The Imam’s Imamate in Sunni Sources

Abstract

Followers of every Islamic school believe in a number of principles, including the belief in the Prophet’s (SAW) twelve successors and the leaders of the Islamic ummah. The significant principle of faith has its origin in successively transmitted riwāyahs narrated from the Messenger of God (SAW) and recorded in reliable sources by scholars of hadith and other disciplines from different Islamic schools. Sunni scholars have tried, based on their articles of faith, to identify the twelve successors. The findings of the present study indicate that there are certain features attested in the riwāyahs, recorded in Twelver Shia sources, that prove the perspective adopted by Shia scholars and disprove the stance adopted by Sunni scholars.