AFTER prophet muhammad pbuh who should be the leader *successor* of prophet
according to sunni it should be appointed by community vote. (hazrat abubakar)
according to shia its on allah who ever he choosoes.

shia faith is proven by quran. where allah says
1 proof<A name=v68>
QURAN(28:68) And your Lord creates and chooses whom He pleases; to choose is not theirs; glory be to Allah, and exalted be He above what they associate (with Him).

2nd proof

[/size]QURAN([size="2"][u]2:30) And when your Lord said to the angels, I am going to place in the earth a khalif, they said: What! wilt Thou place in it such as shall make mischief in it and shed blood, and we celebrate Thy praise and extol Thy holiness? He said: Surely I know what you do not know.[/u]

3rd proof
QURAN(2:247)And their prophet said to them: Surely Allah has raised Talut to be a king over you.
CONDLUSION is in QURAN ALSO
so all these verse proove that only allah choose the leader the successor whoever he wants. and then further allah says
QURAN(33:62)and you shall not find any change in the course of Allah.
this verse prooves that allahs rule and princeiple will never change.

so according to quran shia faith is proven thats WHY we shia considere hazrat ali as successor of prophet muhammad pbuh and our imams. all the sunni beleive that at ghadeer khum rasool says *whomever iam mola ali is his mola after me*

SUNNIES says that where did we shia came up with the concept of IMAMAT.
well to backit up i have prove from quran. LETS see.
QURAN(2:124) And when his Lord tried Ibrahim with certain words, he fulfilled them. He said: Surely I will make you an Imam of men
again the verse before that where allah says YOU WONT SEE ANY CHANGE IN ALLAH'S RULE PRINCIPLES ..
QURAN: 20: 29-30"And make for me a Wazier from among my family, Aaron my brother."
BY THIS VERSE HAZRAT ALI IS BROTHR OF PROPHET.. same rule for prophet muhammad is applied here..coz u wont see any changes in allahs rule.

17:71 (Remember) the day when We will call every people with their Imam
we have our imam and 12 imams.
who are your imams?????
its quran

Excellent ,Allahs peace on you.

where is the imaam of the shias right now?
is ayatollah the imam,infallible?,appointed by Allah and not by community?

imam is in occultation awaiting an appointed time by allah to return.
the ayatolah is an authority on fiqh issues in the imams absence.
shias do not believe ijtihad ended with the four imams of the ahlul sunnah:
-imam shafi, imam malik, imam abu hanifa and imam ahmad bin hanbal.
we believe it is necessary for it to remain open till the imam returns because new situations will arise which the four imams wont have a fatwa on - for example they would not have a ruling on which direction and at what time you should pray when on an aeroplane because aeroplanes did not exist back then.
i would like to emphasise - ayatolahs role is to provide legislation.. fundamental beliefs in tawheed, adalat, nubuwat, imamate and qiyamat must be understood in light of logic and scripture by every shia without referring to 'i am following ayatollah on this matter'.

salaams

Does this include political rule too ? I mean Iran had supreme heads who rule the country.

Yes, in some ways. But to "rule" a country, no one has ever said that there must necessarily be an ayatullah behind it. This is just the case of Iran.

There is a difference between the Mahdi ruling a place and someone else ruling a place. You could even say that perhaps other rulers are mere "governors" to a greater ruler. The Prophets and Imams were only governors, governors of God.

no because there are several ayatollahs and they are not all political rulers although the people who do their taqleed.. kind of like 'bayah' have to obey them in all matters including political...
naturally we are allowed to question them.. but must obey them regardless... until or unless we have evidence to prove that they are not the most knowledgable ayatollah - or worse - are a corrupt ayatollah.

their main function is to be an authority on fiqh rulings.

it is a logical and necessary system.

Does the successor of the supreme ruler in Iran have to accept to sunnah of predecessor in order to become the next supreme leader ?

I dont know

Which ayatullah is a supreme leader?

Imam Khomeini was the first supreme leader. His successor is the current leader who is Khamenei.

Khomeini was a revolutionary, so he must of had supreme power. All revolutions have a supreme power.

I dont personality agree with a "succession" but nonetheless, it has happened. But that is not to say Khamenei is a "supreme" leader. It's more of a constitutional monarchy, except in this case, there is an ayatullah instead of a monarch. But remember, just because Iran have such system, it does not mean its the "correct" way.

So what is the correct way while the 12th Imam is in Gaib ?

I would say a democracy, but with the majority power and decisions are kept with the people. But this is just my opinion, I could be wrong.

the political leadership is a difficult one to know the correct way for because it requires an ayatollah to step up to the plate and take the position on.
as far as i know.. ayatollah khomeini - he was not even the most followed mujtahid of his time... but he took on the poliical leadership..
it is generally not considered separate from spiritual leadership.
whoever your aytatllah is.. you must obey him... as he is the position of acting imam.
so if he orders you in a political matter... you must follow him.. but only his followers...
it is theefore possible to hve conflicting views.. if two ayatollahs disagree..
much like the four imams of the ahlul sunnah disagreed on some stuff.

In terms of ijtihad sunnis do not believe it ended with the 4 imams. Ijtihad was closed by the Abbasids in the 5th century. After that Sunnis were not allowed to practice it. Today sunnis scholar are begining to practice it again.

ok in which case theres no real difference betwen us.
we are both awaiting the mahdi
we both have spiritual leaders who are practising ijtihad..
and we dont really have a strict political or religious leader who is in charge of the whole sect.

Shia too ended up with the same situation as the mainstream Muslims that is to elect a leader by themselves.What was the need to have an infallible imaam in the first place?
secondly ,u say that the imaam is in occultation,how does it make a difference if the imaam was absent.
Imaam means a leader, how can you be led when the leader is not contactable and accessible? It is a conscious of Shia that no one has direct contact with Mahdi during his greater occultation (he had about 70 years smaller occultation during which direct contact was possible).

Did every man, woman and child physically see and touch Prophet Ibrahim when he was made an Imam for all the nations? How did he manage to guide them?

shias do not elect a leader - we do taqleed of an ayatollah.
the ayatollahs do have a relationship with the 12th imam.
we also cannot see and touch shaytan - i am sure you will not try and claim that he cannot do us harm.
the sun is sometimes hidden behind the clouds - i am sure you would not try to claim it only benefits us when it is not hiding behind the clouds.
also.... even if we did appoint a leader.... this doesnt solve the problem... if we both appoint a leader and believe that leadership has been neglected by allah and the prophet - then we would both be in error... and so it is not a defence for sunni muslims.

the prophet also famously said according to both sunnis and shias 'i leave you behind two weighty things. - the quran and the ahlul bayt. they will not separate till they meet me at the pool of kawthar'. this means that if there are no members of the ahlul bayt remaining today - this hadith is wrong.
and if you try to say every sayid related to the prophet is 'ahlul bayt' - then this is ludicrous because you have sayids from sunnis and shias.. and some who are completely unreligious - and they have therefore separated amongst themselves.. so how can they all be the weighty guidance left behind?

i wish the imam wasnt in hiding - but allah willed it and i find it a lot more theologically acceptable for allah to place a leader in hiding amongst the muslims rather than neglect to provide us with a leader at all since the death of the prophet leaving us to pick and choose our own without even providing us with rules and regulations on how such a process should be carried out.

Brother Moostee & Majnoon

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