Islamic Fiqh > Penalties (hudud) > The imamat: the leader's conditions and the pact > The conditions of the imamate and the ruler
Contents
Updated on 27 September 2026 at 3:52 AM
The supreme imamate, the political leadership of the Muslim community, requires a set of conditions gathered in its holder: reason and majority, free manhood, independent legal knowledge, justice, Qurayshi lineage, physical and military capacity. The jurists also examine what becomes of the imamate when a condition lapses, and the case of a community with several rulers at once.
This sheet follows the order of the leaves: accountability under the religious duties, independent legal knowledge, justice and its Qur'anic basis, Qurayshi lineage, the further conditions and disabilities, the deposition of the unjust ruler and revolt against him, and the prohibition of appointing several imams.
The scholars agree that the ruler must be sane and adult: authority is not valid for a child or the insane. Ibn Hazm writes that the schools agree that the imamate is not valid for a woman, a disbeliever, an underage child, and that it is not established for an insane man (Maratib al-idjma' p. 126). He adds that among all the Muslim sects none permits a woman's imamate or a child's, except the Rafidites, who allow the imamate of a child, even of a fetus in its mother's womb, an error, for the child is not addressed by the law while the imam is charged with upholding religion (al-Fasl fi-l-milal 4/89). If the ruler apostatizes, alters the law or innovates, he leaves the category of rulers: obedience to him lapses, and it falls to the Muslims to rise against him and depose him, establishing a just guide in his place if they are able. If that is beyond a small band, deposing the disbeliever remains obligatory, though not that of the innovator, unless they expect the strength; if they find themselves powerless, the Muslim emigrates from his land and keeps his religion safe (Sharh Muslim 12/229, Mirqat al-mafatih 7/227).
The majority of the people of the Sunna require of the ruler that he be an independent jurist, versed in the legal statutes, teaching the people and needing no one's counsel on new cases, for recourse to others removes him from the rank of independent legal reasoning (Mughni al-Muhtaj 5/413). Ibn Abd al-Barr writes: the people of the Sunna and their imams say this is the ideal choice: that the ruler be virtuous, learned, just, beneficent and strong enough to bear the burden of the imamate (al-Istidhkar 5/16).
Al-Juwayni develops the point: the knowledge required is that of the independent jurist who has reached the rank of the muftis, no disagreement having been reported on the requirement. The proof is that most of the affairs of religion attach to the imams: what concerns governors and holders of authority attaches to him plainly, and the rest of the legal statutes may reach him by delegation for commanding right and forbidding wrong. Were the imam not independent in the knowledge of the law, he would need the scholars' counsel on the detail of cases, which would scatter his judgment and expel him from the rank of independence. To say he would consult the muftis as the commoner does is impossible: the cases brought before the imam in the weighty matters are not countless, he is the honor of the scholars and the hope of the Muslims' eyes, and it can happen that no scholar of the region surpasses him in the case brought before him; were he to hesitate and stall, his authority would lapse. Were that permitted, one would admit an imam without competence or independence, consulting the competent and taking counsel from the sagacious, which no one accepts. The imamate being the leadership of religion and world, his independence in temporal matters requires independence in religious ones, the world running along the paths of the law. The secret of the imamate is to gather opinions and unite them on the right judgment, and that union requires independence, joined with receiving the merits of others' sagacities: every reason has its reach, but scattered opinions impair decision; when the independent imam examines the views, weighs them against his vast learning and critiques them with the soundest reflection, he brings the Muslims the fruits of the intellects and shields them from the harm of division. The imam must be followed, not following: were he no independent jurist in the religion of Allah, he would need to imitate the scholars, follow their views, await their permission and prohibition, which contradicts the rank of the imamate and the leadership (Ghiyath al-umam p. 260-262). Al-Qurtubi writes: that the ruler be one fit to judge among the judges of the Muslims, an independent jurist needing no one for new cases, a point of agreement (Tafsir al-Qurtubi 1/270). Ash-Shatibi reports the scholars' agreement: the supreme imamate is concluded only for one who has attained the rank of independent reasoning and legal consultation in the sciences of the law.
An objection is raised from the hadith: "Listen and obey, even if an Abyssinian slave with a head like a raisin is set over you", reported by al-Bukhari (6723). Ibn Hajar and the scholars answer in three ways: an example may be drawn from what hardly exists, like the mosque a span wide in the hadith of reward, the Abyssinian slave here carrying the force of the command to obey; or the slave meant is a governor delegated by the supreme imam over a land, not the supreme imam; or the name slave was used for his earlier condition though free at his appointment, like the name orphan given to the adult in the word of Allah: "Give the orphans their property" (Surah an-Nisa 2) (Charh sahih al-Bukhari 8/215, Ma'alim as-sunan 4/300-301, Fath al-Bari 13/122, 'Awn al-ma'bud 12/234, Tuhfat al-ahwadhi 7/366, Adwa' al-bayan 1/27).
Most of the jurists state that justice is a condition of the imamate: appointing the impious is invalid from the start. Justice means avoiding grave sins and small ones, possessing magnanimity and discernment; it does not demand pure obedience, an impossibility, but that obedience prevail in his state, that he avoid the grave sins, preserve avoidance of the small, and practice the magnanimity that befits his religion and his world (adh-Dhakhira 10/201). The basis is the word of Allah:
And when his Lord tested Abraham with commands which he fulfilled, He said: I make you a leader for the people. He said: and of my offspring? He said: My covenant reaches not the unjust.
Surah al-Baqara 124
At-Tabari writes: this is a report from Allah showing that the unjust is not a leader followed by the people of good (Tafsir at-Tabari 1/530). Ash-Shawkani says scholars relied on this verse to require of the ruler justice and application of the law (Fath al-Qadir 1/138). Al-Jassas writes: this verse establishes the invalidity of the impious man's imamate, that he is no caliph, and that whoever takes this office while impious owes no obedience nor following (Ahkam al-Qur'an 1/86-87). The Prophet said: "No obedience to a creature in disobedience to the Creator"; the verse further covers the inadmissibility of the impious man's testimony and hadith, the invalidity of his consultation, and that he is not preferred to lead the prayer, his led prayer being valid if he leads (Hashiyat Ibn Abidin p. 549).
Some claim Abu Hanifa permitted the imamate and caliphate of the impious while barring him from judgeship. Al-Jassas refutes this attribution, reported by certain theologians like Zurqan, as a lie: with Abu Hanifa there is no difference between judge and caliph, justice being the condition of both, and the impious being neither caliph nor judge, nor witness nor transmitter. How could he be caliph when his testimony is not received and his statutes not executed? And how impute this to Abu Hanifa, who refused the judgeship before Ibn Hubayra in the Umayyad era, was struck, imprisoned and beaten each day, accepted only to count the loads of straw to escape the blows, then refused likewise before al-Mansur, who imprisoned him to count the bricks of Baghdad? His doctrine was famed for fighting tyrants and unjust governors: al-Awza'i said "we bore Abu Hanifa in everything until he came with the sword, meaning the fight against tyrants; there we bore him not". He said that commanding right and forbidding wrong is an obligation by the tongue, otherwise by the sword, and he cited from the Prophet the hadith: "The best of martyrs are Hamza ibn Abd al-Muttalib and the man who stood before an unjust imam, commanding him right and forbidding him wrong, and was killed." Ibrahim as-Sa'igh, a jurist of Khurasan, asked him its status; Abu Hanifa said it is an obligation, and Ibrahim returned to Merv where he stood before Abu Muslim, the holder of power, commanding him right and forbidding him wrong, denouncing his injustice and his shedding of blood without right; Abu Muslim bore him, then killed him. His rulings on Zayd ibn Ali, on sending wealth and consulting the people in secret over his support, and his affair with Muhammad and Ibrahim, the sons of Abd Allah ibn Hasan, are famous. Whoever holds this doctrine of commanding right, how would he permit the imamate of the impious? The error of those who impute it to Abu Hanifa stems from confusion with an accepted doctrine of his: a just judge appointed by an unjust imam issues enforceable judgments and prayer behind the impious is valid, a sound doctrine implying nothing about the validity of the impious man's imamate (Ahkam al-Qur'an 1/86-87, Hashiyat Ibn Abidin p. 549).
Ibn Abd al-Barr repeats that the choice of the people of the Sunna is the virtuous, learned, just, beneficent ruler able to bear the imamate (al-Istidhkar 5/16). Al-Qurtubi ranks justice eleventh among the conditions: there is no disagreement in the community that the imamate is not appointed for an impious man, and the ruler must be among the most learned; he is not required to be preserved from every lapse (Tafsir al-Qurtubi 1/270-271). Ibn Taymiyya writes: the imams agree that the holder of the caliphate must be just, fit to bear witness (as-Siyasa ash-shar'iyya p. 20). Al-Juwayni grounds the requirement: no trust is placed in the impious man to witness a farthing; how then entrust him the affairs of all the Muslims? The impious father, however tender and anxious over his child, is not admitted to the child's property; how then entrust the supreme imamate to an impious man who does not fear Allah? He whom his reason does not shield from his passion and the soul that commands evil, how would he be fit to steer the affair of Islam? (Ghiyath al-umam p. 263). Ibn Abd al-Hadi summarizes: one must consider in the caliph that he be just (I'lam al-muwaqqi'in 1/287).
All the referenced Sunni scholars and the jurists of the schools agree to require of the supreme imam the Qurayshi lineage, on the report of Bukayr ibn Wahb al-Jazari from Anas ibn Malik: the messenger of Allah stood at the door of the Kaaba and said: "The leaders come from Quraysh: they hold a right over you and you hold a right over them, the like of it. If they show mercy, be merciful; if they covenant, honor it; if they judge, let them judge justly; whoever of them does not, upon him is the curse of Allah, of the angels and of all men", an authentic hadith reported by Ahmad (12329) and an-Nasa'i in al-Kubra (5942). Al-Bukhari (3309) reports from az-Zuhri that Mu'awiya, told that Abd Allah ibn 'Amr related that a king would come from Qahtan, grew angry and said after praising Allah: I heard the messenger of Allah say: "This matter remains in Quraysh: whoever opposes them, Allah casts him on his face so long as they uphold the religion." Ibn 'Umar reports from the Prophet: "This matter remains in Quraysh so long as two of them remain", reported by al-Bukhari (3310) and Muslim. Ibn Hajar writes that he gathered the chains of this hadith from some forty companions, answering the man who claimed it was transmitted only through Abu Bakr (Fath al-Bari 7/32).
An-Nawawi writes: these hadiths and their like are a plain proof that the caliphate belongs to Quraysh and is not given to another, and consensus formed on it in the companions' era and after; whoever diverges among the people of innovation is refuted by the consensus of the companions and successors, then by the authentic hadiths (Charh Muslim 12/200). He adds that the status of Ibn 'Umar's hadith endures to the Day of Resurrection so long as two men remain: from the Prophet's era to this day the caliphate never left Quraysh without contest; whoever seizes power by force does not deny that the caliphate belongs to Quraysh, but claims to act as their delegate (Charh Muslim 12/210, Fath al-Bari 13/117). Qadi Iyad writes that these hadiths establish that the caliphate belongs to Quraysh, the doctrine of all the Muslims, on which Abu Bakr and 'Umar argued before the ansar at the Saqifa without any refusal; it counts among the matters of consensus, no divergence in word or deed having been reported from the early generations, century after century. No weight is given to an-Nazzam's claim and that of some Kharijites that it is valid outside Quraysh, nor to Dirar ibn 'Amr's silly objection that a non-Qurayshi should be preferred because his removal would be easier without a protecting tribe: all of it mockery against the early generations and the community (Ikm al-mu'lim bi-fawaid Muslim 6/214). Al-Mawardi writes: the lineage is the requirement of Qurayshi descent, by the arrival of the text and the formed consensus; no weight is given to Dirar, nor to the ansar's objection at the Saqifa when they swore to Sa'd ibn 'Ubada proposing "an amir from us and an amir from you": they dropped the claim when they heard the Prophet's words "the leaders come from Quraysh" and accepted "we are the ministers and you are the emirs", together with the Prophet's words "put Quraysh forward and do not outstrip them", with no objection or divergence remaining (al-Ahkam as-sultaniyya p. 20).
Ibn Battal reports from Abu Bakr ibn at-Tayyib that the caliphate in Quraysh is established from the Prophet and that the Muslims applied it century after century, leaving no sense to the contrary view; the Prophet commended the ansar and told whoever held any of the power to pardon their offenders, which would not have happened had the power been theirs; and the proof of the hadiths is Abu Bakr's and 'Umar's argument before the ansar at the Saqifa, their submission upon hearing it and their return from war when the truth appeared to them, down to Sa'd ibn 'Ubada's words "we are the ministers and you are the emirs" and al-Hubab ibn al-Mundhir's; never would all of Quraysh have accepted a lie laid to them, the habit being to contest unestablished reports, all the more in this immense matter with swords drawn and words crossed. The community's agreement in the first era and after on this condition of the ruler, before the divergence arose, establishes the truth (Charh sahih al-Bukhari 8/211-212). Al-Muhallab treats the hadith of Abd Allah ibn 'Amr on "a king of Qahtan": it may mean a king who is no caliph, imposed on the people without their consent, whom Mu'awiya disavowed lest it be thought the caliphate possible outside Quraysh; and in a version of the hadith it occurs at the signs of the Hour and the change of religion (Charh sahih al-Bukhari 8/211-212).
Al-Juwayni writes that Qurayshi lineage is the condition, none diverging but Dirar ibn 'Amr, a divergence without weight. Some imams said the hadith "the leaders come from Quraysh" has the status of widely-established knowledge, the community having accepted it; al-Juwayni does not prefer that path, the hadith's transmitters falling short of the number of wide diffusion. What clarifies the truth is history: the generations stayed attached to this office's being specific to Quraysh, and no non-Qurayshi ever coveted the imamate across the ages; had it been possible, the powerful and the numerous would have sought it, and the adventurers of power, in their extremes, would have tried; yet those who lunged for the office, like Egypt's seceders, had to resort to false prophecy and to pay lying genealogists to attach themselves to the lineage. All the schools of the generations agree on it (Ghiyath al-umam p. 256-258).
The jurists require further of the ruler military strength and competence in hardships and calamities, hearing and sight, and other conditions. Al-Mawardi classes the defects of the body in three kinds: defects of the senses, of the organs, of action.
The defect of the senses divides in three: what bars the imamate, what does not, and what is disputed. What bars it is of two things. Loss of reason first: if transient and expected to end, like fainting, it bars neither conclusion nor continuation, a brief illness, the Prophet having fainted in his sickness; if permanent with no hope of ending, like madness and dementia: if constant without lucidity, it bars conclusion and continuation alike, its onset annulling the imamate; if lucid intervals interrupt it, the case is weighed: if madness outweighs lucidity it is like constant madness, barring both; if lucidity prevails it bars conclusion, while continuation is disputed, one opinion refusing it as the start, another admitting it, conclusion requiring full health and exit full defect. Loss of sight next: it bars conclusion and continuation, since it invalidates judgeship and bars testimony; night blindness, the sole failure to see at dusk, an illness expected to pass, bars neither. Weak sight does not bar if it distinguishes persons, and bars if it does not. What does not bar: loss of smell and taste, which touch pleasure alone, not judgment nor action. What is disputed: deafness and muteness bar the conclusion, the perfection of qualities being lost, while exit is disputed: one opinion removes him as with blindness, for their effect on conduct; another keeps him, gesture standing in; a third keeps him if he writes well and removes him otherwise, writing being sure and gesture conjectural, the first opinion the sounder. Stammering and partial deafness to loud voices do not remove him if they arise later, while conclusion with them is disputed: one opinion bars it as a defect of perfection, another allows it, the prophet Moses not having been barred from prophethood by his stammering tongue, a fortiori from the imamate.
The defect of the organs divides in four. What bars neither conclusion nor continuation: the defect with no effect on judgment, action or movement, nor ugly to behold, like amputation of the male organ, which touches generation alone, the imamate following the rule of impotence, Allah describing Yahya ibn Zakariyya as master, chaste and prophet (Surah Al Imran 39); al-Hasan, the impotent, per Ibn Mas'ud and Ibn Abbas, is he who cannot go to women, and per Sa'id ibn al-Musayyab he who has no organ for them, or is like the pit; what did not bar prophethood cannot bar the imamate, and the same holds for amputated ears, with no effect on judgment or action, their ugliness concealable. What bars conclusion and continuation: what bars action, like the loss of both hands, or movement, like the loss of both feet, the imamate owing the community knowledge and movement. What bars conclusion with dispute over continuation: partial loss of action or movement, like the loss of one hand or one foot, the imamate not being concluded with it, full capacity to act being required; if it arises after, two schools: it removes him from the imamate as a bar to its start, or it does not, conclusion requiring full health and exit full defect. What does not bar continuation with dispute over conclusion: the ugly defect with no effect on action or movement, like amputation of the nose or one eye, which does not remove him after conclusion, touching none of its rights; on conclusion, two views: no bar, it not being a condition, or a bar, that the leaders of the community be free of blameworthy ugliness that lessens reverential awe, whose weakness turns people from obedience, all of which is a lack against the community's right (al-Ahkam as-sultaniyya p. 20-21).
Justice, al-Qurtubi recalls, bears on the caliph, not on his delegate of today; the caliph who drinks, fornicates or commits a grave sin holds no valid authority and is deposed (I'dah turuq al-istiqama 1/303-304). The jurists differ over the ruler who was just and turned impious. The Hanafis and some Shafi'is say he is deposed by his impiety: Ibn Abidin writes that he deserves deposition when it occurs (Hashiyat Ibn Abidin 1/549). Al-Qurtubi writes: the imam appointed then turned impious, the majority hold his imamate dissolved and he is deposed for manifest, known impiety, for the imam is appointed only to apply the punishments, restore the rights, guard the property of orphans and the insane and oversee their affairs, and impiety prevents him rising to it; permitting an impious ruler annuls the very purpose of his appointment, as at the start none is appointed for an impious man (Tafsir al-Qurtubi 1/270-271). Others say he is removed only by disbelief, or by abandoning the prayer and its call, on the Prophet's word in 'Ubada's hadith: "and that you not contest power with its holders, unless you see flagrant disbelief for which you have proof from Allah" (the text cited at Tafsir 1/270-271).
The Malikis, the Shafi'is on the sahih view and the Hanbalis hold that the imam is not deposed for impiety. The Malikis write that the caliph appointed fulfilling the conditions cannot be deposed when his description changes and he turns impious and unjust, unlike the judge and governor, deposition being set aside to bear the lighter of two harms, given the great trials it provokes (Hashiyat as-Sawi 9/297-298, 10/202). An-Nawawi writes: the people of the Sunna agree that the holder of power is not deposed for impiety; the view reported in some legal books of some Shafi'is that he is deposed, and attributed also to the Mu'tazilites, is an error against consensus. The scholars give the reason for his non-deposition and the ban on revolt: the trials, the shedding of blood and the corruption of relations that follow, the harm of deposing him outweighing that of keeping him (Charh Muslim 12/229). Qadi Iyad frames the whole: the scholars agree the imamate is not given to a disbeliever, and that apostasy deposes him, as does abandoning the prayer and its call; and on the majority's view, likewise innovation. Should disbelief, alteration of the law or innovation occur, he leaves the category of rulers, his obedience lapses, and it falls to the Muslims to rise against him, depose him and set up a just guide if they can; if that is beyond a small band, deposing the disbeliever stays obligatory, though not the innovator unless they expect the strength; finding themselves powerless, the Muslim emigrates. The imamate is not given from the start to an impious man; if he turns impious, some say deposition is obligatory unless it breeds trial and war, while most of the people of the Sunna among jurists, traditionists and theologians hold he is not deposed for impiety, injustice and the suspension of rights, that revolt against him for it is not permitted, but that he must be exhorted and warned, on the hadiths inviting it. Abu Bakr ibn Mujahid claimed consensus on deposition, and was answered with the uprisings of al-Hasan and Ibn az-Zubayr and the people of Medina against the Umayyads, and the great uprising of the successors and the first generation against al-Hajjaj with Ibn al-Ash'ath; the replier interpreted "that you not contest power" as applying to just imams, and the majority's proof is that the revolt against al-Hajjaj was not for impiety alone but for his alteration of the law and his apparent disbelief. It is also said the disagreement came first and consensus later formed against revolt (Charh Muslim 12/229).
Al-Juwayni devotes a long treatment to the question: some theologians and jurists held that verified impiety requires the imam's removal like madness, for if verified impiety bars the conclusion of the imamate, its continuance interrupts the continuation; he refutes the doctrine: it would compel deposing every imam, and tying deposition to the act cannot stand; others held that impiety does not of itself require removal but that the people of decision must remove him once it is verified. The truth, he says, is that claiming impiety entails removal stands far from soundness: exposure to what impiety contains is common in one not presumed protected, and constant piety is rare; slips run with every breath, the heart is the target of whispers, and who escapes? The imam is taken up with covenants, troops and armies, and the registers of war hold only the valiant; how would he be free of every fault and constant in piety? He distributes the wealth gathered from East to West, and it is plain that demanding constant piety makes the office impossible; had the agreed impiety required deposition, every act and word would be examined, no age would lack accusers, and the people would divide endlessly, the elect of obedience to the imam never holding for an hour. Without binding authority over the Muslims, the good would be ruined. It follows that the ruler, not preserved from sin, cannot be deposed for every slip, the doctrine of constant deposition ruining the meaning of the imamate and prompting men to let go of obedience. There is no disagreement that an imam struck by an illness barring judgment, expected to pass, is not deposed; all the more the sin, which does not bar his judgment since its end is hoped. The hadiths calling for obeying the emirs in ease and hardship are near-widespread, among them: "Will you leave me my emirs? The best of their conduct comes to you and the worst falls on them." If asked why the imamate is then withheld from an impious man at the start, the answer is that the people of decision, free in opening the covenant, would make an evil choice naming an impious man to this immense matter, being charged to look to the Muslims' interest to the utmost; but deposition after establishment and continuity, with exposure to slips, corrupts the rule of authority. All this bears on rare sins; but if disobedience persists, aggression spreads, corruption shows, rights and punishments are suspended, protection lifted, treachery manifest, tyrants hardened, the wronged denied redress, and mischief reaches the great affairs and the guarding of the frontiers, the aggravated state must be remedied, for the imamate exists only against it (Ghiyath al-umam 1/271-276).
Ibn Battal comments on the words "whoever among you sees something he dislikes, let him endure": for injustice and tyranny; but for what constitutes opposition to Allah by innovation or change of the law, let him leave the land and emigrate; and if a just imam becomes possible to him with the consent of most of the people, deposing the first is permitted; if he has but a fraction of the people or what breeds division, revolt is not lawful for him. Abu Bakr ibn at-Tayyib writes: the community agrees that disbelief after faith, and abandoning the prayer and its call, require deposing the imam and the falling away of the duty of obedience; but they differ if he is impious, unjust, seizing wealth, striking faces, taking forbidden lives, losing punishments and suspending rights: many say he must be deposed, while most of the community and the people of hadith hold he is not, that revolt is not due, but that he must be exhorted, warned and disobeyed in what he calls to of Allah's disobedience, resting on "listen and obey, even if an Abyssinian slave is set over you", on praying behind the righteous and the sinner, and on the report: "Obey them though they consume your wealth and strike your back, so long as they establish the prayer." Judge Abu Bakr adds the non-penal grounds of deposition: continuing madness and loss of discernment to despair of cure, deafness, muteness, senile old age, or what cuts him off from the community's interests, the imam being appointed for that alone; likewise his capture by the enemy for a time in which harm to the community is feared and his release despaired of: he is replaced, and if he regains freedom or recovers, he does not return to his office, having become a subject of the first. The advent of a more virtuous man does not depose the imam, as impiety arising after the pact does not depose (Charh sahih al-Bukhari 8/215-216). Abu Ya'la al-Farra' writes: if these qualities stood at the conclusion then vanished, the case is weighed: the wound to his justice, that is, impiety, whether touching the acts of the limbs, committing the forbidden, or touching belief, the faulty interpretation, does not bar the continuation of the imamate; so it was with the emir who drank wine and led raids in which men marched, while calling al-Mu'tasim commander of the believers, and who invited him to the doctrine of the Qur'an's createdness (Hilyat al-awliya 10/247 and the chapter's sources).
Most of the jurists of Islam state that no more than one imam can be appointed at a time, even in distant lands, except al-Haramayn and Abu Ishaq al-Isfarayini among the Shafi'is, who permitted it under necessity. Ibn Hazm writes: those who make the imamate an obligation agree that two imams cannot stand at once in the world, save Muhammad ibn Karram as-Sijistani, Abu as-Sabah as-Samarqandi and their partisans, who permitted it. Their argument is the ansar's proposal at the Saqifa, "an amir from us and an amir from you", and the affair of 'Ali and al-Hasan with Mu'awiya. Ibn Hazm answers that the ansar's word was an error of reasoning, contradicted by the emigrants; in contradiction the matter returns to Allah and the messenger:
If you dispute about anything, refer it to Allah and the messenger, if you believe in Allah and the Last Day.
Surah an-Nisa 59
The messenger said: "If allegiance is sworn to two imams, kill the second of the two"; and Allah says:
Be not like those who divided and differed after the clear proofs had come to them.
Surah Al Imran 105
and:
Do not dispute, or you will falter and your strength will depart. Be patient: Allah is with the patient.
Surah al-Anfal 46
With two imams the forbidden division stands. By the way of interest: were two imams permitted, three, four and more would be, down to an imam per town or village, or every man a caliph in his house, which is pure corruption and the ruin of religion and world. As for 'Ali, al-Hasan and Mu'awiya, the Prophet announced the rebel faction from two groups whose closer one to the truth would kill the other, and that 'Ammar would be killed by the rebel band: 'Ali was therefore the holder of truth, and Mu'awiya, in error, rewarded once as an independent jurist; neither ever accepted the other's imamate, and al-Hasan handed the matter to Mu'awiya (al-Fasl fi-l-milal 4/73-74).
Al-Qurtubi writes: appointing two or three imams in one era and one land is permitted in no way. Al-Juwayni reports that his school barred the imamate of two persons at the world's ends, comparing it to two guardians marrying the same woman unknowingly; but appointing two imams in one narrow territory is not permitted by consensus, and as distance lengthens two authorities become possible, beyond the certain; Abu Ishaq al-Isfarayini permitted the imamate in two far-apart climes so that the people's rights not fall into disuse (Tafsir al-Qurtubi 1/273-274). The Karramiyya permitted two imams without distinction, even in one land, and said 'Ali and Mu'awiya were two imams; the answer is that it is permitted only if the law does not bar it, and it says "kill the second of the two", and the community never saw either call himself imam and his rival imam: Mu'awiya claimed not the imamate but the governance of Syria by delegation from the earlier imams (Tafsir al-Qurtubi 1/273-274). An-Nawawi writes that two imams cannot be appointed at once even in two regions, and reports Abu Ishaq's view permitting it in two climes by need, the imam's choice. The author of the Rawda develops: if allegiance is sworn to two men together, both allegiances are void; if successive, the second is void; if the second knew nothing of the first, he and his followers are not punished, otherwise they are. If each claims priority, the claim is not heard, the right belonging to the Muslims; if they agree that one yields to the other, the imamate stands for him only with proof of priority. If one acknowledges the other's priority, the acknowledging man leaves the contest, and the other holds the imamate only with proof (Rawdat at-talibin 6/469-470). Ibn Kathir writes: appointing two imams on the earth, or more, is not permitted, on the Prophet's word: "Whoever comes to you while your affair is one, seeking to divide you, kill him, whoever he is", the view of the majority, whose consensus was reported by al-Haramayn (Tafsir Ibn Kathir 1/73). Ibn Kathir notes the likeness to the Abbasid caliphs in Iraq, the Fatimids in Egypt and the Umayyads in the Maghreb (Tafsir Ibn Kathir 1/73).
Al-Juwayni writes: when appointing a single imam is possible, one whose sight embraces the affair of Islam and whose effect covers creation from East to West, his appointment is required and that of two imams is not admitted, a point of agreement without divergence. When allegiance settled on the caliph of the messenger of Allah, Abu Bakr, and the caliphate continued to the end of the era of the guided imams, it was understood of necessity that the imamate is occupied by one only, one per age. The purpose of the imamate is to unite scattered opinions and bind divergent passions: states are shaken only by the partisanship of emirs, the scattering of views and the pull of passions, and the order of power rests on obedience to a firm judgment drawing on the wisdom of the sage; the most apparent purpose of the imamate is obtained only through the imam's uniqueness. Tying affairs to two judgments and suspending priority over two emirs invites rupture and discord; the provinces endure only by the return of the regions' emirs to one binding judgment, and where no point of return exists they contend, rival and tear at each other for the seizure of power, heedless of the crowds crushed beneath, and there lies the origin of calamities in which sultans and subjects are ground together. Appointing two imams is a cause of corruption, and forcing two with the orders of both executed over the whole territory produces rivalry and dispute; where one effective imam over the whole territory is possible and two are appointed, it is void by consensus and annuls the benefit of the imamate entrusted to a single judgment.
But if the state of the world is such that one imam's sight cannot cover the realms, through the vastness of the territory, the spread of Islam to far lands and islands on tossing seas, the existence of peoples beyond the imam's reach, or a land of disbelief interposed between two lands of Islam cutting off his sight, then it becomes permitted to establish in the region beyond reach a ruler to whom recourse is had: a doctrine attributed to Abu al-Hasan al-Mawardi, to Abu Ishaq al-Isfarayini and to others, who sought the people's interest: the purpose of the imamate being the reform of the common people, the preparing of affairs and the guarding of the frontiers, where appointing one effective imam is impossible, the people beyond reach cannot be left without bond or restraint, and they must establish in their region a governor of succor. Al-Juwayni sets his own position: if an imam was established over the whole territory and an impediment to his reach then arose, the people concerned establish an emir to whom they refer, without that appointee being an imam; if the impediments fall and the imam regains his reach, the emir and the subjects obey him. And if the age is empty of an imam in an interregnum, a part of the territory splits off and appointing one imam covering the whole is hard, an emir is set in each region by necessity, one of the two not being an imam, the imam being the one who gathers all the Muslims together; he does not deny the permission of appointing the two by need, but it is an age empty of an imam (Ghiyath al-umam p. 320-324).
The chapter on the imamate describes the classical theory of the state in Islam, with its conditions for the ruler and its rules of succession, studied here as legal doctrine and the history of political thought. No contemporary state applies it as such, and a Muslim lives under the institutions of his country. The essential to retain: the justice of the ruler as a standing moral requirement, the ban on disobedience short of flagrant disbelief, the refusal of revolt that sheds blood, and the unity of the community as the end of all authority.