Abu Muhammad al Afriqi stated:
Uthman ibn Sa‘id remained the “representative of the Hidden Imam” for a number of years. In all that time he was the only link the Shi‘ah had with their Imam. During that time he supplied the Shi‘i community with tawqi‘at, or written communications, which he claimed was written to them by the Hidden Imam. Many of these communications, which are stilpreserved in books like at-Tusi’s Kitab al-Ghaybah, had to do with denouncing other claimants to the position of representatives, who had come to realise exactly how lucrative a position Uthman ibn Sa‘id had created for himself. The Shi‘i literature dealing with Uthman ibn Sa‘id’s tenure as representative is replete with references to money collected from the Shi‘i public.
When Uthman ibn Sa‘id died, his son Abu Ja‘far Muhammad produced a written communication from the Hidden Imam in which he himself is appointed the second representative, a position which he held for about 50 years. He too, like his father, had to deal with several rival claimants to his position, but the tawqi‘at which he regularly produced to denounce them and reinforce his own position ensured the removal of such obstacles and the continuation of support from a credulous Shi‘i public.
He was followed in this position by Abul Qasim ibn Rawh an-Nawbakhti, a scion of the powerful and influential Nawbakhti family of Baghdad. Before succeeding Muhammad ibn Uthman, Abul Qasim an-Nawbakhti was his chief aide in the collection of the one-fifth taxes from the Shi‘ah. Like his two predecessors, he too had to deal with rival claimants, one of whom, Muhammad ibn Ali ash-Shalmaghani used to be an accomplice of his. He is reported in Abu Ja‘far at-Tusi’s book Kitab al-Ghaybah as having stated: “We knew exactly what we were into with Abul Qasim ibn Rawh. We used to fight like dogs over this matter (of being representative).”
All this guesswork proves absolutlely nothing. The Nasibi is suggesting that the representatives saw this as a money making venture, but he has no evidence to point to the financial benefits that they received. Perhaps he could cite as a source that shows the places that they built, the money the squandered on wordly possessions and the gifts that they showered on their near and dear ones. No such evidence exists, and it is known that the representatives’ collection of Khums was a religious duty for the welfare of the Shi’a.
Furthermore, before making baseless suggestions about the Imam (as)’s representatives we suggest he look carefully at the activities of his third khalifa Uthman ibn al Affan who ensured that under his reign his relatives benefited from the riches that were in the public treasury. Rather than condemn such activities the Ahle Sunnah praise Uthman for fulfilling a religious obligation, namely looking out for his needy relatives, and meeting their “needs” by using public money. When Uthman behaved in this corrupt manner, and one defends it, does one really have any right to imply corrupt on the part of the Imam (as)’s representatives?
Abu Muhammad al Afriqi stated:
When Abul Qasim an-Nawbakhti died in 326 AH he bequethed the position of representative to Abul Hasan as-Samarri. Where the first three representatives were shrewd manipulators, Abul Hasan as-Samarri proved to be a more conscientous person. During his three years as representative there was a sudden drop in tawqi‘at. Upon his deathbed he was asked who his successor would be, and answered that Allah would Himself fulfil the matter. Could this perhaps be seen as a refusal on his part to perpetuate a hoax that has gone on for too long? He also produced a tawqi‘ in which the Imam declares that from that day till the day of his reappearance he will never again be seen, and that anyone who claims to see him in that time is a liar.
Thus, after more or less 70 years, the last “door of contact” with the Hidden Imam closed. The Shi‘ah term this period, in which there was contact with their Hidden Imam through his representatives-cum-tax-collectors, the Lesser Occultation (al-Ghaybah as-Sughra), and the period from the death of the last representative onwards the Greater Occultation (al-Ghaybah al-Kubar). The Greater Occultation has already continued for over a thousand years.
When one reads the classical literature of the Shi‘ah in which the activities of the four representatives are outlined, one is struck by the constantly recurring theme of money. They are almost always mentioned in connection with receiving and collecting “the Imam’s money” his loyal Shi‘i followers. There is a shocking lack of any activities of an academic or spiritual nature.
What this Nasibi needs to understand is that the meeting with the Imam (as) were not open meetings, where one could meet with him as one saw fit. This writer seems to be suggesting that there was a tent where the representatives could meet the Imam on specific days. The Imam (as) did not offer booked advice sessions which were open to all. This was a time when the Nasibi Government was making every effort to assassinate the Imam (as). They were searching for his whereabouts, and this would have no doubt meant they were tailing these representatives and monitoring their every movement in hope of getting a lead. As such, these meetings were few and far between. Their role was to give the Shias the Imam’s orders. If one wants to know why none of these representatives put pen to paper, then we could also ask why the three khalifas failed to indulge in activities of an academic nature despite their designated positions as representatives of Rasulullah (s).
Abu Muhammad al Afriqi stated:
Not a single one of the four is credited with having compiled any book, despite the fact that they were in exclusive communion with the last of the Imams, the sole repository of the legacy of Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam.
Again we could also ask why the Sahaba as inheritors of Rasulullah (s) failed to compile any book, despite their direct contact with Rasulullah (s)? Whilst meetings with the Imam (as) were given on limited, secret occasions the Sahaba (notably the first three khailfas) lived in the same city as Rasulullah (s) and benefitted from his company on a daily basis. Despite this, they failed to compile any books on his teachings. Worse still, we discover that Abu Bakr and Umar both were opposed to canonizing these teachings into book form and set out on a campaign to collate and burn traditions that they found. They set fire to hadith in the same way that Uthman set ablaze the Qur’an. Umar issued edicts against narrating traditions and imprisoned those that narrated traditions. When your beloved Sahaba neither wrote nor allowed the writing / narrating of traditions then what right do you have to question why the representatives of Imam Mahdi (as) failed to compile his teachings into book form?
Abu Muhammad al Afriqi stated:
When we look at the major sources upon which the Shi‘i faith is based, we find that most of them were written after the onset of the Greater Occultation. Those works, like al-Kafi, which was written during the latter decades of the Lesser Occultation, contain scarcely a reference to any of the four representatives as narrators from the Hidden Imam. Instead it is filled with thousands of reports which go back, via other channels, to the fifth and the sixth Imams. That is indeed strange, considering the fact that a man like Uthman ibn Sa‘id al-‘Amri is claimed to have been closely associated with the 10th, the 11th as well as the hidden 12th Imam, and also the fact that his son remained the Shi‘i community’s solitary link to that Imam for half a century. Would it not have been better and more authoritative for an author like al-Kulayni to report the hadith of his Imams from the Hidden Imam via his representatives who lived in Baghdad at the same time as he rather than to trace it all back to the fifth and sixth Imams through a myriad of doubtful channels?
But of course, he could not have done that, because the activities of those representatives did not have as much to do with authentically preserving the legacy of the Ahl al-Bayt as with the collection of wealth in their names.
The reason that most of these traditions have reached us on the authority of Imam al Sadiq (as) and al Baqir (as) is due to the fact that they lived in a time of political upheaval, which gave them more freedom than almost any of the other Imams (as). The struggle for power between the Banu Umayya and Banu Abbas meant that the traditional police and intelligence services used by the state ceased being focused on the Imams, and their attention was focused to other, more immediate enemies. After the rise of the ‘Abbasid dynasty, however, things changed; and by the time of Imam Mahadi (as) oppression against the Shi’a and of course their followers was so extreme that their ability to take traditions from the Imam (as) was severely restricted.
Abu Muhammad al Afriqi stated:
In light of the fact that the Shi‘ah explain the necessity of Imamah in terms of the need for an infallible guide who serves as the repository of the legacy of Ahl al-Bayt, it appears extremely incongruous that this particular guide has left no sort of legacy of his own whereby the legacy of the Ahl al-Bayt can be known. Despite the fact that an infallible guide supposedly exists, it is upon fallible persons such as Muhammad ibn Ya‘qub al-Kulayni that the Shi‘ah must depend for that legacy.
The only bit of information that has come down to us regarding the Hidden Imam’s authentication of the hadith legacy of the Shi‘ah is what is recorded by Aqa Muhammad Baqir Khwansari in his book Rawdat al-Jannat. He writes that al-Kulayni’s book was presented to the Hidden Imam who looked at it and declared, “Hadha Kaafin li-Shi‘atina” (This is enough for our Shi‘ah). This is incidentally how the book received its name.
A report such as this creates a huge problem. It appears to be a ratification of the contents of the book al-Kafi by the infallible Imam. Yet, 9 centuries later the Shi‘i muhaddith, Mulla Muhammad Baqir Majlisi, would declare in his commentary on al-Kafi, named Mir’at al-‘Uqul, that 9,485 out of the 16,121 narrations in al-Kafi are unreliable. What did Majlisi know that the infallible Imam was so unaware of that he would authenticate a book, 60% of whose contents would later be discovered to be unreliable?
We have already addressed these comments in our article on Umme Kalthum (as), and so we refer all readers to our discussion there.
The author also attempts to Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir as-Sadr’s discussion on this subject. He writes:
The Iraqi Shi‘i scholar, Muhammad Baqir as-Sadr, finds proof for the existence of the Hidden Mahdi in what he calls “the experience of a community”. The existence of the Hidden Imam, he postulates, was experienced by the Shi‘i community as a whole in the written communications that the representatives used supplied them with.
The crux of this argument lies in the fact that an individual experience might be doubted, but never that of experience of an entire community. However, the glaring flaw in this line of reasoning is that it very conveniently overlooks the part of the representatives as the individual go-betweens.
The community never had the privilege of seeing or meeting the person they believed to be the author of the tawqi‘at. Their experience was limited to receiving what the representatives produced. Even the argument of a consistent handwriting in all the various tawqi‘at is at best melancholy. There is no way one can get away from the fact that the existence of the Hidden Imam rests upon nothing other than acceptance of the words of the representatives.
The activities of those representatives furthermore go a long way to show that they were much, much more inspired by the desire to possess than by pious sentiments of any kind.
Once again, the author is returning to the same failed argument: that the only reason we believe in Imam al-Mahdi (as) is because of the four representatives. As has been argued, the belief in Imam az-Zaman (as) is derived from the Qur’an and sunnah. The Wahabi author has not even attempted to deal with these issues; rather, he only seeks to insult the character of the four representatives, and even this is done without any evidence.