And they (the Shias) still await for him and that's why they...

And they (the Shias) still await for him and that's why they refer to him as “the Awaited Imam” and every evening after the sunset prayers they wait outside the entrance of this cellar with a steed calling him by his name and urging him to reappear. They continue till the stars fade from the sky and then disperse to return again the next day. This statement of Ibne Khaldun is a lie and calumny and full of malice and hatred towards the Holy Ahle Bayt (a.s) and their followers.

We shall point out some of the factual errors of Ibne Khaldun as below: [1] Al-Muqaddimah, Pg. 359 Firstly: On the basis of his statement quoted above, Ibne Khaldun has rejected the existence of His Eminence, the Awaited Imam (a.s) whereas there are numerous traditions and narrations of the Holy Prophet of Islam (a.s) regarding His Eminence and his reappearance. Such that they reach to the level of Tawatur (widely narrated) and certainty.

The well-known scholar and teacher-researcher, Agha Ahmad Muhammad Shakir has explained the weakness of the statements of Ibne Khaldun and he says: “Ibne Khaldun has followed a thing about which he has no knowledge and has put himself in a way that is full of difficulties and it is not a way traversed by knowledge of narrators. His involvement in political affairs of the rulers and governments has hindered him. That is why he has conjectured that the belief of Mahdi is a Shiite belief.

And in his book, Muqaddimah, he has written a detailed chapter: Section regarding the Fatimi when people go to him by his command.” [1] The belief of Shias and all the Muslims regarding His Eminence, Imam Mahdi (a.s) is a part of the Islamic Messengership. Whoever denies it, has in fact denied Islam as some scholars of Ahle Sunnat have explained it. We shall discuss this also in the coming pages.

Secondly: In this statement the errors and factual mistakes of Ibne Khaldun is that he says: The Awaited Imam entered the cellar with his mother and disappeared from there. This allegation is one that exposes his weakness, because: A. The mother of His Eminence, Imam Mahdi (a.s) had died two years prior to the martyrdom of Imam Hasan Askari (a.s), as we have already mentioned in the beginning chapters of this book. [1] Sharh Musnad Imam Ahmad, 5/197 B.

No Shia or non-Shia historian has ever written that His Eminence was arrested or that the Abbaside ruler had got power over them.