Misplaced Pages

Part of a series on Islam Isma'ilism
Concepts Quran Batiniyya Ta'wil Imamate Ẓāhir Bātin Nūr 'Aql ʿIlm Daʿwa Dāʿī Bāb Hujja Satr Taqiya Pīr Numerology Theology Reincarnation Titles
Seven Pillars Walayah Purity Prayer Charity Fasting Pilgrimage
Musta'lism and NizarismBranches/sects Musta'li Tayyibi Dawoodi Bohra Progressive Hebtiahs Bohra Atba-i-Malak Bohra Badar Vakil Sulaymani Bohra Alavi Bohra Qutbi Bohra Hafizi Nizari Seveners Qarmatians Assassins Satpanth States Qarmatian state of Bahrayn Fatimid Caliphate Multan Sulayhid dynasty Zurayid dynasty Hamdanid dynasty Nizari Ismaili state People Hamdan Qarmat ibn Faraj ibn Ḥawshab ibn al-Fadl al-Jayshani ibn Mansur al-Yaman Abu Sa'id al-Jannabi Abu Tahir al-Jannabi Qadi Numan al-Nasafi al-Sijistani al-Kirmani al-Shirazi al-Naysaburi Nasir Khusraw Pamiris Queen Arwa al-Sulayhi Dhu'ayb ibn Musa Hasan-i Sabbah Hassan Ala Zikrihi's Salam Rashid ad-Din Sinan Pir Sadardin Aga Khans Khojas Dā'ī al-Mutlaqs Nasir al-Din Nasir Hunzai Centers Cairo Anjudan Nizārī strongholds Alamut Atashgah Gerdkuh Lambsar Masyaf Maymun-Diz Rudkhan Qalaat al-Madiq Other Palace of Queen Arwa Queen Arwa Mosque Nizārī Constitution Delegation Ginans Holy Du'a Jama'at Khana Qiyama Abbasid-Baghdad Manifesto House of Knowledge Women
Early leaders Ali Hasan Husayn al-Sajjad al-Baqir Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq Ismāʿīl ibn Jaʿfar al-Mubārak Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl ash-Shākir ʿAbad Allāh (al-Wāfī Ahmad) Ahmad (al-Taqī Muhammad) Ḥusayn (ar-Raḍī ʿAbd Allāh) ʿAbd Allāh al-Mahdī bi'l-Lāh al-Qāʾim al-Manṣūr Maʿad al-Muʿizz li-Dīn Allāh Nizār al-ʿAzīz biʾllāh, Manṣūr al-Ḥākim bi-Amr Allāh ʿAlī al-Ẓāhir li-iʿzāz Dīn Allāh Maʿad al-Mustanṣir bi'l-Lāh Nizār al-Muṣṭafā li-Dīn’il-Lāh / Aḥmad al-Mustāʿlī bi'l-Lāh Manṣūr al-Āmir bi-Aḥkām’il-Lāh ʿAbd al-Majīd al-Ḥāfiz li-Dīn Allāh / Abu'l-Qāsim al-Tayyib
Incumbent leaders Nizārī Ismā'īlī Imām: Aga Khan IV Musta'li Ismaili-Taiyabi Dā'ī al-Mutlaqs: Alavi Bohra: Haatim Zakiyuddin Dawoodi Bohra: Mufaddal Saifuddin Qutbi Bohra: Taher Fakhruddin
Islam portal
v t e

Shams al-Din Muhammad (Arabic: شمس الدین محمد, romanized: Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad; before 1256 – c. 1310) was the 28th imam of the Nizari Isma'ili community. Little is known about his life. He was the first imam to rule after the destruction of the Nizari state by the Mongol Empire, and spent his life hiding his true identity.

Following his death, the line of succession split into two, the Qasim-Shahi line, which survives to this day in the form of mainstream Nizari Isma'ilism, led by the Aga Khans, and the Muhammad-Shahi or Mu'mini line, which has diminished today to a few thousand followers in Syria.

Life

His life is obscure, as few details are recorded about him. He was the youngest son of Rukn al-Din Khurshah, the last ruler of Alamut Castle, the centre of a Nizari Ismaili state until it was captured by the Mongol Empire in November 1256. Nizari tradition records that he had been designated (naṣṣ) as heir by his father, and brought to safety in the last months before the Mongol siege of Alamut and his father's surrender. The rest of his family were executed by the Mongols, leaving Shams al-Din the only survivor. With his father's execution, sometime in late spring 1257, Shams al-Din automatically succeeded him as imam.

He spent the rest of his life in Azerbaijan, in or around Tabriz. He kept his identity hidden, instead assuming the guise of a Sufi mystic (a common practice among the Nizaris at the time) and embroiderer, whence he is known traditionally by the nickname Zarduz. In Nizari tradition, Shams al-Din is sometimes confused with the earlier mystic Shams Tabrizi (1185–1248).

The fall of Alamut deprived the widespread Nizari movement of its centre, but Shams al-Din appears to have established contact with at least some Nizari groups. In his travelogue Safar-nama, the contemporary Ismaili poet Nizari Quhistani alludes to have seen him in person in 1280, calling him by the names Shams-i Din Shah Nimruz Ali and Shah Shams. During his imamate, the Nizari community managed to regroup in Rudbar in northern Persia and even temporarily reoccupied Alamut, but the Syrian Nizaris fell under the sway of the Mamluk Sultanate.

Death and succession disputes

Shams al-Din died c. 1310, inaugurating an obscure period in Nizari history that lasted until the late 15th century. The imams of the time are known as little less than names in lists of succession dating to much later periods, with few reliable dates or information about their lives. It is known however that after Shams al-Din's death, his oldest son, Ala al-Din Mu'min Shah, disputed the succession with the youngest, Qasim Shah. This split the Nizari imamate into two rival lines, the Qasim-Shahis, and the Mu'mini or Muhammad-Shahi line, although the schism itself is almost unmentioned in Nizari literature. The middle son, Kiya Shah, did not lay a similar claim.

The Mu'mini line, originally the more prominent of the two, has diminished today to a few thousand followers in Syria, while the Qasim-Shahi line has ended up representing most modern Nizaris, and is led today by the Aga Khans.

References

1. Daftary, Farhad (1998). A Short History Of The Ismailis: Traditions of a Muslim Community. Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 0748609040.
2. ^ Daftary 2015.
3. Daftary 1997, pp. 295–296.
4. Daftary 2007, pp. 411–412.
5. ^ Daftary 1997, p. 296.
6. ^ Daftary 2007, p. 413.
7. Daftary 2007, pp. 413–414.
8. Daftary 2007, p. 414.
9. Daftary 2007, pp. 413–417, 451–456.
10. Daftary 2007, pp. 413–504.

Sources

• Daftary, Farhad (1997). "S̲h̲ams al-Dīn Muḥammad". In Bosworth, C. E.; van Donzel, E.; Heinrichs, W. P. & Lecomte, G. (eds.). The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Volume IX: San–Sze. Leiden: E. J. Brill. pp. 295–296. doi:10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_6809. ISBN 978-90-04-10422-8.
• Daftary, Farhad (2007). The Ismāʿı̄lı̄s: Their History and Doctrines (Second ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-61636-2.
• Daftary, Farhad (2015). "ŠAMS-AL-DIN MOḤAMMAD". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica, Online Edition. Encyclopædia Iranica Foundation.
• Virani, Shafique N. (2007). The Ismailis in the Middle Ages. A History of Survival, A Search for Salvation. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-531173-0.

• 13th-century Iranian people
• 14th-century Iranian people
• 13th-century Ismailis
• 14th-century Ismailis
• 13th-century Islamic religious leaders
• 14th-century Islamic religious leaders
• 13th-century births
• 1310 deaths
• Iranian Ismailis
• Nizari imams