Encounters with the Hidden Imam in Early and Pre-Modern Twelver Shīʿī Islam

In Encounters with the Hidden Imam in Early and Pre-Modern Twelver Shīʿī Islam , Omid Ghaemmaghami traces the history of one of the core ideas that animate and form the highly influential and instrumental belief in the Hidden Imam, the central figure of Twelver Sh messianic expectation. "The history of what has come to be known as Twelver Shīʻī Islam is a history of attempts to deal with the abrupt loss of the Imam. In Encounters with the Hidden Imam in Early and Pre-Modern Twelver Shīʻī Islam, Omid Ghaemmaghami demonstrates that in the early years of the so-called Greater Occultation, Shīʻī authorities maintained that all contact with the Imam had been sundered, forcing him to remain incommunicado until his (re)appearance. This position, however, proved untenable to maintain. Almost a century after the start of the Greater Occultation, prominent scholars began to concede the possibility that some Shīʻa can meet the Hidden Imam. Accounts of encounters with the Imam from the Greater Occultation soon began to appear, adumbrating their exponential growth in later centuries"-- Provided by publisher The history of Twelver Shīʿī Islam is a history of attempts to deal with the abrupt loss of the Imam. In Encounters with the Hidden Imam in Early and Pre- Modern Twelver Shīʿī Islam, Omid Ghaemmaghami demonstrates that in the early years of what came to be known as the Greater Occultation, Shīʿī authorities maintained that all contact with the Imam had been sundered, forcing him to remain incommunicado until his (re)appearance. This position, however, proved untenable to maintain. Almost a century after the start of the Greater Occultation, prominent scholars began to concede the possibility that some Shīʿa can meet the Hidden Imam. Accounts of encounters with the Imam from the Greater Occultation soon began to appear, adumbrating their exponential growth in later centuries. Dedication 6 Contents 8 Acknowledgments 10 A Note on Transliteration and Style 12 Introduction 14 1 The Unknown, the Unseen, and the Unrecognized 36 2 Hidden from All, yet Seen by Some? The Special Case of Three Hadiths 66 3 “A Lying Impostor” 98 4 From the Youth and the Stone to the Proliferation of Accounts 146 5 Conclusion 185 Appendix 1: A Descriptive Catalogue of Some Key Sources That Deal with the Subject of Encounters with the Hidden Imam 192 Appendix 2: Al-Majlisī’s Gloss of the “lying impostor” Passage of the Final tawqīʿ of the Hidden Imam 201 Bibliography 208 Index of Quran Citations 259 Index of Quoted Hadiths 260 Index of People and Places 262 Index of Subjects 272