The Baghdad Manifesto was a polemical tract issued in 1011 on behalf of the Abbasid caliph al-Qadir against the rival Isma'ili Fatimid Caliphate.
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The Baghdad Manifesto was a polemical tract issued in 1011 on behalf of the Abbasid caliph al-Qadir against the rival Isma'ili Fatimid Caliphate.
The manifesto was the result of the steady expansion of the Fatimid Caliphate since its establishment in the early 10th century, and the continued activity of the pro-Fatimid Isma'ili missionary movement ( da'wa ) across the Middle East. In 1010/11, the da'wa scored a significant success when the Shi'a Uqaylids, who ruled Mosul, Mada'in, Kufa, and other towns close to the Abbasid capital of Baghdad, publicly recognized the suzerainty of the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim by having the khutba read in his name. They were soon followed by the Banu Asad tribe, also resident in Iraq. [1]
This expansion of Fatimid influence to the very doorstep of Baghdad alarmed the Abbasid caliph al-Qadir, who launched a series of counter-moves. In the same year, he successfully forced the Uqaylid ruler Qirwash to return to recognizing Abbasid suzerainty by threatening to attack him otherwise. [2]
He then called an assembly of leading Sunni and Twelver Shi'a scholars, including several esteemed Alids. The assembly issued a manifesto denouncing the Fatimids' claims of descent from Ali and the Ahl al-Bayt (the family of Muhammad) as false, and thus challenge the foundation of the Fatimid dynasty's claims to leadership in the Islamic world. [2] [3]
Based on the work of the earlier anti-Fatimid polemicists Ibn Rizam and Akhu Muhsin, the manifesto instead put forth an alternative genealogy of descent from a certain Daysan ibn Sa'id. [4] The document was ordered read in mosques throughout the Abbasid territories, and al-Qadir commissioned a number of theologians to compose further anti-Fatimid tracts. [2] The manifesto and its list of signatories were reproduced by multiple medieval sources, [5] and during the early 20th century, due to the lack of sources that were not made available until later decades, it was used as a principal source on the origins and early history of the Fatimids. [3]
The Fatimid Caliphate was an Ismaili Shia caliphate extant from the 10th to the 12th centuries AD. Spanning a large area of North Africa, it ranged from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Red Sea in the east. The Fatimids, a dynasty of Arab origin, trace their ancestry to Muhammad's daughter Fatima and her husband ‘Ali b. Abi Talib, the first Shi‘ite imam. The Fatimids were acknowledged as the rightful imams by different Isma‘ili communities, but also in many other Muslim lands, including Persia and the adjacent regions. Originating during the Abbasid Caliphate, the Fatimids conquered Tunisia and established the city of "al-Mahdiyya". The Shiʿite dynasty ruled territories across the Mediterranean coast of Africa and ultimately made Egypt the center of the caliphate. At its height, the caliphate included – in addition to Egypt – varying areas of the Maghreb, Sudan, Sicily, the Levant, and the Hijaz.
The Fatimid dynasty was an Isma'ili Shi'a dynasty that ruled an extensive empire, the Fatimid Caliphate, between 909 and 1171. Claiming descent from Fatima and Ali, they also held the Isma'ili imamate, claiming to be the rightful leaders of the Muslim community. The line of Nizari Isma'ili imams, represented today by the Aga Khans, claims descent from a branch of the Fatimids.
Abu Muhammad Abdallah ibn al-Husayn, better known by his regnal name Al-Mahdi Billah, was the founder of the Isma'ili Fatimid Caliphate, the only major Shi'a caliphate in Islamic history, and the eleventh Imam of the Isma'ili faith.
Abu'l-Abbas Ahmad ibn Ishaq, better known by his regnal name al-Qadir, was the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad from 991 to 1031. He was the grandson of al-Muqtadir, and was chosen in place of the deposed caliph, at-Ta'i, his cousin. His reign was marked by the strengthening of the Abbasid caliphate's role as the champion of Sunni Islam against Shi'ism, notably through the Baghdad Manifesto of 1011, and through the codification, for the first time, of Sunni doctrines and practices in the Risāla al-Qādiriyya, thereby presaging the "Sunni Revival" later in the century.
The Qarmatians was an Iranian dynasty of a syncretic branch of Sevener Ismaili Shia Islam. They were centred in al-Hasa, where they established a religious-utopian republic in 899 CE. They rejected the claim of Fatimid caliph Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah to imamate and clung to their belief in the coming of the Mahdi, and they revolted against the Fatimid and Abbasid Caliphates.
Abuʾl-Ḥārith Arslān al-Muẓaffar al-Basāsīrī was a Turkish slave-soldier (mamlūk) who rose to become a military commander of the Buwayhid dynasty in Iraq. When the Buwayhids were ousted by the Seljuks in 1055, he transferred his allegiance to the Fatimid Caliphate of Egypt, in whose name he conquered Baghdad, which he ruled for almost a year.
Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yūsuf, better known by his regnal name al-ʿĀḍid li-Dīn Allāh, was the fourteenth and last caliph of the Fatimid dynasty, and the 24th imam of Hafizi Isma'ilism, reigning from 1160 to 1171.
Hafizi Isma'ilism was a branch of Musta'li Isma'ilism that emerged as a result of a split in 1132. The Hafizis accepted the Fatimid caliph Abd al-Majid al-Hafiz li-Din Allah and his successors as imams, while the rival Tayyibi branch rejected them as usurpers, favouring the succession of the imamate along the line of al-Hafiz's nephew, al-Tayyib.
Abū Ḥanīfa al-Nuʿmān ibn Muḥammad ibn Manṣūr ibn Aḥmad ibn Ḥayyūn al-Tamīmiyy (Arabic: النعمان بن محمد بن منصور بن أحمد بن حيون التميمي, generally known as al-Qāḍī al-Nu‘mān or as ibn Ḥayyūn was an Isma'ili jurist and the official historian of the Fatimid Caliphate. He was also called Qaḍi al-Quḍāt "Jurist of the Jurists" and Dāʻī al-Duʻāt "Missionary of Missionaries".
Muhammad ibn Ja'far al-Sadiq, surnamed al-Dibaj, the younger full brother of Musa al-Kadhim, and son of Ja'far al-Sadiq appeared in Mecca in the year 200 A.H. / 815 C.E., in the aftermath of the revolt of Abu'l-Saraya, claiming that he was the Awaited Mahdi. He believed in a Zaydi Shia type of Imamate and declared himself as the Caliph of the Muslims and took the oath of allegiance from them and was called the Leader of the faithful. He was recognized as the Imam by a small group of followers. His followers became denominated as the Shumaytiyya (Sumaytiyya) after their leader Yahya ibn Abi’l-Shumayt (al-Sumayt). However, his revolt against the Caliph al-Ma'mun proved unsuccessful in the very same year it started. He ended his revolt by abdicating and publicly confessing his error and was then banished from the Hejaz and the Tihamah.
Idris Imad al-Din was the 19th Tayyibi Isma'ili Dāʿī al-Muṭlaq and a major religious and political leader in 15th-century Yemen, as well as a notable theologian and the most important medieval Isma'ili historian. His work is fundamental for the history of the Fatimid Caliphate and the Isma'ili communities in Yemen.
The Book of the Sage and Disciple is a religious narrative of spiritual initiation written in the form of a dramatic dialogue by Ja'far ibn Mansur al-Yaman. The work describes the encounter of a disillusioned young man with a dā‘ī, or Isma'ili Muslim missionary, who gradually introduces his new disciple to the inner dimensions of Islam as elaborated by the Shi'a imāms.
The Book of the Highest Initiation is a text that falsely claims to be of Ismaili origin and is wrongfully attributed to ‘Ubayd Allah, or Abdullah al-Mahdi Billah, the first Fatimid Caliph-Imam. The work is a false account of Ismaili initiation and was written with the intent of denigrating Ismaili beliefs and practices. It is included in the polemic work of the 10th-century anti-Ismaili writer Akhu Muhsin.
Hamdan Qarmat ibn al-Ash'ath was the eponymous founder of the Qarmatian sect of Isma'ilism. Originally the chief Isma'ili missionary in lower Iraq, in 899 he quarreled with the movement's leadership at Salamiya after it was taken over by Sa'id ibn al-Husayn, and with his followers broke off from them. Hamdan then disappeared, but his followers continued in existence in the Syrian Desert and al-Bahrayn for several decades.
Abu'l-Husayn Muhammad ibn Ali, better known by his nickname Akhu Muhsin, was a 10th-century anti-Isma'ili writer.
Aḥmad ibn Ibrāhı̄m al-Nı̄sābūrı̄ or al-Naysābūrı̄ was an Isma'ili scholar from Nishapur, who entered the service of the Fatimid caliphs al-Aziz Billah and al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah in Cairo. His life is relatively obscure, and is known chiefly from references in his works. Among them three stand out as highly important for Fatimid and Isma'ili history: the Istitār al-imām, a historical work that offers unique information on the early history of the Isma'ili movement and the rise of the Fatimid Caliphate, the Risāla al-mūjaza, which contains an exposition on the qualities and duties of the ideal Isma'ili missionary, and the Ithbāt al-imāma, an influential analysis of Isma'ili conceptions of the imamate, combining rationalist philosophical argument with Islamic theology.
Abu'l-Qāsim al-Ḥasan ibn Faraj ibn Ḥawshab ibn Zādān al-Najjār al-Kūfī, better known simply as Ibn Ḥawshab, or by his honorific of Manṣūr al-Yaman, was a senior Isma'ili missionary from the environs of Kufa. In cooperation with Ali ibn al-Fadl al-Jayshani, he established the Isma'ili creed in Yemen and conquered much of that country in the 890s and 900s in the name of the Isma'ili imam, Abdallah al-Mahdi, who at the time was still in hiding. After al-Mahdi proclaimed himself publicly in Ifriqiya in 909 and established the Fatimid Caliphate, Ibn al-Fadl turned against him and forced Ibn Hawshab to a subordinate position. Ibn Hawshab's life is known from an autobiography he wrote, while later Isma'ili tradition ascribes two theological treatises to him.
ʿAlī ibn al-Faḍl al-Jayshānī was a senior Isma'ili missionary from Yemen. In cooperation with Ibn Hawshab, he established the Isma'ili creed in his home country and conquered much of it in the 890s and 900s in the name of the hidden Isma'ili imam, Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah. After the establishment of the Fatimid Caliphate in Ifriqiya in 909, and the public proclamation of al-Mahdi Billah as caliph, Ibn al-Fadl denounced al-Mahdi as false, and instead declared himself to be the awaited messiah. His erstwhile colleague, Ibn Hawshab, refused to follow him, so Ibn al-Fadl turned against him and forced him to capitulate. Ibn al-Fadl's dominion collapsed swiftly after his death in October 915. In January 917, his stronghold of Mudhaykhira was seized by the Yu'firids, his children captured, and his two sons executed.
Ja'far ibn Mansur al-Yaman was an Isma'ili missionary and theological writer of the 10th century. Originally born and raised in Yemen, where his father Ibn Hawshab had established the Isma'ili daʿwa in the late 9th century, he fled the country to the court of the Fatimid caliphs in Ifriqiya, where he remained until his death. He composed poems in praise of the Fatimids' victory over the uprising of Abu Yazid, a biography of his father, and authored or compiled a number of important theological treatises.
Dāwūd ibn al-ʿĀḍid, known by the regnal name of al-Ḥāmid li-llāh among the Isma'ili faithful, was the 25th imam of Hafizi Isma'ilism, and pretender to the Fatimid Caliphate. He spent most of his life in captivity at the hands of the Ayyubid dynasty.
