page_title: Criticism of Twelver Shia Islam
section_title: Occultation
hierarchical_section_title: Criticism of Twelver Shia Islam / Occultation
caption_attribution_description: English: Author: IA. Source: Taken at Jamkaran, Iran in August, 2005.
context_page_description: Criticism of Twelver Shia Islam dates from the initial rift between the two primary denominations of Islam, the Sunni and the Shia. The question of succession to Muhammad, the nature of the Imamate, the status of the twelfth Shia Imam, and other areas in which Shia Islam differ from Sunni Islam have been criticized by Sunni scholars, even though there is no disagreement between the two regarding the centrality of the Quran, Muhammad, and many other doctrinal, theological and ritual matters. Shia commentators such as Musa al-Musawi and Ali Shariati have themselves, in their attempts to reform the faith, criticized practices and beliefs which have become prevalent in the Shia community.
context_section_description: In the tradition of Twelver Shia Islam, the twelfth and final Imam, Muhammad al-Mahdi, who is also considered by Twelver Shia to be the prophesied redeemer of Islam known as the Mahdi, went into ghaybah ("occultation") in 873. However, this belief has long been criticized by Sunni scholars who "often speculate that the twelfth Imam never existed, but was a myth designed to keep the Shia cause alive." Meanwhile, western scholars have also cast doubt upon the existence of an occulted Imam. According to Robert Gleave, the occultation of the 12th Imam "became subsequent orthodox doctrine" after none of the competing theories that sought to explain the succession to a childless 11th Imam "seemed satisfactory". According to Bernard Lewis, the occultation and subsequent return of the Imam became a characteristic Shi'ite doctrine following the "suppression of many risings and the disappearance of their leaders"; where the leader disappears and "his followers say that he is not dead; he has gone into concealment". With each new leader "who disappeared and did not return", this belief was "enriched" and became more detailed and "essential" as a "feature of Shia Islam."
  However, according to Wilferd Madelung in Encyclopedia of Islam, the doctrine of the Occultation was well-documented by traditions of the Imams before the occultation of the Twelfth Imam whom the majority of the Imamiyya came to consider as the Mahdi after the death of the eleventh. As an example he mentions that "the pattern was already set in regard to Muḥammad b. al-Ḥanafiyya, whose death was denied by the Kaysāniyya [q.v.]. They believed that he was hidden in the mountains of Raḍwā and would return to rule the world. Similar beliefs arose around Muḥammad b. al-Ḥanafiyya’s son Abū Hashim" Moreover, Madelung names several Sunni scholars who have similar beliefs. In a Hadith upon whose authenticity Shias and Sunnis agree, Muhammad had said, "If there were to remain in the life of the world but one day, God would prolong that day until He sends in it a man from my community and my household. His name will be the same as my name. He will fill the earth with equity and justice as it was filled with oppression and tyranny."  However, the majority of Sunnis do not consider the son of eleventh Imam as the promised Mahdi. Shias claim the only possible occasion that the son of eleventh Imam is said to have made a public appearance was at the time of his death, then as a child the boy was seen no more. His birth, Shia says, like the case of the prophet Moses, was concealed due to the difficulties of the time, and because of the belief that he was the promised Mahdi, the caliphs of the time had decided definitely to put an end to the Imamate in Shi'ism once and for all.
caption: Jamkaran in Iran, supposed site of a historical appearance of Muhammad al-Mahdi
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