Written By Arkan Radeef / Translated by Shermeen Yousif
When a priestly clergyman came to Voltaire on his deathbed and asked him to confess in order for him to be forgiven, he did not deny the existence of God, but was denying the priestly right to represent God. It is well known that Voltaire spent his life exposing priestly charlatans and exploiting priests of all classes “I come to you from God,” the clergyman told him. Voltaire was expected to surrender to the divine right to the clergyman in this state of weakness, but he refused to submit to the priestly intellectual terror. “Where are your credentials?” Voltaire replied. This simple question is the most eloquent response to the religious clerics, whether they were Al-Sistani, Al-Sadr, Al-Hakim, etc. Everyone is aware of these religious tyrants and idols who enslaved the Iraqi people through various forms of terrorism, intellectually, physically, socially, and psychologically, and using different methods. Those are the barren minds and ragged tongues that the Hawza spawned in Najaf and Qom evolved, with rotten ideas, brewed over time such as the twelve Imams concept. In fact, this concept is a lie that the last of them vanished from the scene, and therefore the pioneering scriptwriters made up stories of the Twelfth Imam, which did not originally exist after the death of the eleventh imam (Al-Hassan Al-Askari, year 260 AH). That Twelfth Imam who was never born to the Eleventh who had no offspring, neither a son nor a daughter, and thus the incident did not require documentation at the time. Such events are not hidden from anyone as they are part of this famous imam’s social reality, so how did the references and books trust this concept?
In light of this crisis, one of the old scenarios resurfaces, namely the theory of the Imam’s absence, which the duodenal cells used to escape crises and enter endless labyrinths. The only source around which this ideological legend revolves is Ibn Barina, the grandson of one of the Hidden Imam’s deputies from one of his daughters; he is the son of Um-Kulthum, the daughter of Al-Mahdi deputy, Mohammad bin Saeed bin Uthman Al-Amri. The story goes: Shaikh Al-Taifa Al-Tussy found Ibn Barina’s book (as he claims), and began to describe the scenario, in which Hassan Askari’s young son vanishes, and the first line of Al-Askari’s companions begins distributing roles and sharing Al-Mahdi’s fortune of funds donated by millions of Shiites around the world, so the first deputy began to receive it. And after taking possession of it for twenty years, and only when he realizes his term is coming to an end, he transfers the posessions to his son through inheritance, and the son continued to be the absentee representative for another twenty years. The Nobakhti is one of the Mahdist Institution’s partners, whose mismanagement and greed for taking over funds and imports through an exclusive agency caused the first split in the round table of the foundation’s members and the scenario pioneers. The mask fell off when Mohammad bin Ali Al-Shalghomany announced his guardianship of Al-Mahdi, and that he was one of Al-Mahdi doors, which was dealt with by accusing him of atheism and then extracting signatures (through Al-Mahdi’s letters to his companions, which they claimed were found either hanging on a tree, thrown in the water, or brought by an unknown man). This happened with another member of the round table, Muhammad bin Nasir al-Numeiri, who was accused of the same accusations, and they showed him signatures from Al-Mahdi, and leaked information to the Abbasid caliphate, so they were crucified. Worse than that was Al-Nawbakhti had accused one of the Ahl-Al-Bait, the younger brother of Imam Hassan Al-Askari, known as Ja’far bin Ali Al-Hadi, accused of lying. Ja’far, who had nine sons and was the only brother to AL-Askari who does not have children, had asked judges, witnesses and the family of Al-Askari to witness that he does not have children, to testify of that. Yet, the circles of the Twelve Imam started against Ja’far a distorted campaign, accusing him of abandoning prayers, drinking wine, practicing magic and sorcery, and being ignorant of legal rulings. This was the Twelve-Imam line’s new way, which would eclipse a thousand years of conspiracy, murder, liquidation, ignorance, atonement, and deception for anyone who begs to share the fortune coming from the Al-Imam AL-Ghaeb. One of dissidents Askari’s claims is that Shalghumani, who was mentioned earlier, was the first representative and agent of Al-Nubakhti and the author of the approved books on the Twelve Imams, which at the time there was no house without one of his books. He said “whenever we had a discussion with Abu Al-Qassim Al-Nubakhti, we did fight over this matter (Al-Tusi Book of Al-Ghaybah, p. 241).
When the gap among plaintiffs on behalf of “Al-Imam Al-Ghaeb” widened, and those around the round table of (Al-Askari, Al-Loby, and AL-Mahdawi) had all died, there was only the fourth deputy left, Ali Al-Samri, who had no children, so the latter made a check-mate move and let all others miss the opportunity by announcing that “Al-Imam Al-Ghaeb” had disappeared (his biggest disappearance) and would never appear again. Following his death, a change was made to the scenario in which “Al-Imam Al-Ghaeb” will appear before the Day of Resurrection. In another scenario in which the “Al-Imam Al-Ghaeb” would appear when corruption emerges, and in yet a different scenario he would appear when he decides to do so. This is the last scenario on which the “Twelve Imams” institution has decided in agree on to avoid the phenomenon of fighting over being representatives among the big players. On page 252 of his book Al-Maqni’a, Sheikh Al-Mufid writes, “then the fortune of the Imam (the money) must be protected and carried to the trustworthy followers of the people under his guardianship.”
From this point on, the priestly bogeyman’s arms grew and multiplied, breaking wills, conquering liberties, cutting free tongues and just souls under the whips of the clergy’s executioners and in the shadows of a theological prosecution, in which God sent down no authority that was deceived by sinful hearts, slanderous mouths, and scattered minds. As for establishing the limits, it is up to the Islamic authorities appointed by God Almighty, and they are the imams of guidance from Muhammad’s family and those who appointed him for this from the princes and rulers, and they delegated the consideration of it to the jurists, who rose to the Karaki on the stage after 500 years.