You and your Shi'a will reach God being pleased with Him and well pleasing Him...

You and your Shi'a will reach God being pleased with Him and well pleasing Him, and your enemies will reach Him, being angry and will be seized by their necks". Then the Prophet demonstrated how this would be by putting his hand on his neck. (Ibn al-Athir, Al-Nihayah, the entry "qa-ma-ha") There are other hadiths in which the , addressing Ali, used the expression "our Shi’a".

This is in line with what was asserted above that the Shi’a are those who follow Ali, in accordance with the teachings of the Prophet and not because of their own personal decision. For example, Ibn 'Asakir narrated that the Prophet said: "Surely there is a spring in Paradise sweeter than nectar, smoother than butter, cooler than ice, and smells better than musk.

In that spring is the clay (tinah) from which we (my household and me) were created and our Shi’a are made from the same clay."[^7] There are yet other hadiths in which the Prophet, addressing Ali, used the expression " Shi’a of your descendants". This confirms what was suggested above, that the Shi’a are those who follow Ali because they believe in the institution of Imamate.

As we will see in detail later, the Shi’a believe that Ali was the first Imam and after him the institution of Imamate continued in those offspring of Ali and Fatimah that were chosen by God and introduced by the Prophet. For example, Zamakhshari (d. 528 A.H.) in his Rabi’ al-Abrar reports that the Prophet said: "O Ali! When the Day of Resurrection comes I will hold on to God, you will hold on to me, your descendants will hold on to you and their Shi'a will hold on to them.

Then you will see where we will be taken."[^8] It has to be noted that according to the Qur'an, prophethood was also inherited. The Qur'an says: "And surely we have sent Noah and Abraham, and we put prophethood and the Book in their offspring". (57:26) This means that those who were qualified to be chosen as prophets by God were included in their offspring.

In addition to the above-mentioned hadiths and their like, and those hadiths on Imamate that will be mentioned later, there are many other reasons that make the appearance of a group of people such as the Shi’a in the lifetime of the Prophet a very natural and even necessary phenomenon. For example, at the beginning of Islam when the Prophet was asked by God to start his public invitation to Islam by inviting his close relatives, he invited his relatives to a meal.