I will not here renew the arguments urged in this old
dispute more than to say that the dispute still exists, though it has
long ceased to be the only cause of difference between Shiah and Suni.
Beginning merely as a political schism, the Shiite sect is now
distinctly a heresy, and one which has wandered far from the orthodox
road. Their principal features of quarrel with the Sunites are--first, a
repudiation of the Caliphate and of all hierarchical authority
whatsoever; secondly, the admission of a right of free judgment in
individual doctors on matters of religion; and thirdly, a general
tendency to superstitious beliefs unauthorized by the Koran or by the
written testimony of the Prophet's companions. They also--and this is
their great doctrinal quarrel with the unitarian Sunites--believe in a
series of incarnations of the twelve qualities of God in the persons of
the "twelve Imams," and in the advent of the last of them as a Messiah,
or "Mohdy," doctrines which are especially advanced by the Sheykhi
school of Shiism and minimized by the Mutesharreh or orthodox. These
last matters, however, are rather excrescences than necessary parts of
Shiism. They owe their prevalence, without doubt, to the Persian mind,
which is equally prone to scepticism and credulity, and where Shiism has
always had its stronghold.
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