Seadet-i Ebediyye - Endless Bliss Third Fascicle

Istanbul-Turkey). The Jewish convert Murtezâ, the author, died in
Baghdad in 436 [1044]. And his brother Radî bin Tâhir was born
in 359 and died in Baghdad in 406. The book Manâqib-i-Jihâr Yâri-Ghuzîn,
(by Eyyûb bin Siddîq), gives a detailed account of the
superior virtues of the Ashâb-i-kirâm.
Of all the many characteristics whereby the Shi’a group differ
from the Sunnites, what makes the Shiites worst is the fact that
they bear the creed of Hurûfî. So excessive are some people in the
Râfidî heresy that in the end they become disbelievers. Râfidîs
were few and were about to perish, when Shâh Ismâ’îl, one of
them, established a state; so they proliferated again. The heresy
infiltrated into our country, too; almost all the dervish convents
came into contact with it, and many innocent people caught this
contagion and tumbled down into eternal death. May Allâhu ta’âlâ
not let us digress from the right and pure belief of the Ahl as-
Sunnat. May He protect us against the perils called Wahhabism
and Shiism, which instigate faction among Muslims! Âmîn. It is
written on the initial pages of Tuhfa-i ithnâ ’ashariyya: The
founder of Shiism was a Jew from Yemen, namely, ’Abdullah bin
Saba, who was exiled to Madâyin by Hadrat ’Alî because he called
him a god. [It is written in Munjid that he was a Jew who came
from Egypt to Medina in 34 A.H. (657) and became a Muslim.]
This group of heresy took a different shape in every century, was
put into a definite shape during the time of Shâh Ismâ’îl, and
books were written. Shiism first appeared during the time of
Hadrat ’Alî. Its spreading among people began afterwards. In the
sixtieth year of the Hegira, the Kisâniyya sect, in the sixty-sixth
year the Mukhtâriyya sect, and in the hundred and ninth year the
Hishâmiyya sect appeared, yet they could not catch on and
perished. The Zaydiyya sect, which has been distracting Muslims
from the right way for centuries, appeared in the hundred and
twelfth year, and all the other sects appeared thereafter. We may
say briefly that all sects of bid’at which have been instigating
faction among Muslims appeared after the deaths of all the
Sahâba. [1] The beliefs of all the Shî’a sects come together in three
groups:
1) Tafdîliyya: they say that Hadrat ’Alî is the highest of the
Sahâba.
[1] Please see the thirty-sixth chapter of the second fascicle of Endless
Bliss.
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