with esoteric and
gnostic religious doctrines. Within Twelver Shia Islam there are
two major legal schools, the Usuli and the Akhbari. Akhbaris
constitute a very small group and are found primarily around
Basra and in southern Iraq as well as around Khorramshahr in
Iran. The dominant Usuli school is more liberal in its legal
outlook and allows greater use of interpretation (ijtihad)
in reaching legal decisions, and considers that one must obey a
mujtahid (learned interpreter of the law) as well as an
Imam.
Data as of May 1988
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