Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib (599 - 661) was a cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad who served as the fourth of the Rashidun caliphs from 656 until his assassination in 661. [1] He is honoured throughout the Muslim world as an early convert, a judge and a soldier, and he occupies a foundational place in Shia Islam, whose adherents regard him as the first Imam and the rightful successor to Muhammad. [2]
Early life
Ali was born in Mecca around 599 into the Banu Hashim clan of the Quraysh tribe, the son of Abu Talib, who was Muhammad's uncle and protector. [1] He was raised in Muhammad's household and, according to the traditional accounts, was among the first to accept the message of Islam while still a youth.
He remained with Muhammad through the years of persecution in Mecca and is said to have slept in the Prophet's bed on the night of the migration to Medina in 622, allowing the departure to go undetected. In Medina he married Muhammad's daughter Fatima; their sons Hasan and Husayn became central figures in later Islamic history.
Service under Muhammad
Ali took part in most of the major engagements of the Medinan period, including the battles of Badr, Uhud and the Trench, and the expedition to Khaybar, acquiring a reputation for personal courage that is celebrated in a wide body of tradition. [1] He also served as a scribe and as an envoy, and he was among those entrusted with the administration of justice.
Caliphate
After Muhammad's death in 632 the leadership of the community passed successively to Abu Bakr, Umar and Uthman. Ali was acclaimed caliph in 656, following the killing of Uthman by rebels, at a moment of severe division within the young Muslim state. [3]
His rule was consumed by internal conflict. In 656 he defeated a force led by Aisha, Talha and al-Zubayr at the Battle of the Camel near Basra. The following year he confronted Mu'awiya, the governor of Syria and a kinsman of Uthman, at Siffin; the battle ended inconclusively and was referred to arbitration. [4] That decision split Ali's own following, and a faction later known as the Kharijites turned against him, whom he defeated at Nahrawan in 658.
Ali moved his capital to Kufa in Iraq and is remembered in the sources for an austere personal style and an insistence on equal treatment in the distribution of public funds, a policy that cost him support among established elites.
Death
In January 661 Ali was struck with a poisoned sword by a Kharijite assailant while at prayer in the mosque at Kufa, and died of his wounds. [1] Mu'awiya thereafter established the Umayyad Caliphate. Shia tradition identifies Ali's burial place as Najaf in Iraq, where the shrine bearing his name became one of the principal pilgrimage sites of the Muslim world.
Legacy
Sunni Muslims count Ali as the last of the four "rightly guided" caliphs, while Shia Muslims hold that Muhammad designated him as his successor and that religious authority passed through his descendants; this disagreement stands at the origin of the two great branches of Islam. [2]
A large literature of sermons, letters and sayings is attributed to him, collected most famously in the Nahj al-Balagha, a work admired in Arabic letters for its eloquence and much studied as a source of ethical and political reflection. [2] Numerous Sufi orders trace their spiritual lineage back to him.
