II ASA N AND TIOSEIN. ) The conservatives ac. knowledged Ali's caliphate and revered him as a saint and martyr, hut they possessed no such legitimist principles as his adherents. A bitter struggle followed his selection as Caliph. (See OmmtAns; MoAwlyAtt.) The resulting history is a remarkably 14 implicated one, partly by reason of the interfusion of the Shiites throughout ortho dox Islam, and partly because the party itself soon split upon all kinds of political purposes, per sonal ambitious, and theological tenets. We find them in part founding new States, in part es tablishing mystical fraternities and schools of liberal thought, in part cherishing, more or less patiently, millennial hopes.
As has been said, the root of the sect lay in the personality of Ali. Politically, this involved the sole right of succession as inherent in his de scendants. Here, however, various views de veloped according to the claims of various lines; some held that descent must pass through Fa tima, the daughter of Mohammed and wife of Ali. others that. any of Ali's descendants were legitimate. Further, about Ali's person arose a theology which was incongruous to original Is lam, and which gave room for all forms of the osophie speculation. lie came to be named in the creed along with God and Mohammed as 'the representative of God.' Some, even in his lifetime, held him to be an incarnation of God. Others, starting from his violent death, taught that he was reserved for a future reappearance, as the Hidden Imam, or Mandi (q.v.), who should establish the millennium; this notion was contributed to by the large numbers of Jewish and Christian converts that came into Islam. Vet another development of thought held that Ali was reincarnated in the Imams, his legiti mate descendants; this was the product of Ori ental theosophy coming in through Persia and India. In general, the doctrine was that God never left Himself without an authoritative rep resentative or Imam in the world, and that it was the business of the faithful to find him. The strength, therefore, of the Shiites lay in the doc trine of and in the opportunity it gave to those temperaments and races which desired a richer theology than that of simple Moslem unitarianism. With the passing of Is lam out of Arabian hands, the development of history made the whole doctrine of a legitimacy of blood or race as a sine qua non of the ruler a pure fiction, and in its opportunism lay the strength of Sunnite orthodoxy, which was thus able to assimilate the barbarian races which conquered original Islam. As for the pe
culiar Shiite theologies. they antagonized in gen eral the spirit and letter of the Koran, to which as a religion of a book Islam is necessarily bound. Thus we find Shiism perpetuating itself secretly and coming to the surface sporadically or on the periphery of Islam, but never able to gain any hut a temporary control over the great :Moslem body. Its history, therefore, is a story of opposition to the principles of Islam, existing in underground organizations, taking advantage of political and theological opportunities and of free-thinking rulers, now and again creating in dependent States through the personal ability of some Alide scion. An early instance was the establishment of the ldri.s:ide dynasty in North Africa. (about 800), through a great-grandson of Ali. From this connection the present Sherifs of Morocco. whose dynasty has existed since the end of the eighteenth century, claim to possess the legitimate caliphate. Another branch of the family, that of the Zaydites, arose in North ern Persia and in Yemen, in Benatle•n Arabia; in the latter land the sect still maintains itself.
The doctrine of the Bidden Imam or the Mandi soon produced innumerable divisions in the sect. Any Alide might come to be regarded as the Promised One, and so gain a following. The most notable split of this kind occurred in 705. when a dispute arose as between the two sons of the sixth 'Imam, Jafa• al-Sadik. Through one of these, the line was traced down to the twelfth in descent. ibn al-Ilasan, who was supposed to have been mysteriously trans lated to abide his return. followers are called the Ithnaashariya, i.e. Twelvers, and have come to be the prevailing Shiite sect, and the only one now• possessing an important political domain, namely, Persia. which came into their hands by conquest in 1502. But .Jafar's other son, Ismail, who was the seventh in succession, was accepted by another faction, the Isnmelites or Sabalyites, i.e. Seveners. His cause was taken up by a remarkable machinator, one AliciaBab ibn Maimun (about 850). who founded the secret society which developed into the Karma thians.