Al-Muti

Abū ʾl-Qāsim al-Faḍl ibn al-Muqtadir (; 913/14 – September/October 974), better known by his regnal name of al-Mutīʿ li-ʾllāh (), was the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad from 946 to 974, under the tutelage of the Buyids. 
Al-Muti's reign represented the nadir of the Abbasid caliphate's power and authority. During the previous decades, the secular authority of the caliphs had shrunk to Iraq, and been curtailed by powerful warlords; it was now abolished entirely by the Buyids. Al-Muti was raised to the throne by the Buyids and was effectively reduced to a rubber-stamping figurehead, albeit with some vestiges of authority in judicial and religious appointments in Iraq. However, his subordinate position helped restored some stability to the caliphal institution: in stark contrast to his short-lived and violently deposed predecessors, al-Muti enjoyed a long and relatively unchallenged tenure, and was able to hand over the throne to his son al-Ta'i.
Al-Muti's prestige as the nominal leader of the Muslim world rapidly declined at the same time. Regional rivals to the Buyids delayed their recognition of al-Muti's caliphate, seeing in him only a Buyid puppet, and his inability to respond effectively to Byzantine advances tarnished his reputation. More importantly, the rise of Shi'a regimes across the Muslim world directly challenged Sunni and Abbasid predominance. The Buyids themselves were Shi'a, and their retention of the Abbasid caliphate was purely out of expedience; while in the west, the Fatimid Caliphate posed a direct challenge to the Abbasids, and during al-Muti's reign, conquered Egypt and threatened to expand into the Levant, threatening Baghdad itself.
Biography.
Early life.
The future al-Muti was born in 913/14 as al-Fadl, a son of Caliph al-Muqtadir () and a Slavic concubine, Mash'ala. He was the brother of caliphs al-Radi () and al-Muttaqi (). During the reigns of al-Radi and al-Muttaqi, the caliphs had lost power to a series of military strongmen, who with the title of (commander-in-chief, ) controlled the Abbasid government. Al-Muttaqi himself had been raised to the throne by the Bajkam, but attempted to play off the various regional warlords—notably the Hamdanids of Mosul—to recover the independence and authority of his office. These attempts ended in failure and his deposition and blinding by the Tuzun in September 944.
As the chief of the remaining sons of al-Muqtadir and brother of the two previous caliphs, al-Fadl was an obvious candidate for the throne. Tuzun, however, chose al-Mustakfi (), a son of Caliph al-Muktafi (), instead. Al-Mustakfi and al-Fadl were said to have hated each other already during their stay in the Tahirid Palace as young princes. Not only were they members of two rival lines of succession, but their characters were diametrically opposed: while al-Fadl, like his father, was renowned for his piety, al-Mustakfi offended pious opinion by his association with the militia—drawn from the poorer urban classes, they were often decried as troublemakers and suspected for their association with heterodox and sectarian groups like the Sufis—and his participation in 'vulgar' games. Once al-Mustakfi was enthroned, he sent his agents to capture al-Muti, but the latter had already gone into hiding, and the caliph had to satisfy himself with demolishing his house. This futile act only served to mark al-Fadl as a serious rival; on hearing of it, the veteran vizier, Ali ibn Isa, is said to have remarked that "This day he [al-Fadl] has been acknowledged heir to the throne". 
When the Daylamite Buyids under Mu'izz al-Dawla () seized Baghdad in December 945, al-Fadl emerged from hiding and urged Mu'izz al-Dawla, now appointed , to depose al-Mustakfi, which was done on 29 January 946 (or 9 March, according to other accounts).
Caliphate.
The Buyids and their followers were Shi'a sympathizers, and Mu'izz al-Dawla toyed with the idea of deposing the Abbasids outright and installing an Alid on the throne of Baghdad, or recognizing the Isma'ili Fatimid caliphs. He was dissuaded by his secretary, Abu Ja'far al-Saymari, who pointed out that in a clash between himself and a Shi'a caliph, the Daylamite soldiery were likely to side with the latter. Instead, and apparently to general astonishment, on the same day as al-Mustakfi was deposed, Mu'izz al-Dawla raised al-Fadl to the caliphate, with the regnal name of (). The deposed al-Mustakfi was blinded, apparently as a revenge act initiated by al-Muti, and spent the rest of his life as a prisoner in the caliphal palace, where he died in September 949.
It also seems that Caliph Muti used to venerate Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal a lot. An incident which is mentioned by Qadhi Ibn Abi Ya’la in the Biography of Abu Muhammad Rizqallah bin Abdul Wahab Tamimi quoted :
Abu Muhammad Tamimi said: 
Caliph al-Mutīʿli-‘llāh sent a great fortune to build a dome over the grave of Imam Ahmad Ibn Hanbal. My grandfather and Abu Bakr ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz said to him: Dont you want to come closer to Allah with this(act)? 
He (the caliph) replied : Why not?
So they both said to him: "His madhab was that nothing should be built upon it."
The caliph (then) said: "Give (this as) charity to those whom you deem fit."
They both said: “Rather, give charity to whomever you want."
[Tabaqat al-Hanbilah, vol.2, p.215]
Role and relations with the Buyids.
Al-Muti was a weak figure, for all intents and purposes a puppet ruler of the Buyid , first Mu'izz al-Dawla, and then his son, Izz al-Dawla (). As a result of his lack of real power, al-Muti himself barely figures in the chronicles of his reign, and medieval historians generally considered his reign as the lowest ebb of the Abbasid Caliphate.
In theory, the Buyids and all their officials acted in the name of the Abbasid caliph. In practice, he was deprived of any meaningful authority, even over the choice of the officials of his household. In exchange for being allowed to lead a comfortable and secure life in the vast caliphal palaces, al-Muti provided legitimacy to the upstart Buyid regime in the eyes of the Muslim world. The Buyids kept a close watch on the caliph, especially during their periodic conflicts with the Hamdanids, lest he might try to defect to them, as al-Muttaqi had done. During the battles of summer 946, when the Hamdanids briefly occupied East Baghdad, he was kept under house arrest in a church in West Baghdad, and not released until he had sworn an oath of loyalty. Whenever Mu'izz al-Dawla campaigned against rebels south of Baghdad, al-Muti was forced to accompany the Buyid ruler, lest he defect north to the Hamdanids. Conversely, when the Buyid campaigned against the Hamdanids in the north, al-Muti was left behind in Baghdad. In addition, in 948/49, Ispahdost, Mu'izz al-Dawla's brother-in-law, was arrested on suspicion of conspiring with al-Muti (or with an unnamed Alid).
Under the Buyid tutelage, al-Muti was effectively reduced to a salaried state official, and his responsibility curtailed to the oversight over the judiciary, religious institutions, and the affairs of the members of the wider Abbasid clan. The caliph's chief secretary was no longer termed 'vizier', but merely 'secretary' (), and his role was limited to the management of the , a department managing the caliph's properties, the formal conferment of titles and offices and certificates in the name of the caliph, and the appointment of judges and jurors. Upon taking power, Mu'izz al-Dawla distributed the former caliphal crown domains for the upkeep of the army, and al-Muti had to content himself with a daily salary of 2,000 silver dirhams. When Basra was recovered from the Baridi family shortly after, he was assigned extensive possessions there, raising his income to 200,000 gold dinars per year. Although the general decline of Iraq later reduced his income to about a fourth, this allowed the caliph to financially support members of the Abbasid clan in need, and to make rich gifts to the Kaaba. The income also sufficed for the construction a series of pavilions in the caliphal palace grounds: the Peacock Palace (), the Octagon House () and the Square House ().
The troubled relations between caliph and now assumed a more regular and tranquil character: the Buyids at least formally respected the caliph's remaining responsibilities, while al-Muti apparently accepted his subservient role, regained some freedom of action, and maintained cordial relations with Mu'izz al-Dawla. In 955/56, Mu'izz al-Dawla even appointed his 13-year-old son, the future Izz al-Dawla, as the caliph's chamberlain. The most notable exception to the good relationship between caliph and was the latter's attempt to rent out the appointment of chief of Baghdad to Abdallah ibn Abi al-Shawarib for 200,000 dirhams per year between 961–963. This was opposed by both Sunni and Shi'a scholars as illegal, and al-Muti refused to sign the appointments made by Mu'izz al-Dawla during this period. This is also almost the only reference in the sources to al-Muti's activity in the religious or judicial sphere; otherwise his reign is passed over in silence. 
A positive corollary of this subservience was stability. Although of a sickly disposition, al-Muti reigned as caliph for over 28 years, in stark contrast to his short-lived predecessors, and had to contend with remarkably few rival pretenders to the caliphate. A grandson of al-Muktafi rebelled in Armenia in 960 and claimed the caliphate as al-Mustajir Billah before being defeated by the local Sallarid rulers. In 968, Abu'l-Hasan Muhammad, a son of al-Mustakfi, who had fled to the Ikhshidid court in Egypt, gained considerable support in Iraq by hiding his identity and posing as the Mahdi (the Islamic messiah). The leading convert to his cause was a Buyid commander, the Turk Sübüktegin al-Ajami, who gave him protection and was preparing to mount a coup in his name, before his identity was uncovered and he was handed over to al-Muti. The Caliph did not severely punish him, other than ordering his nose cut off, thereby disqualifying him from the succession; although Abu'l-Hasan Muhammad eventually managed to escape, his hopes of seizing the throne were never realized, and the caliphal succession henceforth firmly remained with the line of al-Muqtadir.
Facing the Shi'a and Byzantine challenges.
Outside the Buyid domains, on the other hand, the Abbasid caliph's authority over the wider Muslim world declined. Until the conclusion of a peace with the Buyids in 955, the Samanids of Khurasan refused to acknowledge his caliphate, while in the west, the rival Isma'ili Shi'a Fatimid Caliphate was growing more and more powerful, conquering Egypt in 969 and beginning its expansion into the Levant. Even in Baghdad, the pro-Shi'a sympathies of the Buyids meant that Shi'a influence was growing, and many Shi'a practices were introduced in the city—the celebration of Ghadir Khumm is attested since 963—while Sunni and Shi'a partisans clashed in the streets. 
At the same time, al-Muti played a leading role as a mediator in the formation of an anti-Fatimid coalition that included the Qarmatians under al-Hasan al-A'sam and the Hamdanid ruler of Mosul, Abu Taghlib, with the backing of the Buyids. This coalition managed to stop the Fatimid expansion into the Levant until 973/74. In the process, the Qarmatians recognized al-Muti in the and their coins, and denounced the Fatimids as impostors. In 951, when the Qarmatians returned the Black Stone to the Kaaba in Mecca, whence they had taken it in 930, al-Muti is rumoured to have paid them 30,000 gold dinars as the Stone's ransom.
Another source of danger was the Byzantine advance against the Hamdanids in Upper Mesopotamia and northern Syria. Especially after the sack of Nisibis, Amida, and Edessa in 972, Muslim refugees from these cities flooded to Baghdad, and clamoured for protection. Unwilling and unable to help, Izz al-Dawla pointed them to al-Muti, since the was still formally the caliph's responsibility. Bereft of any military or financial resources, al-Muti was powerless to help them, and his prestige suffered accordingly, while the riots engulfed the Shi'a quarter of Karkh, which went up in flames. Izz al-Dawla used the opportunity to pressure al-Muti into selling off his valuables and providing 400,000 dirhams, ostensibly to be used to employ soldiers against the Byzantines, but in reality soon squandered by the profligate Buyid ruler.
Abdication and death.
Over the years, Izz al-Dawla increasingly alienated the Turks under Sübüktegin, culminating in a failed assassination attempt on the Turkish commander. As a result, on 1 August 974, Sübüktegin seized control of Baghdad from Izz al-Dawla. 
When the coup happened, al-Muti left Baghdad along with the members of the Buyid clan, but Sübüktegin forced him back and confined him to his palace. Increasingly incapacitated by a partial paralysis that had begun following a stroke in 970, al-Muti was now induced to abdicate with his health as a pretext, and was replaced by his son Abd al-Karim, as al-Ta'i (), on 5 August. This was the first father-to-son succession of the caliphate since al-Muktafi in 902. 
Sübüktegin had himself appointed by the new caliph, and left Baghdad to campaign against the Buyids, accompanied by both al-Muti and al-Ta'i. Al-Muti died on the way, at Dayr al-Aqul, on 12 October 974. He was buried at the mausoleum of his paternal grandmother, Shaghab, in the Baghdad quarter of al-Rusafa, where his brother al-Radi had also been buried.