Академия Корана:Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān/ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib

Ali S. Asani, "ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib" in: Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān, General Editor: J. D. McAuliffe, Georgetown University, Washington DC.

The cousin of the Prophet Muḥammad and husband of his daughter Fāṭima. ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib (d. 40/661) was among the first to embrace Islam and was renowned for his loyalty to the Prophet and his courageous role in a number of the military expeditions in the defense of the early Muslim community. Also known for his piety, his profound knowledge of the Qurʾān and the sunna (the exemplary practice of the Prophet; see sunna), he figures prominently in several esoteric traditions in Islam including Ṣūfism (see ṣūfism and the qurʾān).

Shīʿī Muslims — originally «the partisans of ʿAlī» (shīʿat ʿAlī, see shīʿa) — citing texts from the Qurʾān and the ḥadīth, maintain that on the Prophet’s death the temporal and spiritual leadership of the Muslim community should have devolved to ʿAlī, but instead was usurped by other close Companions of the Prophet (q.v.). According to Shīʿī doctrine, ʿAlī as the divinely-designated imām (q.v.) also bore the responsibility for preserving the divine message of the Qurʾān after its revelation. Upon his passing, his direct descendants inherited the imamate, although few of them were able to exercise the powers of their position due to persecution by the rival Sunnī rulers as well as the Sunnī religious establishment.

Early Shīʿī tradition claims that ʿAlī had in his possession an authentic version of the Qurʾān which was rejected by his political opponents among the powerful Meccan tribe of the Quraysh (q.v.). Instead the vulgate commissioned by his rival, the caliph ʿUthmān (q.v.), and purged of the verses naming ʿAlī and the other members of the Prophet’s family as the leaders of the community became canonical (see collection of the qurʾān). According to the lore of the Twelver (or Imāmī) Shīʿites, the succeeding imāms secretly passed down ʿAlī's copy of the Qurʾān, the contents of which will be revealed to the world by the messianic twelfth imām. Shīʿī views on the nature of ʿAlī's Qurʾān were gradually modified from the fourth/tenth century onwards, when the majority of Shīʿī scholars came to accept the accuracy of the official ʿUthmānic vulgate, disputing only the order of the chapters and verses. ʿAlī's Qurʾān, they believed, while not containing any additional revealed texts, presented the chapters and the verses in the original order of their revelation and held as well his personal notes. This original arrangement and ʿAlī's notes were what subsequent imāms passed on.

Nevertheless, ʿAlī in his capacity as the imām, was held to possess a special knowledge of the inner meaning of the Qurʾān and hence was in a position to engage in hermeneutic interpretation (taʾwīl) of the text (see exegesis of the qurʾān: classical and medieval). This divinely endowed knowledge which ʿAlī transmitted to his descendants provided the Shīʿī imāms with insight into the esoteric aspect (bāṭin) of the revelation, thus enabling him to guide the faithful to a truer and more comprehensive understanding of God’s guidance to humanity. The Shīʿī imām in the role of the supreme interpreter of God’s revelation is often referred to as the «speaking Qurʾān» (al-Qurʾān al-nāṭiq), while the text itself is called «the silent leader» (al-imām al-ṣāmit).

See also

family of the prophet; shīʿism and the qurʾān.

Bibliography

• M. Amir-Moezzi, The divine guide in early Shiʿism, trans. D. Streight, Albany 1994; J. Eliash, The Šīʿite Qurʾān
• A reconsideration of Goldziher’s interpretation, in Arabica 16 (1969), 15-24
• E. Kohlberg, Some notes on the Imamite attitude to the Qurʾān, in S. Stern, A. Hourani and V. Brown (eds.), Islamic philosophy and the classical traditions, Oxford 1972, 209-24