The tradition that holds leadership of the community belonged by designation to Ali and the Prophet's household, carried by the doctrine of the Imamate.
Shia Islam began as the party of Ali and became a family of traditions ordered by the Imamate: the line of divinely guided Imams through whom the Prophet's authority continued. Its Twelver, Ismaili, and Zaidi branches divided over the succession within that line.
Produced by Sunni-Shia Split
632 and after · The leadership of the community: election and consensus against designation and the Imamate.
Current status of that division: In dialogue.
Sub-branch / Family
Sub-branch / Family
Twelver Shia Islam
The largest Shia branch, which follows twelve Imams and awaits the twelfth, the Mahdi, in occultation, under the guidance of its scholars in the…
Sub-branch / Family
Ismaili Shia Islam
The Shia branch that followed the line of Ismail ibn Ja'far, carried today by the Nizari Imam, the Aga Khan, and the Tayyibi Bohra communities.
Sub-branch / Family
Zaidi Shia Islam
The Shia branch of Yemen, which holds that any qualified descendant of the Prophet who rises for the office may be Imam, and stands closest of the…
Movements
Movements cross branches; each one below also stands under the other branches it appears in.
Shia Islam across the site
Sources
Primary
- The Nahj al-Balagha, attributed to Ali ibn Abi Talib.
Secondary
- S. H. M. Jafri, The Origins and Early Development of Shia Islam (1979).