THE THIRD RESEARCH
Why is this whole desire to
prolong His (A.S.) age
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Why is this whole desire to
prolong His (A.S.) age
Now we discuss the second question that is:
Why is this whole desire from God(S.W.) for this human selfsame. All the natural laws must be idled in order to prolong his life? Then why is the leadership of the promised day couldn't be late for a person, whom will be resulted by the future. And the indications of that promised day will prepare him, so He will be prominent on the area, and He will carry his expected role out.
In other word: what is the benefit from this long absence and what is the justification for it?
The numerous of people are asking this a question while they are hopeless to hear a metaphysical answer, rather we believe that the twelve Imams are a singular series(1) it is impossible to change any of them, but those
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(1) As a sign to the Shiite Ithna Asharia belief which is based on the proofs of the philosophical and traditional sciences, and in special according to the widely transmitted Ath-Thakalain tradition " I have left among that if you adhere to them you will never go astray : The Book of God, and the members of my House " Please
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inquirers are truly demanding with a social interpretation for the position, according to the perceivable truths of the great change activity, itself and the understandable requisites of the promised day.
by passing on this basis, we put out the characteristics aside temporarily, that we believe in the availability of in it these infallible Imams(1) and put the following question forth:
Regarding to the expected change activity through the promised day, as it is understandable in the light of the life norms and it is experiences, can we consider his long age of their preserved leader as a factor from the factors of
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review Sahih muslim vol. 4 p.1873, and review As-Sawaaikul-Muhrika. By Ibn Hijr: p.89 in which he said : then you know that for the tradition of the adherence with that several ways which came from above the twenty of companions of the prophet. And also his (s) saying : They will not separate from other until They enter into me at the fountain abundance and until his saying: The caliphs after me are twelve whole of them are from Quraish " And the signification as a whole is the establishment of this meaning.
(1) The holy prophet (s) mentioned the characteristics and the roles of the infallible Imams, and their mission with their functions, and they are the delivers of the Islamic law, and the ships of the rescue and the safety of the nation and the protectors of the nation from the error as it is mentioned in Ath-Thaqalain tradition, and the tradition of will not be separated, and both of them maintain their infallibility, it is incredible, that they are the protectors of the nation from the error, and they will not separate from the the infallible Quran, while they are not infallible!! Please review these subjects : The general principals of the comparative jurisprudence / by the intellectual Muhammad Taqi Al-Hakeem / The research of the prophet's practice validity: p.169....
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making a success for it, which enables him to practice it and lead it by the utmost border?
thus we answer that by the positive for several reasons as the following:
The great change activity truly requires a unique psychological setting in the leader who practices it and which is full with the feelings of superiority and the feeling with the dwindling of the supercilious entities, for which the eliminating is prepared and change it's civilization into a new world.
so as much as the leader's heart can survive, and who is the changer of the feeling with the insipidity if the civilization by whom He struggles, and obvious sense, that is just appoint on the long line of the human civilization, it becomes powerful from the psychological aspect(1) in order to face it, and to stand against it, and to continue with his efforts opposite it up to the victory.
It is clear that the desired volume from this psychological sense agree with the volume of the change itself, and what is intended to omit from the civilization
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(1) The historical leader must be ready physically and be prepared as a suitable preparation to carry out this mission. This affair is undisputed, so if we turned to holy Quran, we would find it discourses about this affair though the history of the prophets by a very clear style, and particular relating to the prophet Nuh (A.S) which is matter that strikes the sight and the view, and perhaps for the similarity and the identification in the role and the mission which are interested to them, as the Martyr Sadr { May God be pleased with him} has told about it.
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and entity, whenever the meeting was to a greater entity more established, and highest, it seeked a greater propel from this replete spiritual sense.
Since the mission of the promised day is to change a world, which is filled up with the injustice and oppression, a general change with the whole of it's cultural morals and various entities, of course this mission is searching for individual who is greatest with his sense of that whole world, for a person who is not from the generations of that world who grew up under the effect of this civilization, for which it is wanted to be damaged.
To substitute the civilization of justice, and right instead of that, since the person who grows up under the shadow of the established civilization which established the world with its authority, morals and its thoughts, who lives with the feeling of the dignity against it, because He was born while it was established and grew up since He was a little, and it was tremendous. He opened his eyes in the world, through which He didn't find unless the various appearances of it.
And in a contrary of that, a person who goes deeply in the history that He lived before, and that civilization truly found the blossoms, and He saw the great civilizations which governed the world one after the other, and then they are damaged and collapsed(1).
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(1)- We can approach this meaning by what we have survive and seen the raising and improvement of the Soviet-Union, until it became the second center in the power of the world.And it participates the
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He saw that by his true eyes and didn't read it in the history books ......, then He saw the civilization for which predetermined to be the last section of the human story and that will be before the promised day, He saw it while it was a little seed that couldn't be seen unless by difficulty, and then He saw it while it was already taking place in the human social entrails, and while it was looking for the opportunity to grow and emerge, and then He coeval with it, while it already began to grow and advance, and attacked by the deterioration one time and got success in other time, and then He attended it while it was flourishing and became a giant, and gradually dominated on the whole authorities of the world completely.
A person of these situations, who lived the whole these periods with complete insight and attention, while He was watching at this giant, which He wanted to struggle with from the corner of the long historical extension whom He lived it with it in his full sense, not through the books of the history, but He looks at it not as inevitable predestination, nor as {Jean Jacques Rousseau}(1) who considered the kingdom in French, so it was already
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civilization power and the political supremacy with America, and both of them mounted the atmospheres of the space,and then we saw the collapse and the rupture of the members of the Soviet Union as the regular speed of the fall, How much effect it had? And how much of deep meaning in it?
(1) Jean Jacques Rousseau {1712-1778} a Frence writer and philosopher that some of the critics considered him as the outmost
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narrated about him that He was afraid, when He imagined France without a king, although He was one from the great philosophical, and intellectual propagandists for advancing the existing political situation through that time, since {Rousseau} grew up under the royalty, and breathed it's air during all his life. However this person who is penetrated deeply within the history, so He has the gravity of the history, and the power of the history, and the replete sense that what is surrounding him from the beings and civilization, which are resulted in one day from the history, the means are fulfilled for it and the means also will be fulfilled so it will be vanished, nothing will be reminded, from it as nothing was found from it in the nearest or Fareast recently. The historical ages of the civilizations and beings truly however they are prolonged, they aren't unless short days from the long age of the history. Have you read Al- Kahf chapter? and have you read about those youths who believed in their lord and He (S.W.) increased them in guidance?,(1)
and they faced ruling pagan regime, which hadn't mercy up on anyone and didn't stop to strangulate any
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face influence in the modern French literature and the modern philosophy, and his writing and essays arranged for his publications is {The social riddle}.
(1) It is a sign to the blessed Quranic verse: surely they were youths, who believed in their lord and we increased them in guidance. al-Kahf: 13, and please review the interpretation of it in al-Kash-shaaf book by al-Zamakhshari vol.2 pg.706.
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seed of the monotheism and the raising from the polytheism unit, so their souls became powerless, and the desperation enters into themselves, and the vents of the hope were closed in front of their eyes, so they resorted to the cave while they were seeking a solution for their difficulty, from God (S.W.) after the solutions fatigued them, and it became greater, that the oppression is continuing to umpire to wrong and to subdue the right and to kill every one whose heart palpitates for the right.
Do you know what Allah (S.W.) acted up on them?
He (S.W.) had put them into a sleep for three hundred and nine years(1) in the cave, then He (S.W.) had waken them from the sleep, and held them for the life theatre, while that being which was surprising them with his power and injustice is already collapsed and declined, and became a history that could not scare any one, and couldn't move a tranquil thing, the whole of that was for these young men to see the demise of that injustice and which his circulation power and, continuity, and to see the end of his order with their eyes, and the injustice became little in their minds.
Indeed if this clear view is found for the fellows of the cave with the whole of what it was included from psychical height and impetus through that unparalleled phenomenon which prolonged their life for three hundred years, so the same thing will be occurred to the expected
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(1) And they remained in their cave three hundred years, and (some) add (another ) nine. (al-Kahf:25)
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leader through his long life, that gives opportunity to him in order to see the giant while He is a pygmy, and the lofty tree, while it is a seed and the hurricane while it is just as a breeze.(1)
In addition to that, the experience which the escorting of these sequential cultures that provide him (A.S.) with, and the direct facing for it's movement and progressions has a great effect in the intellectual preparation, and to deepen the experience of the leadership of the promised day; since it puts the saved individual in front of several practices of the others including the whole points of the weakness and the power, and the kinds of the errors with true, which supplies the individual a greater ability to evaluate the social phenomenon with the perfect attention on its origins, and all the historical circumstances.
Thus the stored change activity of the expected leader is passing on the basic of a specific mission, that is the mission of Islam, and it is of course this activity in this case requires a leader who is close to the principal sources of Islam, while his personality is already constructed a
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(1) And whole of that have a role in the education of him and the preparation of him, which was special preparation, including that he has the deep and comprehensive view, as well as he (a.s.) finds by himself the dwindling of those arrogant people who fill the world the hubbub and tumult, while they scare the people, and this watching qualifies him more and more to perform his universal mission for the change, that to fill the earth with the justice , after it had been filled with the injustice, this in addition to the particular divine providence, and his self capabilities.
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perfect structure in autonomous shape, and separated from the effect of the civilization that assumed for the promised day to fight them.
Then on the contrary of that, the person who is born and grown up under the protection of this civilization, his feelings and thoughts will be effloresced within the limitation of it. Then He often can't liberate from the reminding of that civilization and its principals, even though He led a transformational charge.
So in order to be sure that the saved leader will not be affected by the civilization for which He is perfected to change, it is inevitable that his personality is already structured a perfected structure within a previous cultural stage, which is the nearest in the general spirit and from the aspect of the origin for the cultural state, which the promised day moves to achieve it by the leadership of his own(1).
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(1) It is impossible for a person to expostulate, that the prophet(s) was living under the patronage of the ignorant through this nationality of his mission and his great change function, so that he was not effected by it, and also as for the previous prophets, so what is the interpretation of this opinion? The answer for this:
A- The prophet (s) is actually subjected for a state of a complete isolation from the ignorant culture, and it is truly as it is narrated through the prophetic biography, that the privacy is already made interested for him, and he (s) was isolated in Hera cave to devote
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himself to worship, and also the prophets were away from what their societies were on, and they were isolated, and for that it is mentioned in then Holy Quran as He (s.w.) said {so when he withdrew from them and what they worshipped besides Allah, we gave him Ishaq....} Marium:49.
B- It is revealed to the prophet, while He (S.) is directly supported from the heaven, and He (S.) is informed with the activities and steps which he may follow,step by step, and for the Imam (a.s.) it is not mentioned- according the Imamia belief, and he isn't informed directly from the heaven. Surely he is supported and included under the divine providence, so he (a.s.) needs for a particular preparation.
So in the same time which he will be closed and contacted with the Islamic tradition, he (a.s.) derived the excellence, knowledge and science from his grandfathers (a.s), he will be aware from all the humanity experiences, and the civilizations in their development, and the factories of the origin and authority of them, and also their failing with the factories of their weakness and collapse, so He (a.s.) derives the experience, the ability and the comprehension with the whole orders, this in addition to our belief with the scientific personal abilities of the Imam (a.s) that Allah (s.w.) had given him, and so He (a.s.) is supported from the heaven, as it will be clear for us through the fourth research.
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THE FOURTH RESEARCH
How the preparation of the
expected Leader has been
completed
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How the preparation of the expected
Leader has been completed
Now we come on the third inquiry as the following:
How will the preparation of the expected leader be achieved while He (A.S.) didn't live with his father Al- Imam Al- Askari (A.S.) unless five years approximately? Which is the childhood period, and that is not enough to the leader's personality maturation, so what are the situations through which He was perfected?.
The response:
Al- Mahdi (A.S.) followed his father in the muslims leadership. And that means He truly as an Imam had the whole spiritual and intellectual content of the Imamat {leadership} since the very early time of his Holy life.
A group of his previous fathers (A.S.) preceded him to the leadership {Imamat} so Imam Muhammad
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the son of Al- Jawaad (A.S.) got the leadership on while He was eight years old(1).
Al-Imam Ali the son of Muhammad Al- Haadi who got on the leadership while He was nine years old(2) , and al- Imam Abu muhammad Al Hassan Al- Askari (A.S.)(3) the father of the expected leader who got on the leadership while He was twenty-two years old.
It is observed that the early leadership phenomenon it is up-to it's utmost through Imam Al- Mahdi and Al- Imam Al- Jawaad's (A.S.) personality.
We called it as a phenomenon since it originates a scientifical palpable denotation regarding to Imam Al- Mahdi's fathers (A.S.) which Muslims had lived before and that they were aware of it inspite their experiences related to the Imam (A.S.) in a way or
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(1) Please review: al-Fusool- al- Muhimmah, by ibn al-Sabbakh al-Maliki {T.855 A.H}, and review: al-Irshaad by Sheikh al-Mufid: p. 316.
(2&3). Please review the epilogue in the leaderships, history {al-Tatimah fee tawarekh al- Aimmah} by Sayyeed Tajujdeen al- Amili, one of the knowers of the eleventh century A.H, the publish of al-Biethat Institution- Qom, and review: al-Sawaaeq al- Muhriqah by ibn Hijr: p 123-124, that he mentioned a part of Imam al-Mahdi's behaviour and his chrisms.
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other, and it is impossible for us to demand with the establishment of one phenomenon from the occurrences which is more intelligible(1) and forceful than the nations experience, for that we explain this meaning through the following points:
A- The Imamat in Ahlul-Bait (A.S.), wasn't a way center that the king inherits the power from his father, And He will be supported by the role of his government, like the ruling regime supported it as the Fatimian's caliph leadership {Imamat}, and the succession of Abbasian caliphs, but it was assuming the loyalty of it's vast popular principals by the means of the spiritual disturbing, and the intellectual satisfaction of this principals by worthiness of this Imamat {leadership} to guide Islam, and to lead it according to intellectual and spiritual principalities.
B - These popularity groups are truly stated since the beginning of Islam, and they grew up, and extended through the two Imams al- Baqir and As- Sadiq's (A.S.) epoch, and the school that was been taken care by these two Imams have innermost of
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(1) Please review: al-Irshaad by Shaikh al-Mufeed: p. 319, and after this as-Sawaaeq al-Muhriqah : p.123-124.
The narrators narrated the dialogue which took place between Imam al -Jawad (a.s.) and Yahya the son of Akhtam through the period of al-Maamoon, and how Imam could proof his scientism and his ability to confute the opponent he was through his early age.
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these groups that became in forming a vast intellectual tendency within the Islamic world, and that included hundreds of jurist scholars and commentators and the knowers from a different kind of Islamic and humanitarian knowledge, which were known at that time, even Al- Hassan the son of Ali Al- Wash- Shae said: when I have entered Al- Kufeh mosque I saw nine hundred sheikhs(1) , all of them were saying. Ja'afar the son of Muhammad told us.
C - The conditions that this school, and like it the popular groups in the Islamic group that you believed in it, that you practice it lows, to appoint the Imam and to know his fitting for the leadership {Imamat}, according to them, they are difficult conditions; since they believe that the Imam couldn't be appointed as
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(1) Please review: al-Majaalis as-Sanyah by Sayyid al-Ameen al-Aamili vol.5 pg.205,and this affairs is a famous which the prominent and the common people reported.
And also review Sihah al-Akhbar book by Muhammad Sirajuddeen al-Rifaei: p.44 related from Imam as- Sadiq, and the four Doctrines book by Asad Haidar: vol.1: p.06,and Ibn Hijr narrated in as-Sawaaeq al-Muhriqah p. 120: {Jaafar as-Sadiq, that people narrated from him of the sciences, which is the caravans carried, and it's celebration is separated through the whole countries, and the great leaders narrated from him as Yahya the son of Saaed and Ibn Juraij, Malik, as-Sufyani, Abi Haneefah, Shuebeh and Ayub
as-Sikhtyani...}.
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an Imam unless He could be the must knowledgeable of his era(1).
D- The school and it popular groups were presenting the great sacrifices in the way of the resistance on it's belief with the leadership, since it was informing a hostile error in the view of the temporary caliphate, and at least from the intellectual aspect even the matter which resulted that regime taking up on torturing and Killing campaign continually approximately, several people were killed and imprisoned, and the hundreds loosed their lives in the darkness of prisons, which means that the belief in the leadership {Imameh} of Ahlul-Bait (A.S.) cost them expensively(2) , and there is nothing of the temptation for the person unless what believer feels
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(1) Since Imam was the most knowledgeable of his era's inhabitants, this matter is agreeable by Shiites. Please review the eleventh chapter by the intellectual al-Hilli, while they (a.s.) were presented more than one test to confirm this claim, so they succeeded in them.
Please review: al-Sawaaiq al-Muhriqah by Ibn Hijr p.123.He already elaborately mentioned this affair about Yahya ibn Akhtam's argumentations about Imam al-Jawad (a.s.).
(2) The believing in the leadership of Ahlul-Bait's Imams truly cost their followers the numerous and the value, so this is established historically that there is no way to renounce it, and the eyes witness is also indicating to the absent.
Please review Mukatilut-Talibyeen book/ by Abel-Farajul-Asfahani.
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with the believing or that He supposed the rapprochement to Allah (S.W.) and the rank at God (S.W.).
E- The Imams whom the groups submitted to them by the allegiance and leadership weren't isolated from them, nor they confined in elevated towers as the roles have usually done with their nations, and they were not vanished from them unless that the sultan carry them away by the prison or punishment, and we know through the great number of the narrators and the inspired relators about every one of the eleven Imams, and through what is narrated from the writings, which were occurred between the Imam and his coetaneous people, and through what Imam was doing as journeys from aside, and through the agents of his own in the different fields of the Islamic world from other side, and through what the followers {shi'ites} have gotten habit of the inspection and visits of their Imams in Madinah Munawwarah, when they go to the Holy house from every where to do the pilgrimage in junction(1) .
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(1) The Imams have already recommended their followers as the several narratives mentioned.
Please review: Usoolul-Kaafi vol.1:p.322 and al-Hujjah, section 2,it is an obligated on the people, that when they finished their ceremonies, they came to the Imam and asked him about their religion and matters, and to declare their loyalty and friendly to him.
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All that obliged a continual communication between the Imam and his extended groups through the Islamic regions in a distinct measure with the various classes from the scholars, and others than them.
F- The contemporary caliphate for the Imams (A.S.) was looking at them and their spiritual leadership and Imamat as a great danger source for their being, and worthies, then according to this principality, it made all the efforts, and tries in the way of destroying this leadership, and been patience in the several negativism's in case of it.
And sometimes it seemed with autocracy and strictness aspects, when the ensuring of it's situations compelled it for that, so the detention and pursuit campaigns for the Imams themselves were continued, although that truly results from the sense of the felling or the disgust at muslims, and all the people who are the supporters from different classes.
If we took these six points into the consideration, while they are historical facts indubitably, we could get with a result that is:
The early leadership {Imameh} phenomenon truly was a practical phenomenon, and wasn't a fiction of the illusions; since the Imam who appeared on the theatre while He was a little boy, He declared himself as a spiritual and intellectual leader {Imam} for
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muslims, and all that tendency admitted with the friendship and leadership to him. It is definitely that He must be on a perfect clear once and noticeable but great quality from the knowledge of science, and the vast thought, capacity and the mastery from the interpretation, doctrines, and jurisprudence, because if He (A.S.) wasn't so, the groups couldn't declare their belief with his leadership {Imameh}.
In addition to what is mentioned in the previous time, that Imams in positions which allowed to their groups to interact with them and because of the different limelight to be thrown up on their life and their personalities and characteristics.
Do you ever see the boy who will nominate himself for the leadership of his own, and will make himself as a chief for Islam while He is at the sight and hearing of, the people from his public groups.
Then they will believe in him, and they will try to give value from their safety, and life, in the way of that aim, and do not bother themselves to discover his actual situation, and that phenomenon of this early leadership {Imameh} does not shake them in order to
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research the fact of this position and to evaluate this young Imam(1) ?
Then suppose that people didn't move to scout the position, so is it possible for the days and months but years to pass on this matter without the exposure of the fact inspite of the continually natural reaction between the young boy Imam and the whole people?
Is it honestly and from the wise that He has been actually a juvenile in his mind and his science, and that will not be exposed through this long communication?
And if we assumed that it was impossible for the popular groups of Ahlul- Bait's leadership to discover the reality of the matter, so why the present caliphate kept silent and didn't try to declare the fact if it was agreed with its benefit?
And however it was easy for the existed authority, if that young Imam was a child in his thought, and culture as it is usually, in the children, and it results for not meriting the Imamat, and spiritual leadership, and thought. If it's difficult to satisfy that someone at the age of forty or fifty can not merit the leadership, that doesn't mean there is a difficult satisfaction for
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(1) A mention to Imam Al-Mahdi (A.S), and before that to Imam Al-Jawad (A.S) for example.
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the child to not merit it, however intelligent and meriting the Imamat, with it's meaning which was known by Imamia(1) shiites.
And this was easier and simplest than the compound ways, and the curbing with the temerity techniques that the regime followed at that time.
The single interpretation of that temporary caliphate ubstaining from the play by this paper(2) was the perceiving of it, that the early leadership {Imameh} was an actually phenomenon and not artificial thing.
And truly it really perceived that, after it tried to play with that paper, but it couldn't, and the history told us about attempts from this type, and the flop of them(3) , while the history didn't tell us yet about a
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(1) That means, it is obligation that he (A.S) must be the best of the people, and the most knowledgeable as a belief of Imamia Ithna Asharia.
Please review Haqul-Yakeen Fee maerifat usool Ad-deen by sayeed Abdul-lah Shubber {1242 A.H.} vol. 1: p. 141 the third intention.
(2) Intended that they presented the young Imam against the public for the test in order to show them the fact of the matter.
(3) Almaemoon has already done that, and what have Imam Al Jawaad (A.S.) of the jurisprudence the and science is declarated and become clear at the particular from the scientists, please review Al-sawaaiqul-Muhriqeh book. By Ibn Hijr : p. 123.
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position in which the early leadership phenomenon tottered or the young Imam faced an embarrassment which overcome on his ability or shake the belief of the people by him.
And this is the meaning that we have mentioned about the early leadership phenomenon, which is actual phenomenon through the life of Ahlul-Bait (A.S.), and it wasn't save a supposition, also this actual phenomenon truly has it's roots and it's similar cases in the tradition of the heaven, which extended through the missions and leaderships.
There is an example for the early leadership phenomenon in the tradition of the heaven about, Ahlul- Bait (A.S.) that is Yahya, that Allah (S.W.) said {O, Yahya: take hold of the Book with strength, and granted him wisdom while yet a child: Mariam, verse: 12.
And when it is proved that the early leadership is a really phenomenon, and it is actually existed in the Ahlul- Bait's (A.S.) life, So there is no objection regarding to the leadership of Al- Mahdi (A.S.) and
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appointing him (A.S.) after his father, while He was a child(1).
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(1) The faithful people of shiites already saw Imam Al-Mahdi and communicated with him and took the for nations from him, as it was occurred by the way of the four vices. Please review Tabsiratul wali fiman rae-al-Qaaim Al-Mahdi / by Al-bahraani, Al-Irshad / by Al- shaikh Al-Mufeed : p.345, and please review Tafseal an wafyan Feeddafae Anel-Kafi / Asyeed kaafi Al-Ameedi vol. p. 535.