Islamic Thought

Title: A Survey into the Lives of
the Infallible Imams
Author: yatullah Murtada Mutahhari
Translator: Zainab Muhammadi Araghi
Prepared by: Translation Unit, Cultural Affairs Department; The Ahl
al-Bayt (a) World Assembly
Editor: Zahra Abbas Razavi
Proofreader: Majid Karimi
Publisher: ABWA Publishing and Printing Center
First Printing: 2010
All rights reserved.

FOREWORD ―11
Preface to the Farsi Edition ―13
CHAPTER ONE: PROPHETHOOD
Section One: The Necessity of Prophethood ―19
The necessity of prophethood from the Islamic theological perspective ―21
The necessity of prophethood from the Islamic philosophical perspective ―25
Some notes ―33
Section Two: The Contributions and Blessings of the Prophets ―37
The prophets and morality ―37
The prophets and knowledge ―39
The prophets and social justice ―47
The prophets and mysticism ―48
An example of the manifestation of the blessings of the prophets ―49
Section Three: Revelation and Miracle ―51
Revelation ―51
Miracles ―56
Miracles as proof of the truthfulness of the prophets (‘a) ―62
The Qur’an as the eternal miracle ―63
Finality of prophethood ―70
CHAPTER TWO: IMAMATE AND LEADERSHIP
Section One: Period of the Presence of the Imams (‘a) ―77
Shi‘ism ―80
The necessity of Imamate ―84
Imamate as a matter of appointment [mansus] ―86
The Tradition of Ghadir [Hadith al-Ghadir] ―87
The role of the Imams (‘a) ―91
Philosophy of occultation [ghaybah] ―94
A question ―97
Imamate and the duty of the faithful [mu’minin] ―99
Section Two: Period of Occultation ―103
Religious authority ―103
Salient features of ijtihad ―104
Sources of ijtihad ―107
Leadership ―109
1. Rational proof ―109
2. Textual proof ―111
Dimensions of the theory of wilayah al-faqih ―113
Index ―121
Transliteration Symbols ―126