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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books A Strife-free Dialogue (A Step towards Understanding) How to Present the Imamiyyah School of Thought to the Wahhabis In the book “ Rihlati min al-Wahhabiyyah ila al-Ithna ‘Ashariyyah ”, I explained the reason as to why I left Wahhabism even though I used to lead prayers in a Wahhabi mosque myself.

In the present book, however, I attempt to clarify the facts and peculiarities of the Twelver Shi‘ah, Imamiyyah, in a manner that will set a Wahhabi’s confused mind right, and give him a clear understanding of the Imamiyyah faith. So long as the confusions are not settled, any discussion with the Wahhabis will be barren. The Imamyyiah faith, I believe, should be introduced to a Wahhabi at three essential levels, duly sequenced.

If done otherwise it will be impossible to treat his mental perplexity or make him understand the relevant facts and peculiarities. The Wahhabis should also understand that because they have not heeded the three immediately-linked stages (explained below), they have drifted away from the method which the Sunnis follow when investigating the Imamiyyah school. This, in turn, has resulted in an entirely different image from the one the Sunni forerunners had of Shi‘ism.

The present research gains further importance because no scientific framework has yet been offered for the proper method of discussion with the Wahhabis nor has there been one to show why their approach differs from the one the Sunnis followed when confronting other Islamic schools with whom they had sharp differences. I have no doubt, however, that differences stem from the dissimilarity inherent in these two approaches.

There is evidently a close link between the method that the Wahhabis advocate and their conception of the Imamiyyah. Therefore, the application of a non-scientific procedure—one containing invisible errors—will result in a distortion and falsification of the Imamiyyah’s real beliefs.

We cannot grasp how important research methodology is in depicting and presenting the realities of Shi‘ism, unless we take up a scientific method that contrasts the Sunnis’ conception of the Shi‘ahs with that of the Wahhabis. It is apt for an objective researcher examining the Imamiyyah school of thought to make a distinction between the school itself and the erroneous methods that lead to the misunderstanding of the realities of Shi‘ism. We ought to remember that these two are different.