Abu al-ʿAbbās Abd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿal-ʿAbbās, known by his laqab al-Saffah, was the first caliph of the Abbasid Caliphate, one of the longest and most important caliphates in Islamic history.
Husayn ibn Ali was a social, political and religious leader. The grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a son of Ali ibn Abi Talib and Muhammad's daughter Fatima, as well as a younger brother of Hasan ibn Ali, Husayn is regarded as the third Imam (leader) in Shia Islam after his brother, Hasan, and before his son, Ali al-Sajjad. Being the grandson of the prophet, he is also a prominent member of the Ahl al-Bayt. He is also considered to be a member of the Ahl al-Kisa, and a participant in the event of the mubahala. Muhammad described him and his brother, Hasan, as the leaders of the youth of Paradise.
The Battle of Karbala was fought on 10 October 680 between the army of the second Umayyad caliph Yazid I and a small army led by Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, at Karbala, Sawad.
Zayd ibn ʿAlī, also spelled Zaid, was the son of Ali ibn al-Husayn Zayn al-Abidin, and great-grandson of Ali ibn Abi Talib. He led an unsuccessful revolt against the Umayyad Caliphate, in which he died. The event gave rise to the Zaydiyya sect of Shia Islam, which holds him as the next Imam after his father Ali ibn al-Husayn Zayn al-Abidin. Zayd ibn Ali is also seen as a major religious figure by many Sunnis and was supported by the prominent Sunni jurist, Abu Hanifa, who issued a fatwa in support of Zayd against the Umayyads.
Zaydism is one of the three main branches of Shia Islam that emerged in the eighth century following Zayd ibn Ali‘s unsuccessful rebellion against the Umayyad Caliphate. Zaydism is typically considered to be a branch of Shia Islam that comes closest to the Sunni, although the "classical" form of Zaydism over the centuries had changed its posture with regard to Sunni and Shia traditions multiple times, to the point where interpretation of Zaydi as Shia is often based on just their acceptance of Ali as a rightful successor to prophet Muhammad. Mainstream ("twelver") Shia sometimes consider Zaydism to be a "fifth school" of Sunni Islam. Zaydis regard rationalism as more important than Quranic literalism and in the past were quite tolerant towards Sunni Shafi'ism, a religion of about half of the Yemenis.
Muhammad ibn Ali al-Baqir was a descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and the fifth of the twelve Shia imams, succeeding his father, Ali al-Sajjad, and succeeded by his son, Ja'far al-Sadiq. Muhammad's honorific title al-Baqir is short for baqir al-ilm, which means 'the one who splits knowledge open', a reference to his fame as a religious scholar.
The Ibadi movement or Ibadism is a branch inside Islam, which many believe is descended from the Kharijites. The followers of Ibadism are known as the Ibadis or, as they call themselves, The People of Truth and Integrity.
Ali ibn al-Husayn al-Sajjad, also known as Zayn al-Abidin was the great-grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the fourth imam in Shia Islam, succeeding his father, Husayn ibn Ali, his uncle, Hasan ibn Ali, and his grandfather, Ali ibn Abi Talib.
Sa‘īd ibn Jubayr (665–714), also known as Abū ‘Abd Allāh, was originally from Kufa, in modern-day Iraq. He was regarded as one of the leading members of the Tabi'in. Sa'īd is held in the highest esteem by scholars of the Shi'a and Sunni Islamic tradition and was considered one of the leading jurists of the time. He also narrated several hadith from Ibn Abbas.
Muhammad ibn Abi Bakr ibn Abi Quhafa al-Taymi was an Arab Muslim commander in the service of the fourth Rashidun caliph and first Shia Imam, Ali ibn Abi Talib. Muhammad was the youngest son of the first Rashidun caliph Abu Bakr and Asma bint Umays. He had his son, Al-Qasim taught by his aunt, Aisha, and by Ibn Abbas. Which is why many Hadiths are quoted through Muhammad and his son and thus were the source of much of the information of Islam and narrations available today.
Muslim ibn Aqil al-Hashimi was a relative of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Muslim was the son of Aqil ibn Abi Talib and a cousin of Husayn ibn Ali, the third Shia Imam, who dispatched him to Kufa in Iraq to ascertain their support upon the accession of the Umayyad caliph Yazid. The Kufans welcomed Muslim and overwhelmingly pledged to support Husayn against the Umayyad rule, which they considered illegitimate and tyrannical. In response, Yazid replaced the mild governor of the city with his strongman Ubayd-Allah ibn Ziyad, who soon discovered the hideout of Muslim through an informant. When Ibn Ziyad imprisoned or killed Hani ibn Urwa, who was secretly sheltering Muslim, he came out in open revolt and surrounded the governor's palace with his supporters in September 680 CE. With a combination of threats and promises, however, Ibn Ziyad induced Kufan tribal leaders to abandon Muslim and withdraw their men. A deserted Muslim was arrested after a strong resistance and executed. Before this turn of events, he had written to Husayn and urged him to come to Kufa. Husayn thus left Mecca with his family and a few supporters, but his caravan was intercepted and massacred by the Umayyad forces in October 680 in Karbala, near Kufa. Muslim is revered in Shia Islam for his bravery and moral uprightness. His shrine in Kufa is a destination for Shia pilgrims.
Al-Mukhtar ibn Abi Ubayd al-Thaqafi was a pro-Alid revolutionary based in Kufa, who led a rebellion against the Umayyad Caliphate in 685 and ruled over most of Iraq for eighteen months during the Second Fitna.
Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya was a son of Ali ibn Abi Talib, who was the fourth caliph in Sunni Islam and the first imam in Shia Islam. Ibn al-Hanafiyya was an effective lieutenant for his father Ali during his caliphate. After the assassination of Ali and the deaths of his two sons Hasan and Husayn, many recognized Ibn al-Hanafiyya as the head of the House of Ali. Claiming to represent Ibn al-Hanafiyya, Mukhtar al-Thaqafi rose in Iraq in 686 to avenge Husayn and his relatives, who were massacred in 680 CE by forces of the Umayyad caliph Yazid bin Mu'awiya. The quiescent Ibn al-Hanafiyya did not actively associate with this rebellion but was still rescued by Mukhtar when he was detained by the rival caliph Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad. Support for Ibn al-Hanafiyya continued even after the defeat and death of Mukhtar in 686–687 in the form of the Kaysanites, a now-extinct Shia sect that traced the imamate to Ibn al-Hanafiyya and his descendants, particularly his son Abu Hashim. After the death of Ibn al-Hanafiyya in 700–701, some Kaysanites declared that he was the Mahdi, the eschatological Islamic leader who would reappear in the end of time and eradicate injustice and evil. The Kaysanites later provided the organizational structure for the Abbasids to overthrew the Umayyads in 750–751.
Batrīyya or Butrīyya is an early branch of Zaydī Islam.
The Hashemite–Umayyad rivalry was a feud between the clans of Banu Hashim and Banu Umayya, both belonging to the Meccan Arab tribe of Quraysh, in the 7th and 8th centuries. The rivalry is important as it influenced key events in the course of early Islamic history.
Abū Muḥammad al-Hasan ibn al-Hasan ibn ʿAlī al-Hāshimī was an Islamic scholar and theologian. He was a son of Hasan ibn Ali and Khawla bint Manzur. He was a grandson of the fourth caliph Ali and a great-grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Ḥasan ibn al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib al-Hāshimī al-Qurashī (Arabic: أبو محمد عبد الله بن الحسن بن الحسن بن علي بن أبي طالب الهاشمي القرشي; c. 689 – 762, better known as ʿAbd Allāh al-Maḥḍ and ʿAbd Allāh al-Kāmil, was an Islamic scholar, theologian and hadith narrator, grandson of both Hasan ibn Ali and Husayn ibn Ali. His sons include Muhammad and Ibrahim, who rebelled against Abbasid rule, and Idris, who rebelled in the Maghreb and established the Idrisid dynasty.
Yahya ibn Zayd was the eldest son of Zayd ibn Ali, the founder of the Zaydi movement. He participated in the unsuccessful revolt against the Umayyad Caliphate launched by his father in 739/40, and escaped to Khurasan, where he tried with limited success to gain support for another rebellion. In 743 he was tracked down and finally killed by forces of the Umayyad governor, Nasr ibn Sayyar.
In Zaydi Islam, the imamate is the supreme political and religious leadership position. In common to other Shi'a sects, it is reserved for Alids, i.e. descendants of Muhammad via Ali ibn Abi Talib and Fatimah. Unlike the Twelver or Isma'ili imamate, however, it was not hereditary and could be claimed by any qualified Alid; nor were its holders ascribed semi-divine attributes of infallibility and miracle-working. Necessary qualifications were a grounding in Islamic jurisprudence and a public call to allegiance, usually in the form of leadership of an uprising against unlawful authority. In practice, this meant that there could be several Zaydi imams at the same time, even in the same region, or none at all. This resulted in the unique concept of a 'restricted' imamate, for holders of political power who did not meet the scholarly credentials. Moreover, the personal nature of the imamate for a long time prevented the rise of persistent institutions, rendering the Zaydi states established in Yemen and Tabaristan unstable. As a result, the imamate often came to be passed down in hereditary fashion, especially as the Imams of Yemen abandoned Zaydi doctrines for Sunni ones in the 18th century.
