(Muslim) Denominations

[johny smith]

Sunni Islam is the largest denomination of Islam. Sunni Islam is also referred to as Ahl as-Sunnah wal-Jamaah ("people of the example (of Muhammad) and the community") or Ahl as-Sunnah for short. The word Sunni comes from the word Sunnah, which means the words and actions or example of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad.

 

[johny smith]

Shia Islam (Shiah, sometimes Shi'a or Shi'ite), is the second largest denomination of Islam, after Sunni Islam. Similar to other schools of thought in Islam, Shi'a Islam is based on the teachings of the Islamic holy book, the Qur'an and the message of the final prophet of Islam, Muhammad. In contrast to other schools of thoughts, Shi'a Islam holds that Muhammad's family, the Ahl al-Bayt ("the People of the House"), and certain individuals among his descendants, who are known as Imams, have special spiritual and political rule over the community. Shia Muslims further believe that Ali, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, was the first of these Imams and was the rightful successor to Muhammad and thus reject the legitimacy of the first three Rashidun caliphs.

 

[johny smith]

Kharijites (literally "Those who Went Out"; singular, Khariji) is a general term embracing various Muslims who, while initially supporting the caliphate of the fourth and final "Rightly Guided" caliph Ali ibn Abi Talib, later rejected him. They first emerged in the late 7th century AD, concentrated in today's southern Iraq, and are distinct from the Sunnis and Shites. Whereas the Shiites believed that the imamate (leadership) was the sole right of the house of Ali, the Kharijites insisted that any pious and able Muslim could be a leader of the Muslim community. And whereas the Sunnis believed that the imam's impiousness did not, by itself, justify sedition, the Kharijites insisted on the right to revolt against any ruler who deviated from the example of the Prophet Muhammad and the first two caliphs, Abu Bakr and Umar. From this essentially political position, the Kharijites developed a variety of theological and legal doctrines that further set them apart from both Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

 

[johny smith]

Ismailism is a branch of the Islamic faith, and is the second largest part of the Shiah community, after the mainstream Twelvers. The Ismaili get their name from their acceptance of Ismail ibn Jafar as the divinely appointed spiritual successor (Imam) to Jafar, wherein they differ from the Twelvers, who accept Musa al-Kazim, younger brother of Ismail, as the true Imam. Tracing its earliest theology to the lifetime of Muhammad, Ismailism rose at one point to become the largest branch of Shiism, climaxing as a political power with the Fatimid Empire in the tenth through twelfth centuries.

 

[johny smith]

Mu'tazili theology originated in the 8th century in Basra (Iraq) when Wasil ibn Ata (d. 131 A.H./748 A.D.) left the teaching lessons of al-Hasan al-Basri after a theological dispute regarding the issue of Al-Manzilah bayna al-Manzilatayn; thus he, and his followers, including Amr ibn Ubayd (d. 144 A.H./ 761 A.D.), were labelled Mu'tazili. Later, Mu'tazilis called themselves Ahl al-Tawhid wa al-'Adl ("People of Divine Unity and Justice") based on the theology they advocated, which sought to ground Islamic creedal system in reason.

 

[johny smith]

Here is the folder of the Muslim religions.

http://wocrapture.svn.sourceforge.n...Assets/Modules/Rapture/Muslim.tar.gz?view=tar

 

[alireza1354]

nice