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58 comments to "What’s the Difference: Shia vs. Sunni"
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Fazia
March 13th, 2007 at
7:49 am
As a Sunni with no beef with any Shia…excellent breakdown.
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beajerry
March 13th, 2007 at
9:37 am
It’s interesting to see any religion broken down into it’s pristine forms, because it then shows how much it gets perverted and abused from there.
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zdravko
March 13th, 2007 at
10:35 am
the first split in christianity was the great schism in the 11c which divided it into eastern orthodox and catholic. the protestant reformation came 5 centuries later.
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Jay (Jakanden)
March 13th, 2007 at
11:17 am
Thanks for the information. I wondered what the deal was but hadn’t gotten around to researching it yet heh.
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jael
March 13th, 2007 at
11:51 am
It’s always assumed that the “catholic” church began at Christ’s resurrection, but in fact, the early church fathers were Christians…not “catholic”. The RCC didn’t formulate until the third century a.d. and didn’t truly organize until the 5th century. Tradition says otherwise, but the truth is clear and well documented.
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penlies
March 13th, 2007 at
2:10 pm
Yes Jael but what you fail to mention is that the early “Christians” you refer to were usurped by the Catholic Church and disappeared entirely for a few thousand years until recently when they were rediscovered or shall I say reborn. The modern versions of these Christians have more in common with the Catholic Church then they do those first sects. This also sort misses the point of the article don’t cha think?
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Dustin
March 13th, 2007 at
3:05 pm
Its funny to read just how absurd the idea of religion is.
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Ali
March 13th, 2007 at
4:47 pm
Good and succint historical breakdown on well…the “breakdown” between the Sunni’s and Shias.
It’s kinda sad that all the sectarian violence seemed to have stemmed only because of Saddam manipulating the two sides against each other. Which would explain how he stayed in power for so long.
I hope the Iraqis can move past this infighting and work together as they used to before Saddam played them.
Hell, my Grandma is a Shia and I’m a Sunni. This little difference doesn’t mean a thing!
Boo to the fighting!
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Katrineholm Review
March 13th, 2007 at
5:15 pm
You spoke of Catholics and Protestants but you left out the Eastern Orthodox Christians. To simplify, the Church was one church which split East and West and several hundred years later the Protestants split from the West or Roman Catholic Church.
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Kyle
March 13th, 2007 at
7:23 pm
This is an insightful look into Iraq’s history - thank you!
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Monte
March 13th, 2007 at
11:53 pm
Wait a minute - are the Shia in eastern Iraq Arabs? I really doubt it. Check out A Brief History of Iran-US Relations, Part 1: Constitution to Khatami.
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Zeeshan
March 14th, 2007 at
12:08 am
shia & sunni are both Muslims thats it rest its media & people like you who are breaking them apart and rising the conflict by differentiating them.
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Amir
March 14th, 2007 at
12:14 am
As a Shia, I too have no beef with Sunnis. We believe in the same stuff. Now just because we believe the successor was different doesn’t mean we should kill each other. Muslims embarrass me because instead of uniting like the other religions do, we are stuck kicking our own butts. Like a dog biting its own tail. Instead of trying to unite and take on Israel and the U.S.’s bully asses, we are still killing each other.
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Saladin
March 14th, 2007 at
12:48 am
I’ll give you one thing it’s a little confusing, but now if someone can explain to me the differences between Protestants and Lutherans and Mormons and Calvinists and Methodists I’ll be set.
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Kevin Federline
March 14th, 2007 at
12:52 am
Muhammed’s successor?
I thought he was the ‘last’ prophet. How could he have a successor?
These mozzies have been 0wned.
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Jonathan Soeder
March 14th, 2007 at
1:10 am
The map would provide a lot more context — and a lot more relevant information in relation to what you hear about the Middle East on a daily basis, and the political differences between these two groups — if you showed the distribution of Sunni and Shia across Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Not just Iraq.
The geopolitical relationships between these countries, their make-up in terms of Shia / Sunnia Islam, and US foreign policy are all very important. For example, the members of the Axis of Evil Iran and Syria have large and influential Shiite populations.
Saudi Arabia is primarily Sunni. Iraq is has a large Shiite population as well but was ruled by the Sunni minority with funding from the Saudi and the Americans.
All of this deserves deeper investigation if you want to understand who are our political “enemies” and who are our “allies”
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mustakim
March 14th, 2007 at
1:10 am
yeah… i agree with amir. Why bother about our small differences. That’s what bring us down. Shame on those who like to stay in groups and kill their own brothers.
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Jonathan Soeder
March 14th, 2007 at
1:10 am
You can find a good map here:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a0/Muslim_distribution.jpg
courtesy of wikipedia.
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Friend
March 14th, 2007 at
1:27 am
Fascinating and an excellent, readable– and most importantly, recallable– summary! Thank you!
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SSuheb
March 14th, 2007 at
2:18 am
If we try to see it from a very generic scenario then I am sure all the muslims will agree that Islam (Quran) doesn’t differentiate the followers into any category. We follow the teachings of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H). It was Allah’s final Messenger’s decision brothers to make Abu Bakr (RaziAllahuanhu) the leader so how can we question or even debate on the thing that
Hazrat Ali (RaziAllahuanu)should have been the made the first Caliph. ISLAM is for every human being in this world and it teaches us a way of life. All other religions teaches you - To Love, To Care, To live in Harmony, ISLAM teaches you all this plus how to achieve it. We all face in one direction when we pray so there is no question of division which the higher classes and politics have created between us today. -
Abd-allah
March 14th, 2007 at
2:19 am
All terrorist organizations consist of Sunni Muslims, who don’t follow the right path of the religion. The Prophet NEVER taught violence.
Shia’s on the other hand, are peace loving people and the Dawoodi Bohra community (sub-sect) being the most official (has an official spiritual leader) and organized among them.
Bottomline: Islam doesn’t teach terrorism/violence and Terrorists are NOT Muslims (from the moment they violate the religious laws).
Peace.
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Robert
March 14th, 2007 at
2:35 am
by the way, the great schism was not between the byzantine and roman church, but after the split into western and eastern orthodox, and occurred within the west as there were two popes at one time, one residing in Avignon, and the other in Rome.
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IamX
March 14th, 2007 at
2:43 am
First I have to say i’m not a muslim, but I know lots of people that are muslim religion and there is only one word i can call them good people.
As for differing beetwen the fractions in the same religion it is to my understanding so stupid that it makes my head ake. I am from the region in Europe that people know of as Balkans so i know what i’m talking about.
The only thing i would like to say to the muslim people in the world is unite and throw out those imperialist war mongerrers likes of US and others.
Believe me when i say they got nothing you really need. -
kamy
March 14th, 2007 at
2:56 am
Great info on a touchy subject.
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Sulaiman
March 14th, 2007 at
3:09 am
As a practising Muslim myself I am ashamed at the politicizing of these issues. When you look at the common man, shia or sunni, they are all the same. Unless you are madly indoctrinated the common man doesn’t have a problem with sunni or shia. We are all humans, we all breathe air, drink water, and eat the same food.
The root cause of sunni shia fighting and unrest relates to a much bigger problem, the prevalence of fundamentalist elements motivated by power, money and weapons. This does not apply to Islam alone and we can see this in different forms in other religions too, though we muslims are condemned as fundamentalist and violence prone.
This is not helped in any way by the preponderance of violent radical imams and fundamentalis wahhabi strongholds preaching extremes and violence against everyone else. Unless we address this problem at the root, it is going to end in a very very bad way.
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Ugly American
March 14th, 2007 at
3:15 am
You really need to learn more about the history of the Christian Church if you think it went 1600 years without a major split. That’s their propaganda.
A major cause of the Dark Ages was the Roman Church and the Byzantine Church bankrupting the corpse of the Roman Empire to hire mercenaries to attack eachother.
Not to mention the systematic mass murder of anyone who disagreed with them. For example, the First Inquisition focused not on witches but on the heretical Cathars who were guilty of the unforgivible sin of claiming the Church should be poor like Jesus. For that they were ruthlessly exterminated by both major Christian Churches who were and are filthy rich.
But back to the Sunni and Shia. The Shia have saints, mix the church in worldly affairs and maintain many Zoroastrian symbols and rituals. And hey, I’ve got nothing against Zoroastrianism. In fact, alot of Christianity is plagerized from it. But it’s not Islam. So the Sunni have documentation when they say the Shia have not followed the Koran.
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BJ
March 14th, 2007 at
5:40 am
Zeeshan, I’d suggest that it’s the guys holding the rocket launchers and hacksaws that are tearing the two groups apart - not the folks who publish USA Today.
I agree wholeheartedly with Dustin.
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bobg
March 14th, 2007 at
8:34 am
Thanks for this post. Just one question-I’ve heard that it is automatic passage to hell for killing another Muslim. Why all of the killing then?
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Nick
March 14th, 2007 at
8:58 am
Christianity was fissiparous from the very beginning: see e.g. the so-called Ebionites, the Donatists or the Arians.
However, if we’re talking about splits that have survived to this day, the oldest one would be that which took place in 431 at the Council of Ephesus, between the churches that adhered to the designation “Theotokos” for the Virgin Mary (modern descendants are the Orthodox, Catholic and most Protestant denominations) and those that rejected it (the Nestorian Christians).
This was followed by the dispute between the “Diophysite” or Chalcedonian Christians (modern descendants are, again the Orthodox, Catholic and most Protestant denominations) and the “Monophysites” who rejected the Council of Chalcedon in 451. The latter group included the majority churches in Armenia, Egypt and Ethiopia. Recently, however, they seem to have kissed and made up with the Orthodox churches and, to an extent, even the Catholic church.
Only then came 1054 when Orthodox and Catholics began to go their separate ways (emphasis on began; the fourth crusade was the real clincher, and they did get back together again briefly in 1439)
And then came the Reformation….
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Khawaja
March 14th, 2007 at
9:05 am
The article did a great job in differentiating between both Sects. Just to add to the article Ali was not just called mawla, the actual statement of Mohammad (p.b.u.h) was “Whomsoever’s master (mawla) I am, this ‘Ali is also his master.” Shi’ites believe that successor to Mohammad (p.b.u.h) cannot be chosen democratically as only perfection (Mohammad p.b.u.h) can know who’s perfect for succession.
For those willing to learn more about shi’ite: http://www.al-islam.org
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bryant
March 14th, 2007 at
9:49 am
People divide on any matter because we like to judge others and we judge others because we have no real idea of who we really are or why we are born. All religions are based on faith because nobody has seen God yet. None, let alone meeting God. As such, all such faiths are blind faiths and blind faith is based on fear and greed. Fear & greed are the 2 sides of the same coin. Like male & female within a family unit.
There are always 2 sides to any argument just like there is always 2 sides to a story. The reason for this duality is for humans to realise that balance can only be achieved when we comprehend what having 2 sides mean. It is meant for complementing. Like a mother & father, when they complement, only then will there be peace or else division will rule, one way or another.
Love is another word for unity whereas power is another word for division. Power cannot exist without division for power is division. Power cannot be shared for male and female are different. Power can only be neutralised when we realised that when truth is attained, and not read about, preached, taught, practiced artificially, etc, power becomes love. God has no notion of power for to Him, power is Love. Which is why we are all alive and sustained by aspects of Truth called The Sun, Nature, etc. If God exists and He was to have the notion of power like humans do, everything will be destroyed.
Power means to judge, to have contrast, to divide. Love, because it is not power but Truth, do not judge. The love that gives and gives without contrast, judgement, division, etc, is Permanent Power and any entity who is so empowered, do not need to judge. That entity can afford to give and give. If we comprehend this far, we will have some foundation of what Truth, Love, Power, etc is all about. It is about not judging others but judging our self and once we’ve judged our self and found out who we really, really are, we then do not need to judge others and allow others to judge us by way of religions, faiths, right & wrongs, good & bad and all the nonsense that humans take as real and immanent.
Ask yourself this and that is, how can a chimp understand what a human understands? It can’t because there is a difference in evolution [but not a difference in importance for evolution is just a message for those who are honest enough to open their eyes fully]. To evolve higher and back towards Truth/God/Love/etc, we need to evolve away from the hypocrisy that we take as real, like blind faiths. God is not about believing but about knowing and accepting who we really, realy, are and where we stand in relation to Truth, and we can only do that when we judge our self first and not others or allow hypocrisy to judge us [like when we accept a blind belief]. There is nothing that we can express on the outside [without] that we are not already inside [within]. We cannot despise hypocrisy unless we are a hypocrite our self first. Self-judgement is the truth within and only the truth will free the individual. Otherwise, we will be shackled to “technologyâ€, religion, hypocrisy, commerce, politics, and all the junk within humanity that most take as the reason for existing.
The ONLY reason for existing is to evolve back to Truth and Nature uses the mechanism of death to reinforce that point. The blind will always be blind if they refuse to judge themselves first and when we don’t self-judge, we then judge others and covet what belongs to others, especially others’ freedom of beliefs, be that correct or incorrect. Once the majority start judging themselves first and act truthfully, peace will finally start manifesting. And not before, inspite of going to Mars, blindly and greedily/fearfully believing in super-high tech, religions, “New World Orderâ€, kelptomania economics, politics as a means of plundering, or not. If you are “heartlessâ€, your heart will tell you so and all the pills, surgery, maverick of Big Pharma, religion, etc, will not make a bit of difference for removing malice is not the same as perfuming it. Another word for hypocrisy. Humans were evolved to return-back-to/reflect, Truth, and not to become some mad insanity masquerading as “truthâ€. And WE ALL know it. Hypocrite or not and humans are addicted to hypocrisy and will do anything to hide that fact. Can any animal be so dumb as to cheat itself like humans do?
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Glenn
March 14th, 2007 at
10:09 am
In response to penlies, re: the history and development of the early christian church. It’s important to recognize the differences between the early Catholic “church” and the christian faith. Although it was instrumental in spreading the Gospel, the administrative body of the Catholic church was actually the government, and really not Faith oriented at all. They used religion as the tool to manipulate the populace, and create war against everyone else. When the populace started to recognize this discrepency, the Reformation occurred, which of course was corrupted in various ways as well.
The nature of the evangelical church today is to hold Christ as the head of the church (not the Pope) and recognize our responsibility as the Body of Christ on earth (the church). In this it is VERY different than the “Catholic” church at any period.
Glenn -
James
March 14th, 2007 at
10:22 am
The difference between Christianity and Islam with regards to sects is that, in Islam, difference is political and not doctrinal, Christian church was split right after the death of Christ you can see that in book of Acts, but majority of those sects where killed off as heretics. Infect some of the early christian sects in their belief were very similar to muslims regarding Jesus Christ.
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Bark
March 14th, 2007 at
10:26 am
“As for the locations where Shias have a significant Muslim majority, there are really only two: Iraq and Iran.”
Shias also hold the majority in Baltistan. This is a country that borders Tibet, which you never hear of because Pakistan has control over, so it’s part of Pakistan.
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w00t
March 14th, 2007 at
10:45 am
The only thing i would like to say to the muslim people in the world is unite and throw out those imperialist war mongerrers likes of US and others.
Believe me when i say they got nothing you really need.1. Please explain how the US can be considered imperialist, we’ve never taken a country and called it our own.
2. Please explain how the US are war mongerrers, we liberated your islamic asses and have been protecting you ever since. -
Andrew R.
March 14th, 2007 at
1:21 pm
Big blunder about Christianity makes me doubt deepness of author’s knowledge about Islam.
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mr. stink
March 14th, 2007 at
3:19 pm
Q. What do Shia and Sunni have in common with other religions?
A. Fantasy death cults.
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Sean
March 14th, 2007 at
6:36 pm
to woot:
1. The US doesnt have to specifically invade and annex another country to be called imperialistic. In the 21st century, imperialism in the strict definition in the word would be fairly infeasible. The US operates like an economic imperialist. We already enjoy such massive power here that the vast majority of us can stay home, while a very small percentage of businessmen and government officials travel overseas to further consolidate our power. We enter into developing countries, and using money that is often supplied by the US Treasury, and approved by the World Bank, offer them massive loans to build up their infrastructure, with the stipulation that those infrastructure contracts go to private contractors that the US supports. When these countries are eventually unable to pay back these massive debts, they often cut national programs or raid their own treasury to avoid defaulting. Once they do default, we agree to absorb their debt in exchange for a ‘pound of flesh’. This may be paid in supporting specific policy measures, agreeing to fight against a specific country, privatizing their resources to US-led multinational corporations, etc etc. While our army doesnt specifically go over and enslave those of other countries, a class of businessmen representing “our” interests travels to other countries, and inevitably creates a situation in which those countries are beholden to us, by material or ideological support. So yes, we are imperialistic, we are just way, way better than previous empires at concealing this fact.
2. A country that has been in a state of national emergency for 70+ years, that has spent the majority of its history in some kind of war, that spends more on military budget than the next 50 highest military spenders combined, that jump into a war that the majority of the world are against with little to no factual support, and who are run mostly by neoconservatives who have an obsession with defense contracts and Israeli conflict….I would say the ‘warmonger’ status is pretty friggin accurate.
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Monte
March 14th, 2007 at
11:37 pm
Interesting additional map at Iraq demography. Shia are, apparently, largely Arabs in Iraq, but Persians in neighboring Iran.
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Monte
March 14th, 2007 at
11:41 pm
I wonder if it’s important to bear in mind that terrorists are a tiny minority of Muslims. In fact, Muslims generally are less likely to condone violence against civilians than are Americans, considered as a group. See Think Muslims Support Terror?
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Monte
March 14th, 2007 at
11:44 pm
Sorry, inaccurate link. Should be Think Muslims Support Terror?
In case the link doesn’t work again, here ’tis:
http://masbury.wordpress.com/2007/02/24/think-muslims-support-terror-c heck-this-out/ -
ted
March 15th, 2007 at
8:40 pm
LOL at “to woot”.
My two cents is that although terrorists may be in the minority, there are lots of Muslims in the world who tacitly agree with some of the things that terrorist organizations say.
The Christian equivalent would be the moderate Christian who agrees with some fundamentalist viewpoints.
Sometimes you “agree” with some points. Sometimes you just “not disagree” with others.
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Bob
March 30th, 2007 at
6:38 am
Are Hindus Christians or muslims?
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Monte
April 2nd, 2007 at
12:52 am
To w00t: I invite you to read A brief history of Iran-US relations. Iran was only the first of many democracies in which the US organized coups, replacing fairly-elected governments with dictators more favorable to US interests.
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Syed
April 24th, 2007 at
8:03 am
Well, I agree with Zeeshan, Shia and Sunni are merely a division which is widening by media, specially the western media.
This is not the new thing for the West to divide and rule, so they game plan still the same, they rule India by dividing Hindu and Muslim, other wise India was the most prosperous country before the bustard Britishers came in, under the Muslims rule they were prosperous for thousands of years. Then the bustards’ Britishers divided them and still they are fighting.
The same way they want the oil from Iraq and they divided the Sunni’s and Shia’s.Till yesterday nobody in West know the real difference between Shia and Sunni and now the bustard’s American play a dirty game and divided the society for their own advantage.
I believe they should forget what ever little difference between them and kick the westerner out of the country then build new iraq.
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nikto
May 5th, 2007 at
2:33 pm
It’s just the Same Old Game in new dressing:
The Elites use religion (or ethnicity/culture) to divide the “little people” and keep them fighting each other instead of their REAL enemy & main obstacle
to freedom–The Elites.And of course, most folks fall for it.
Saddam was a master of that game, but so is
Bu$hCo and the MSM.As long as this Game continues, the future of the human race is very much in doubt.
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brainworms
May 6th, 2007 at
6:16 am
Fact is that both Christianity and Islam are differing interpretations (cults) of Judism, a religion based on ancient Semitic mythology. It’s Santa Claus for grownups… and Santa is just an anagram for you-know-who.
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Blynn
May 7th, 2007 at
3:37 am
This was a good summary of the subject, and many of the comments were helpful, especially Nick’s. I would add one difference between Sunni and Shia: the latter have a streak of messianism, awaiting the reappearance of the Mahdi, a revered past figure who disappeared centuries ago. Shiaism also has more hierarchy and is confined to Southwest Asia, mostly Arabs and Persians (but not most Arabs), giving the lie to the ridiculous term “Islamofascism” as applied to Sunnis. Fascism is nothing if not devoted to strong central authority in a monoethnic culture. The only “fascism” at work among insurgents in Iraq, among them battle-hardened Chechens, resembles the “leaderless resistance” of US white supremcists and gun nuts.
As for the comments about the nature of imperialism: WTF? Since when is annexation a requirement? The Romans used puppets, like our good friend Herod the Great, to put a local face on their administration. If the system did not keep the populace in line, direct occupation would follow. The Romans win either way. Either the puppet is successful, or, in an attempt to be sucessful, he is overly brutal and the Romans were “liberators”. (The system failed with Cleopatra and Herod Agrippa, who led revolts against the Romans). Hitler placed puppets in Slovakia and part of France, and even countries occupied, like the Netherlands and my beloved Norway, local constables collaborated in arrests and deportation. The SS and Gestapo were not always needed.
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Faisal Aziz
June 26th, 2007 at
12:08 pm
I think there is a big difference between shias and sunnis , but the problem is that we dont have much time to understand this differences, we have understand the differences. the persons who understant the difference are only our islamic scholers, common peoples only said ” We are brothers of each others”
No!! We are not brothers , we are entirely different,
shia has other way and sunnis has anohter way….. -
Zeeshan Asla
June 26th, 2007 at
12:11 pm
I m 100 percent agree with Faisal Aziz
shias are non muslims
becoz their direction is out of islamic rules
they believe in mutta, mutta is zana -
shahid
July 12th, 2007 at
11:31 pm
Q1-Do you think the Prophet (PBUH) would leave this world without entrusting Islam to some capable person? Was he not wise enough to nominate his successor to prevent disruption after his departure from this world? Were his followers Abu Bakr, Umar, Usman wiser in realizing that a successor should be elected even before his death?Why were four different methods adopted to install each of the Four Rightly Guided Khalifs?
Q2-Br. Zeeshan Asla,muttah was halal during the reign of Abu Bakr and half the reign of Umar, what authority did Umar have to declare muttah haram?
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Study Guide
August 12th, 2007 at
6:27 am
Well the shia were the ones who parted from mainstream islam. Not like protestantism and catholicism where both parted to two different ways.
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tam
August 14th, 2007 at
1:32 am
to bob: hinduism is an entirely different religion from christianity and islam (the religion of muslims).
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odin
September 14th, 2007 at
6:04 pm
There either is or is not, a “spiritual” world, i.e. a world with beings greater than our level of evolution, (and usually, not readily perceivable). These beings have to do with our world of matter as interactors and creators, guides or detractors. If there is even one being of this nature then there is a real “spiritual” world. If there are none, then there is no such world. If there is no such world, all of our religions are science fiction. If there is such a world, what are the chances that all of these gods, Allah, Christ, God, Shiva etc.etc. have their own little boxes or Kingdoms and are desperately trying to get us to join their own gang. It is much more likely that there is a spiritual reality than that there isn’t. It is also likely that the essence of these creative spiritual forces are pure and powerful in a way we can barely comprehend. The force is probably like a color. Perhaps Love is a beautiful rose-violet. A clairvoyant, (a person who was lucky or developed enough to see into the spiritual world), would see this color whenever a human being loved. It would have nothing to do with the gang they belonged to or what they thought in their intellect. It would happen that when that person loved, forgave, encouraged or nourished the color of that action would be there. When the person killed, lied, hurt or abused a different vibration or color would exist. Repeated actions of one sort or another would cause the color or vibration to exist and come to live in that person no matter what they proclaimed to be on the outside. If there is a spiritual world, no person on this earth has the luxury of “atheism”. All humans worship one color or another with their everyday actions. All humans are attracting themselves to or away from spirituals beings with every decision they make. The possibility that the Christian’s God and the Muslim’s Allah are two totally different gods is non-existent unless their basic vibration or color is also totally different. A God of love, dynamic and powerful enough to create this universe and sustain our hearts is the same God for all of humanity no matter what our limited intelligence gives as a name. A God of violence, ruthless enough to ravage the innocent and destroy the hopes of the suffering is also the same God for all of humanity. We align ourselves with these forces in a thousand ways every day. When we pass over - the truth comes out.
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besmelah arahman araheem
April 12th, 2008 at
5:26 pm
so, i think the shias are just blain stupid, seriously i wont even count them as real muslims, especially their relegious leaders, and also their actions that are totaly wrong, one example is them hitting them self for someone who have died earlier, i always ask my self, why dont they hit them self in the date muhamad died on? second example is that they do not follow the sharea, which is the guidance from muhamad’s actions and his followers (sahaba), and another questions pops up, if they only learn islam from the quran, then where does it say that salaht athohr is 4 rakas? and just another example is the facts of them traveling to visits shrines other than the 3 allowed, seriously, muhamad said do not travel to any shrine other than the ones in maka, madina, and kods, but no they travel to all those imams and they go to their shrines for some reason!
any way i have a lot of things about their wrong actions but they are totaly to much for me to write and for you to read, hopefully they will wakeup one day and understand some of their wronge actions, inshallah
and aslam 3la man itaba3a alhoda -
Imaz
June 8th, 2008 at
3:58 am
One time ago,I almost embrace Islam but when I watched Islamist terrorists (Al-Qeada & Taliban)slaughterred Late Eugene Armstrong in cold-blooded,multilated bodies of other helpless and innocent victims including Pakistani’s soldiers..I give up. These terrorists cited verses from the Quran before they cut their throats and decipated their bodies… I realised that it is not the RIGHT religion to choose.
Now I am VERY happy thatI am NOT a Muslim. Mr.Abd-allah, please do not tell lies or cover up by saying that terrorists are NOT Muslims. They are real Muslims and I understand most of them learned and studied the Quran much more better than you such as Osama Laden..and others.I believe they pray five times a day….They are the real killers in the Middle-East…. Bombed innocent children, elders and more…Some Imans and extremist Muslims declare ,’if you kill the ‘Kafirs’(Non-Muslims) you can short-cut to Heaven without any question ask…and your graves will be filled with fragrance of good, pleasant smell of flowers automatically….. INSYA’ALLAH’.To what I have observed till now, when they are more Muslims in one country, they tend to be turmoil or troubles in that country…. as if there are no blessings in those countries. May be Satan is more influencial than Angels….in these countries.
When there are less Muslim in one country, they are really nice, good and caring people because their minds are more opened not like in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Telling you all these because of my long experience with Muslims.
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Qasim
June 14th, 2008 at
2:42 pm
Just to correct one of the posters above - the difference between Shias and Sunni may seem political in origins, but is as much doctorinal. One of the most important difference is the shiite belief in continuation of ‘ijtehad’, which allows interpretation and re-interpretation of religious law in modern times. The Sunnis too allowed this initially, but sometime during the Abbasid reign, and inspired by the skeptics such as Imam Ghazali - they closed the doors of rational interpretation.
Another doctrinal difference is the shiite belief in the institution of Imamate - the belief that the Imams were the rightly chosen successors and infalliables. Sunnis have similar reverence for the companions of the Prophet, but they don’t consider them Infalliable.So unlike what one ignorant poster has said above - shias believe in following the teachings of Quran as well as the actions of the Prophet (and the Imams), unlike Sunnis - The second Caliph is said to have proclaimed that Quran was sufficient and he needed no other guidance.
Also - a very recent phenomenon is Wahabism. Wahabis consider themselves an offshoot of Sunni Islam, started merely 200 years back and all terrorist activities can be traced back to this virulent sect. So you would never find a shia or sunni engaging in terrorism, but wahabis (also known by some other names such as Ahle-Hadiths and Salafis)
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imtiaz
August 1st, 2008 at
2:07 pm
its simple the shias are mention in the quran as munafics ad they exzited during the time of the prophter and they the shias who killed imaam hussan thats why n mohoram they kill and hurt them selves. get a grib on life Mohammed is the last prophet respact him and remember Ali is not higher then him Ali was or as equal as the oour kalifa who we all respact equaily
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