The Mahdi (Twelfth Imam)
The twelfth Imam of Twelver Shi'ism, believed to be in occultation and expected to return at the end of time to establish justice.
Read in context →Biography
Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Mahdi is, in Twelver Shia belief, the twelfth and final Imam, held to have been born in 869 CE in Samarra as the son of the eleventh Imam, Hasan al-Askari. According to Twelver doctrine he became Imam as a young child upon his father's death in 874 CE and was concealed by God in a state known as occultation (ghayba). His Minor Occultation (874–941) was a period in which he communicated with his community through four successive deputies; the Major Occultation that followed continues to the present, during which religious scholars guide the Shia community in his absence. He is identified with the awaited Mahdi, the messianic restorer believed destined to fill the world with justice, making him central to Shia eschatology and the doctrine of just leadership. The contested point is that non-Shia historical sources record Hasan al-Askari's death without a known successor, leading some historians to question whether he had a son, while Twelver tradition explains the absence of record as deliberate concealment.
Quotes & narrations
«(Narrated about him:) He will fill the earth with equity and justice as it was filled with injustice and tyranny.»
«(The Prophet said:) The Mahdi is of my family, of the descendants of Fatima.»
Related entities
Also appears in
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Iranica, "Ḡayba (Occultation)"
- Jassim M. Hussain, The Occultation of the Twelfth Imam (1982)
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Muhammad al-Mahdi al-Hujjah"