Similarly...

Similarly, the term ‘ ahlul thikr ’ exclusively denotes the immaculate and infallible Ones (a.s.). However, in recent times, the term ‘ahlul thikr’ is also being misused by some Twelver Shia to denote a pious and learned person. Another term that is grossly maligned, misinterpreted and misunderstood is ‘ Jihad ’. There is a sharp difference in the Shiite and Sunni interpretation. Basically, the term is used to denote struggle or effort.

Thus, the first requirement of a Muslim is Jihad an-Nafs (the strife against one’s base desires or excesses). On a larger perspective, it is a struggle, fight and strife against oppression and tyranny. In the later sense, it means war. For the Twelver Shia, no person or body of persons has the right to declare or commence a war. The Divinely designated and Divinely inspired Imam (a.s.) of the time alone has the authority to order or commence Jihad .

Even in such cases, the Imam (a.s.) never declares a war of aggression, or in modern terms, ‘war of preemption’, but to act only in defense against oppression and tyranny by standing up to the tyrant, after all the avenues of avoiding the conflict have failed. This is exactly what Imam Husayn (a.s.) did in Karbala, as the Imam of the time, to protect the faith and to expose the injustice and oppression of Yazid, the tyrant ruler.

Imamate , the real and ostensible religious authority, always remained with Ali (a.s.) and his eleven designated progeny who were then were, as even today are, called Imams of the Ahlul Bayt (a.s.), while the Caliphate came to represent temporal authority. The three Caliphs never ever, at any time, claimed Imamate or called themselves or were ever known as ‘ Imams ’. They always remained merely the Caliphs .

The real temporal as well as religious authority ( Caliphate and Imamate) always remained vested in the Imams of the Ahlul Bayt (a.s.). The importance of the difference between Imamate and Caliphate has to be understood in the light of the Qur’an and the Sunna. The Qur’an reveals that after Abraham’s sacrifice had been accepted, God declared that Abraham, already a Prophet (S) and Khaleel, was made the ‘Imam’.

When Abraham wanted to know if his progeny also would be designated as Imams, the reply was ‘not those who are transgressors and oppressors’.[^3] Authentic traditions abound, in both Sunni and Shia books, about the Prophet’s designating, by name, of the twelve Imams of the Ahlul Bayt (a.s.).