والأخبار بمثل هذا تخرج عن حدّ هذا الكتاب.
١ كذا في م، وفي ز، خ، ل: يسأله.
In the ability to judge is combined all knowledge that people require regarding God’s lawful and unlawful things, the obligations He has imposed, and His rulings. Concerning these things, the people must submit to the one whose knowledge was attested to and prayed for by the Messenger. During the entire extent of ʿAlī’s life after the passing of the Messenger of God, those who had followed the Messenger before him found themselves needing to consult him concerning the religious law, while ʿAlī had no need to consult or ask anyone at all about such matters. This is one of the things that engendered anger toward ʿAlī on the part of those who had been regularly consulted and to whom people referred concerning matters about which they disagreed. An example of this is the reliably transmitted report attributed to ʿAlī according to which he often used to command, “Ask me before you lose me.”19 He also stated, “My eyelids never shut, nor did sleep ever enter my head even one day during the days of my life with the Messenger of God until I had learned the permitted and forbidden things that Gabriel, peace be upon him, had brought down that day, whether a report from the Prophet or a citation from the Scripture. So ask me, for you will not find anyone more knowledgeable about what is between the Scripture’s two covers than I. There is no verse in the Qurʾan but that I learned when it was revealed and about what it was revealed.”20 To present all the reports of this type would cause us to go beyond the scope of this book.
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وقد سئل أبو عبد الله جعفر بن محمّد عليه السلام عن علّة اختلاف الناس بعد رسول الله صلّى الله عليه وعلى آله ما كانت وكيف سببها؟ فقال للسائل: هل كانوا اختلفوا في حياة رسول الله صلّى الله عليه وعلى آله؟ قال: لا وكيف يختلفون ورسول الله صلّى الله عليه وعلى آله معهم يبيّن لهم ما اختلفوا فيه فيرجعون إليه ؟ قال: صدقت. وكذلك لو ولي الأمر من بعده من يعلم ما يسأل عنه، فإذا سألوه أجابهم ما اختلفوا، ولكن ولي الأمر١ من لم يعلم كلّ ما ورد٢ عليه فسأل٣ الناس عن كثير ممّا لم يعلمه فاختلفوا عليه فيه ، فكان الاختلاف من أجل ذلك . ولو سلّموا لوليّ الأمر وأخذوا عنه لما اختلف منهم٤ اثنان في دين الله عزّ وجلّ كما لم يختلفوا في حياة رسول الله صلّى الله عليه وعلى آله.
١ م تزيد: من بعده. ٢ ز: أورد. ٣ ل: فيسأل. ٤ ز: عنهم.
Abū ʿAbd Allāh Jaʿfar ibn Muḥammad,21 God’s blessings on him, was asked about the cause of disagreement among the Muslims after the Messenger of God and the circumstances that led to it. He asked the questioner, “Did they disagree during the life of the Messenger of God?” “How could they disagree,” the questioner replied, “when the Messenger of God was with them, explaining to them the matter over which they disagreed, so that they might adopt his ruling?” The Imam responded, “You have spoken the truth. In like fashion, if the one who assumed authority after the Messenger had been apprised of the matters regarding which he was consulted, he would have answered them whenever they posed questions regarding their disagreement. However, the one who assumed authority did not know the answers to all the questions that were referred to him, so he asked the people about many things that he did not know, and they gave him conflicting answers on those topics. Disagreement occurred as a consequence. If they had submitted to the true authority and accepted his word, then no two of them would have disagreed over the religion of God, just as they did not disagree during the life of the Messenger of God.”
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فهذا ممّا رُوي في الاختلاف في بدء الأمر. فأمّا ما كان بعد ذلك فإنّه ولي أمور الناس من بني أميّة وبني العبّاس من لا علم له بحلال الله ولا بحرامه ولا همّة له ولا بغية في إقامة ذلك، وإنّما كان إبتغاؤهم١ وهمّتهم طلب حطام الدنيا، فلمّا ظفروا به أقبلوا عليه وأعرضوا عمّا سواه وسلّموا أمر الدين للمتفقّهين من العوامّ بزعمهم، فكان ذلك ممّا أرضوهم به واستمالوهم٢ بسببه إلى بغيتهم على ما لا يعلمونه، فهم خلوا٣ بأنفسهم٤ وتنافسوا في رياستهم، وكثروا وتشعّبت بهم الأهواء وخالفت بينهم الآراء لمّا أعرض عنهم الأمراء خلافًا لأصل الشريعة وما تعبّد الله القائمين بها من إقامة الدين والذبّ عن حريمه وجهاد من خالفه .
١ ز: اتباعهم. ٢ ل: استمالوا هم. ٣ ز، ل: فيهم وخلو. ٤ ز: بنفسهم.
This is just part of what has been related about early disagreements. Later, control over people’s affairs was assumed by the Umayyads and the Abbasids, who had no knowledge of God’s permitted and forbidden things and no ambition or desire to uphold the sacred law, but whose only desire and ambition, instead, was to seek the trappings of this world. When they obtained power, they became engrossed in the mundane and turned away from all else. They handed over control of the religion to commoners who claimed to be learned in the law. The rulers did this in order to appease the jurists and to attract thereby their support in attaining their own desires, despite their ignorance. The jurists took free rein and vied unhampered for leadership among themselves. They multiplied, and with increased numbers, their various inclinations caused them to split into factions, and their distinct views on legal questions led them to oppose one another. This occurred because the rulers had left them to their own devices, violating the fundamental principle of the Sacred Law and the obligations that God imposed on those who would uphold it, including the duty to maintain the religion, protect its sanctity, and combat those who go against it.
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فكان١ أوّل من ظاهر بذلك وقام به خطيبًا من بني أميّة، بعد الذي أخذه الناس على عثمان ممّا
