Fatimid dynasty

The Fatimid dynasty emerged as the leaders of the clandestine early Isma'ili missionary movement (da'wa) in the ninth century CE, ostensibly acting on behalf of a hidden imam, implied at the time to be Muhammad ibn Isma'il.

Their initial obscurity, and the publication of conflicting and incorrect genealogies by the first Fatimid caliph, Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah (known by the diminutive Ubayd Allah by his detractors), cast doubt on the accuracy of these claims, which were usually rejected by contemporary Sunni and Twelver Shi'a alike, who considered them impostors and usurpers.

The initial dynamism of the da'wa was diminished by bitter succession disputes, which resulted in large parts of the Isma'ili community, such as the Druze, Nizaris, and Tayyibis, breaking off from the Fatimid allegiance, and tarnished the prestige and authority of the dynasty.

[1] A line of imams emerged from the offspring of Husayn, who did not openly lay claim to the caliphate, but were considered by their followers as the true representatives of God on earth.

[12][13] Thus the pro-Isma'ili Prince Peter Hagop Mamour, in his 1934 apologetic work Polemics on the Origin of the Fatimi Caliphs, lists no fewer than fifty variations of the line of the four hidden imams between Isma'il ibn Ja'far and al-Mahdi, claiming that the various names represent pseudonyms.

[21][10] Medieval anti-Fatimid polemicists, starting with Ibn Rizam and Akhu Muhsin, were keen to discredit Isma'ilism as an antinomian heresy and generally considered Fatimid claims to Alid descent fraudulent.

[16][28] Research by Vladimir Ivanov, on the other hand, has conclusively shown that the supposed Qaddahite descent of the Fatimids is a legend, likely invented by Ibn Rizam himself: the historical Maymun al-Qaddah is now known to have been a disciple of Muhammad al-Baqir (recognized by both Isma'ilis and Twelvers as an imam), and both he and his son Abdallah hailed from the Hejaz.

This would make the claim of al-Mahdi's descent from an 'Abdallah ibn Maymun' actually correct, and lead hostile sources to confuse him with the earlier Shi'a figure.

[30] Another suggestion, by Abbas Hamdani and F. de Blois, is that the officially published genealogies represent a compromise between two different lines of descent from Ja'far al-Sadiq, one from Isma'il and another (per al-Mahdi's letter to the Yemenis) from Abdallah al-Aftah.

[31][28] Other scholars, such as Halm, remain skeptical, while Omert Schrier and Michael Brett dismiss the Fatimid claims of Alid descent entirely as a pious fiction.

[32] States People Centers Other Both the Twelvers and the Seveners held that their final imams were not dead, but had simply gone into concealment, and that they would soon return as a messiah, the mahdi ('the Rightly Guided One') or qa'im ('He Who Arises'), to usher in the end times.

[1][33] The mahdi would rapidly overthrow the usurping Abbasids and destroy their capital Baghdad, restore the unity of the Muslims, conquer Constantinople, ensure the final triumph of Islam and establish a reign of peace and justice.

[35] While the mahdi Muhammad ibn Isma'il remained hidden, however, he would need to be represented by agents, who would gather the faithful, spread the word (da'wa, 'invitation, calling'), and prepare his return.

[41] During the late ninth century, millennialist expectations increased in the Muslim world, coinciding with a deep crisis of the Abbasid Caliphate during the decade-long Anarchy at Samarra, the rise of breakaway and autonomous regimes in the provinces, and the large-scale Zanj Rebellion, whose leader claimed Alid descent and proclaimed himself as the mahdi.

[42] In this chaotic atmosphere, and with the Abbasids preoccupied with suppressing the Zanj uprising, the Isma'ili da'wa spread rapidly, aided by dissatisfaction among Twelver adherents with the political quietism of their leadership and the recent disappearance of their twelfth imam.

[48] These doctrinal innovations caused a major rift in the movement, as Hamdan denounced the leadership in Salamiyah, gathered the Iraqi da'is and ordered them to cease the missionary effort.

While his companions expected to head to Yemen, where the Isma'ili da'wa had enjoyed great success, Abdallah turned westward, and established himself at the oasis town of Sijilmasa, in what is now southwestern Morocco, in August 905.

[10][53] The da'i proclaimed a Shi'a regime, but kept the name of his master secret as yet, only using the title hujjat Allah, 'God's proof'; and soon set out westward, at the head of a large army, to bring his imam to Ifriqiya.

[55] On 4 January 910, Abdallah entered Raqqada, where he publicly proclaimed himself caliph with the regnal title of al-imam al-mahdi bi'llah, 'the imam rightly guided by God'.

[10] Conversely, the local Arabs of Ifriqiya were Maliki Sunnis, while most Berber tribes further west—notably the Zenata confederation—adhered to various forms of Kharijism, and thus opposed to the Isma'ili regime of the Fatimids.

The Fatimid caliphs aimed to overthrow not only the rival Muslim monarchs—the Abbasids of Baghdad and the Umayyads of Cordoba—but also the Byzantine Empire, claiming a divine right to universal sovereignty.

[10][68] The victory over the rebel leader, who had almost destroyed the Fatimid state and was symbolically called the Dajjal ('the false Messiah') by the Isma'ili da'wa, was the moment when Abu Tahir declared himself as the imam and caliph in succession to his father, with the name of al-Mansur bi-Nasr Allah ('The Victor with the Help of God').

Meticulous military and political preparations were undertaken, and the agents of the Isma'ili da'wa engaged to promote the Fatimid cause in Egypt and suborn officials of the weakened Ikhshidid regime.

Both invasions were beaten back at the gates of Cairo, forcing the Qarmatians to retreat to Bahrayn, and opening the path for a renewed Fatimid attempt to conquer Syria.

[10] The early years of his reign saw the conclusion of peace with Byzantium in 1001,[79] as well as the great tribal revolts of Abu Rukwa in Cyrenaica in 1005, and of Mufarrij ibn Daghfal in Palestine in 1012–13.

[10] From 1015 on, the Fatimid Caliphate, and the Isma'ili community, were confronted by a rise in sectarianism: a series of preachers who propagated extremist versions of Isma'ilism appeared, preaching the imminence of the end times, the divinity of al-Hakim, and the abolition of the Sharia.

[10] Members of the dynasty were carefully kept out of public affairs; even princes and princesses of the blood did not have a special position at court, let alone being entrusted with the governance of provinces or the command of armies as in other medieval states, which might result in an independent power base that could threaten the orderly father-to-son succession of the imamate and caliphate.

[81] The sole exception was the designated successor, such as al-Qa'im, al-Mansur and Abdallah ibn al-Mu'izz, and that only in the early decades of the dynasty; as the caliphs increasingly ascended the throne as children, this practice was also dropped.

[84] For similar reasons, Fatimid princesses were usually not wed outside the family, and the caliphs themselves did not usually engage in a full marriage, but had slave concubines, who could rise to the high status of an umm walad upon the birth of a son.

Thus at their death in 1050/51, two daughters of Caliph al-Mu'izz left estates of about 1.7 million gold dinars each, while Sitt al-Mulk is known to have employed an extensive staff of able administrators of both sexes for her far-flung economic interests.