Usul al-Kafi

Context

The Usul al-Kafi was written during a time of political strife and religious factionalism; although this volume is not a political document, it is reflective of the manner in which government and religion often fuse in crucial ways in the Islamic world. The Usul al-Kafi was a response to people who needed clarification of their faith, as the government was becoming progressively unstable and religious disputes rocked the Islamic world.

By the time the Usul al-Kafi was written, the rapid expansion of Islam that had followed the death of Muhammad in 632 had slowed down. Islam had spread across northern Africa and had reached as far west as Spain and as far east as the Indus River. The Islamic world was governed by the Abbasid Caliphate (so named because its initial leaders descended from ‘Abbas ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib, an uncle of Muhammad). While the Abbasids briefly converted to Shia Islam during their struggle for political dominance, they quickly returned to their Sunni origins after securing power. At the height of their reign, the Abbasids governed all of the Islamic world. They made their capital in Baghdad; by the middle of the eighth century, Baghdad rivaled Constantinople in size. It was a center of learning graced by mosques, palaces, observatories, and libraries.

By the beginning of the tenth century, when the Usul al-Kafi was written, the Abbasids were in a period of decline, both in terms of political and religious unity. Shia separatism became firmly established in the early tenth century, as the Fatimids—the descendants of Muhammad’s daughter Fatimah and his son-in-law Ali—broke away from the Sunni Abbasids and traveled to North Africa, ultimately conquering the Syrian coast and Egypt and making their capital Cairo. Other separate Shia dynasties that came to power during this time were the Buyids in Iran and Iraq and the Hamdanids in Syria. Almost immediately after the Usul al-Kafi was written, the Abbasid caliph was reduced to performing religious functions. Ultimately, the Islamic world became far more factionalized and was no longer governed from a single dynastic seat.

The Usul al-Kafi was compiled in response to the emergence of Shia separatism and the deep-seated uncertainty that accompanied it. As Abbasid power declined and the Shia appeared to be ascendant, people needed a statement of the basis of their faith and the particulars of their religious practice. As the Shia shifted from being a small, struggling minority to being a self-governing authority, the Usul al-Kafi filled a need by providing references to how previous Shia leadership approached problems.

The Usul al-Kafi is strictly a Shia text. Unlike the Sunnis, the Shia believe that the first imams were designated by Allah as the sole and infallible interpreters of the revelations of God (Allah). They believe that the imamate was passed down from imam to imam, with each imam naming his own successor. According to Twelver Shia, the imamate passed from Muhammad’s son-in-law ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib (ca. 600–661) through ten more imams, the eleventh being Hasan ibn ‘Ali al-Askari, born in 846, who died unexpectedly in 874. Al-Askari’s successor, Muhammad al-Mahdi, was born in 869. Al-Mahdi assumed the imamate at age five, at which point he is believed to have gone into occultation. Occultation is a mystical concept in which the imam is considered to be very much alive but outside the vision of mere mortals. Many Twelver Shia believe that since humankind cannot exist without an imam, the twelfth imam, known as the Mahdi, will someday emerge from occultation. The Mahdi was believed to be in communication with various deputies for the first few decades following the death of al-Askari. These decades are called the period of minor occultation. The Usul al-Kafi is considered particularly reliable because it was compiled during this period of minor occultation. The Mahdi is said to remain inaccessible in occultation today, and Shia believe that he will emerge at an unknown point in time. The Twelvers can be compared to the less popular Seveners—who believe that infallibility was extended only to the first seven imams.

In compiling the Usul al-Kafi, al-Kulayni justified his work by asserting that Allah divided all humans into two categories: healthy, thinking people and unhealthy persons of unsound mind. The Qur’an holds that healthy, thinking people have a duty to educate others so as to invite humankind toward the unity of Allah. Al-Kulayni pointed out that it is difficult for “interrogative” people to fulfill this duty because there are conflicting statements regarding the utterances of Muhammad and the imams. Al-Kulayni compiled this collection of Hadith in the hope of remedying the need for a compilation of traditions.