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Ism Witch History

Decent Essays

Despite al-Dawānīqī’s threat, al-Ṣādiq designated his son, Ismaʿil, as his successor and imam. However, al-Dawānīqī’s persecution, threat, and frustration brought a new twist to the life and history of Shīʿa communities. The key twist in this part of the Shīʿa history is the issue of Ismāʿīl’s imamate and occultation. Historical accounts vary on Ismaʿil’s death and life during al-Ṣādiq’s lifetime. While it is beyond the scope and focus of this paper to enter into a debate on this matter, it suffices to state that the ʿAbbāsid threat and persecution caused the emergence of many splinter groups among al-Ṣādiq’s followers. Remaining with the Ismaili line of imamate, Ismaili communities firmly believe in Ismāʿīl’s imamate and the continuation of …show more content…

Firstly, it informs us that the region of Qandahār, Sīstān, Hirāt, Ghūr, and Gharjistān (which is currently the homeland of Baluch, Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara and other Turkic groups) was heavily penetrated by the Ismaili dāʿīs, who maintained a significant daʿwa network and were very successful in their missions. Secondly, it names certain daʿwa figures, namely Abū Bilāl and his key associates, Ḥamdān and Tūzkā, whose headquarter was named Dār al-ʿAdl. Thirdly, it reveals that non-Ismaili power holders and amīrs failed to give an intellectual response to the Ismaili daʿwa. Instead, they chose to respond by way of violence, military force, and slaying the converted laypeople. Fourthly, the killing of Ismaili dāʿīs and communities also appears to have been an easy and quick means to political and religious popularity. The governors would secure their positions in the eyes of the amīrs, who in turn would gain the religious blessings of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs and chief religious clerics. Finally, the execution of ten captured Ismaili notables in the cities of Balkh, Samarqand, Farghānah, Khwārazm, and Nīshāpūr suggests at least three points: gaining religious popularity, creating fear in the heart of people and stopping them from converting to the Ismaili faith, and that the Ismaili dāʿīs had already created a clandestine daʿwa network in these cities. However, despite the massacre and terror the Sāmānid Amīr and his governors created …show more content…

According to Ibn Nadīm’s and Niẓām al-Mulk’s accounts, al-Hallāj was the first dāʿī of Jibāl in present-day Iran (Ibn Nadim, 2002:352; Niẓām al-Mulk, 1999:283-4). He might have been the first person who could have assumed an official title of dāʿī, but, as the presented analyses have demonstrated, he certainly was not the first person who was involved in the Ismaili daʿwa in Persia. Ghiyāth fled to Khurasan around the end of the third/ninth and the beginning of the fourth/tenth centuries, when a certain Sunni cleric, ʿAbd Allāh al-Zaʿfarānī, incited public opinion against him (Niẓām al-Mulk, 1999:284). Al-Zaʿfarānī was the founder of the al-Zaʿfarāniyya faction, one of the three schools of Najjāriyya (al-Barghawthiyya, Mustadrika, and al-Zaʿfarāniyya), and a follower of Ḥusaīn ibn Muḥammad al-Najjār. He attacked Ghiyāth in order to create a bigger space and fame for himself. Consequently, Ghiyāth migrated to Khurasan and settled in Marw al-Rūd, in present-day Bālā Murghāb in north-western Bādghīs province of Afghanistan, which is still populated with many Hazara groups. Ghiyāth’s major achievement was the conversion of Amīr al-Ḥusaīn ibn ʿAlī al-Marwarūdī or al-Marwazī (hereafter, al-Marwazī). He governed Sīstān, Hirāt, Ghūr, Gharjistān, Bādghīs, and Marw (Stern, 1960:60-61; Niẓām al-Mulk, 1999:285) for the Sāmānid amīrs. As has already been mentioned,

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