Imam Al Mahdi

According to scholar Moojan Momen, signs that Sunni and Shi'a are agreed upon include the following:

1-The Mahdi will be a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad of the line of Fatimah
2-He will bear the name Muhammad.
3-He will rule for either seven, nine or nineteen years.
4-He will distribute wealth.
5-His coming will be accompanied by the raising of a Black Standard.
6-His coming will be accompanied by the appearance of the Dajjal (anti-Christ) in the East.
7-He will fill the world with justice and fairness at a time when the world will be filled with oppression.

Among Shi'a Muslims the Mahdi symbol has developed into a powerful and central religious idea.Shi'a Muslims believe that the Mahdi is the Twelfth Imam, Muhammad al-Mahdi, the Twelfth and last Imam, who was born in 868 AD and was hidden by God at the age of five. He is still alive but has been in occultation awaiting the time that God has decreed for his return.

According to scholar Moojan Momen, traditions report that the Mahdi be a young man of medium stature with a handsome face and black hair and beard.He will not come in an odd year,will announce himself in Mecca between the corner of the Ka'ba and the station of Abraham and will call on the people to pay allegiance to him. He will then go to Kufa.

The Hidden Imam will return as the Mahdi with "a company of his chosen ones. Also part of the return (or Raj'a) will be his enemies led by the one-eyed Dajjal and the Sufyani. The two forces will fight one final apocalyptic battle where the Mahdi and his forces will prevail over these forces of evil. After ruling the Earth for a number of years, Isa Al-Maseeh will return to earth.

In another tradition Imam Baqir says:

The Master of the Command was named as the Mahdi because he will dig out the Torah and other heavenly books from the cave in Antioch. He will judge among the people of the Torah according to the Torah; among the people of the Gospel according to the Gospel; among the people of the Psalms in accordance with the Psalms; among the people of the Qur'an in accordance with the Qur'an.

Imam Jaffar Sadiq predicted the following:

Before the Qa'im's rise two deaths will occur: one death red and the other white. These will kill five out of every seven persons. The red death will occur by means of killing and the white through epidemics.

Another saying by Imam Jaffar Sadiq is:

Knowledge is divided into twenty-seven parts. No more than two parts has been acquired by human beings so far. When our Qa'im arises he will expose the rest of the twenty five parts and distribute it among the people.

According to Moojan Momen, among the most commonly reported signs that presage the advent of the Mahdi in Shia hadith are the following:

1-Before his coming will come the red death and the white death. The red death is the sword and the white death is plague. (See also Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse)
2-Several figures will appear: the one-eyed Dajjal, the Sufyani and the Yamani. Another figure, the Pure Soul (an-Nafs az-Zakiyya), will be assassinated.
3-The sun will rise from the West (a hypothesis: Changing the Earth's Rotation) and a star will appear in the East giving out as much light as the moon.
4-The Arabs will throw off the reins and take possession of their land, throwing out the authority of the foreigners.
5-A caller will call out from heaven.
6-There will be a great conflict in the land of Syria until it is destroyed.
7-Death and fear will afflict the people of Baghdad and Iraq. A fire will appear in the sky and a redness will cover them.
8-According to Imam Jaffar Sadiq, after the second coming of Imam Mehdi his face shall appear in the moon.
9-Imam Mehdi and Dajjal both shall raise the dead, thereby making it very difficult for Believers to ascertain who is the real Mehdi. Dajjal's raising of the dead shall be a trick, as he will order a Jinn to enter a soulless dead body and move and speak from within that dead boy. If someone recites Quran especially Ayat-ul-kursi that body shall fall dead again.
10-Imam Mehdi's followers shall organize themselves into an army and the followers of Jesus Christ shall also become an army and both these armies shall unite to defeat the army of Dajjal (Anti Christ) in the last war of Human history on earth.

The coming of the Mahdi is a disputed notion within Sunnis. The concept is not mentioned directly in the Quran or Sahih al-Bukhari; however, the Mahdi is mentioned in the Sahih Muslim collection of ahadith. According to scholar Cyril Glasse, Belief in the Mahdi has been rejected by noted Sunni authorities as being a Messianism … various Hadith about the Mahdi appear to be inventions to support political causes,It is also reported to be denied by the Ahle Quran.

On the other hand it is found in Sunan Abi Dawud, Ibn Majah, and Tirmidhi and some non-Shiite Muslims believe that the Mahdi will come in addition to the Second Coming of Jesus.

Al-Shaykh Muhammad ibn Ja'far al-Katani said:The conclusion is that the hadiths narrated concerning the Mahdi are mutawatir, as are the hadith concerning the Dajjal and the descent of Jesus the son of Mary, upon whom be peace.Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Hajar al-Haytami in his fatwa titled The Brief Discourse on the Portents of the Awaited Mahdi, said that denial of the Mahdi is disbelief.Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti in his book The Rose Fragrance Concerning the Reports on al-Mahdi, wrote,This is the belief of Ahl al-Sunnah, this is the belief of the Sufis, this is the belief of our Shaykhs, and this is the belief of the true Shadhili Shaykhs, whose path both al-Suyuti and al-Haytami followed. Whoever differs with them is a liar and an innovator.

Of those Sunnis that hold to the existence of the Mahdi, some believe the Mahdi will be an ordinary man, born to an ordinary woman. Umm Salamah said:

I heard the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon Him) say: 'The Mahdi is of my lineage and family…

— Sunan Abu Dawud, 11/373; Sunan Ibn Maajah, 2/1368.

Abu Sa'eed al-Khudri said:

The Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon Him) said: "He is one of us..

— Reported by Abi Na'eem in Akhbaar al-Mahdi, see al-Jaami' al-Sagheer, 5/219, hadith 5796.

The Naqshbandi Haqqani Sufi Order, under the leadership of Shaykh Nazim and his khalifah Shaykh Hisham Kabbani of Islamic Supreme Council of America (ISCA), is among the Sunnis/Sufis who strongly believe the coming of Imam Mahdi in this 21st Century is imminent. Shaikh Hisham has written a book The Approach of Armageddon" that touches much on this subject according to Sunni doctrine and beliefs.

In the light of traditions and interpretations, the personality of the Promised Mahdi would be as such:

It is said "predictions and lore concerning the Mahdi abound.Among them are that the promised Mahdi would be a Caliph of God and that to make a covenant with him is obligatory. He would belong to the House of Muhammad and would be in the line of Imam Hussein. His name would be Muhammad and his family name would be Abul Qasim, his father's name would be 'Abdu'llah, and he would appear in Mecca. He would protect the Muslims from destruction and would restore the religion to its original position.He resemble like prophet his father would be abdullah and mother amina.

In their book, Al Mahdi and the End of Time, Muhammad Ibn Izzat and Muhammad Arif, two well-known Egyptian authors, identify the Mahdi from the Book of Revelation, quoting Hadith transmitter Ka'ab al-Ahbar.

In one place, they write,

I find the Mahdi recorded in the books of the Prophets… For instance, the Book of Revelation says:And I saw and behold a white horse. He that sat on him…went forth conquering and to conquer.

Izzat and 'Arif then go on to say:

It is clear that this man is the Mahdi who will ride the white horse and judge by the Qur'an (with justice) and with whom will be men with marks of prostration (zabiba) on their foreheads.

Main article: People claiming to be the Mahdi

Over the years, several individuals have declared themselves to be the Mahdi prophesied in Islam. Similar to the notion of a Messiah in the Judeo-Christian religions, the notion of a Mahdi as a redeemer to establish a society has lent itself to various interpretations leading to different claims within minorities or by individuals within Islam.

The first historical reference to a movement using the name of Mahdi is al-Mukhtar's rebellion against the Umayyid Caliphate in 686, almost 50 years after Muhammad's death. Al-Mukhtar claimed that Ibn al-Hanifiya, a son of the fourth Caliph Ali (the first Imam of Shi'ite), was the Mahdi who would save the Muslim people from the unjust rule of the Umayyads. Ibn al-Hanifiya was not actively involved in the rebellion, and when the Umayyads successfully quashed it, they left him undisturbed.

Syed Muhammad Jaunpuri (1443 - 1505), another historical claimant was born in northeastern India, in Jaunpur, (presently in state of Uttar Pradesh). His father's name was Syed Abdullah & mother's Aamina. He was descendant of Imam Husayn & through Imam Musa Kadhim. He claimed being the promised Mahdi on three occasions. He announced his claim; first in Mecca and then two places in India. He attracted a large following, and received opposition from the ulema. He died at the age of 63 in the year 1505 AD while at Farah, Afghanistan. The burial location is a preserved sanctuary, looked after by the local inhabitants.

Another more recent claim was that of the Báb ( the Gate ) in 1844, founding the religion of Bábism. He was later executed in the town of Tabriz by a firing squad. His remains currently reside in a tomb at the Bahá'í World Centre in Haifa, Israel. He is considered to be the forerunner of Bahá'u'lláh. (ba-haa-ol-laa Glory of God ) Both are considered Prophets by Bahá'is, and the proclamation of the Bab is considered by Baha'is to be the beginning of the Baha'i calender.

Sudanese Sufi Muhammad Ahmad, declared himself Mahdi in 1882 and defeated Ottoman-Egyptian forces to set up his own state and died in 1885 but his Mahdist state lasted until 1899 when a British army destroyed it following the Battle of Omdurman.

Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, who appeared within British India, claimed towards the end of the 19th Century to be the Mahdi of the latter days as awaited by the Muslims as well as the Promised Messiah (the spiritual second coming of Jesus.), being the only person in Islamic history who claimed to be both. He founded the Ahmadiyya religious movement in 1889 which, although considered by its followers to be Islam in its pristine form, is not recognized as such by the majority of mainstream Muslims. The parliament of Pakistan adopted a law declaring the followers of Ghulam Ahmed as Non-Muslims in 1974. Since Ghulam Ahmad's death the Ahmadiyya Communty has been led by his successors and has grown considerably.

The most recent notable claim to Mahdiism was by Mohammad Abdullah al Querishi whose brother-in-law, Juhayman ibn-Muhammad ibn-Sayf al-Otaibi, led several hundred men to take over the Grand Mosque in Mecca in November 1979. This uprising was defeated after a two-week siege in which at least 250 rebels, soldiers, and pilgrims were killed.

People claiming to be the Mahdi
Al-Qa'im (the Shi'a expectations)
List of Islamic terms in Arabic
Islamic eschatology
Mahdaviat

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