Publisher's Synopsis
The present work is a book in the Creedal Foundations of Waliyic Islam Series. With the exception of the first volume which contains about 60 pages of new material, the content of all eight of the books in this series have been taken from the much larger work Creedal Foundations of Waliyic Islam by Blake Archer Williams, and are in fact fascicles of this larger work which stand by themselves and have been separated in order to make the work available to a more general readership in single fascicle units. The series contains the following titles: 1.Introduction to Waliyic Islam - Sacred Communities & their Covenantal Dispensations 2.The Exclusivity of Providential Lordship - Its Rational and Scriptural Proofs 3.Qoranic, Prophetic and Imamic Revelation 4.Tansis - Scriptural Proofs of Divine Designation to the Investiture to Succession to the Prophet's ministry 5.The Imamate I: Its Theological Bases 6.The Imamate II: Its Historical Realities 7.The Role of Feqhicity during the Era of the Occultation 8.The 22 Proofs in Imam Khomeini's Islamic Governance Creedal Foundations of Waliyic Islam is an attempt at a comprehensive treatment of what is called Waliyic Islam, approached from the perspective of Shi'a Islam itself, as opposed to the perspective of orientalism or some other branch of the humanities, all of whose perspectives are ultimately philosophical in their underpinnings and bearings and therefore do not reflect the religion as it is understood by the clerisy of the religion itself, but do so from a perspective and ideological framework that is alien and indeed antithetical and at times hostile to it... Thus, in addition to its unique religious rather than academic, "objective" approach, what is specifically unique about Creedal Foundations of Waliyic Islam is that it provides, probably for the first time in English, the following: * A definition and exposition of what Imamic revelation is, and how the need for it continues after the occultation, and how the magisters fulfill the role of explicatory revelation in the absence of immaculate guidance. * A detailed definition of the theoretical aspects of the Imamate, together with a long chapter on the historical realities of what the imamate actually turned into and why. * A collection of all of the major instances of tansis or the divine investiture of Imam Ali to the succession to the Prophet and to the office of his imamate, sourced exclusively from Sonni hadith scripture. * The nature and function of feqhicity and the post-occultation authority of the Shi'a clerisy. * A summary of the 22 rational and scriptural proofs in Imam Khomeini's seminal 1970 book Islamic Governance - The theoretical framework and logic of how all of the above creedal beliefs relate to each other and flow together to give rise to the theory of velayat-e faqih. Blake Archer Williams' greatest contribution perhaps lies in the fact that his book (Creedal Foundations of Waliyic Islam, which is the basis of the series of the same name) provides the rational as well as scriptural theoretical framework and logic of how all of the above creedal beliefs relate to each other and build upon one another to give rise to the theory of Velayat-e Faqih. The fifth and sixth volumes in this series deal with the issue of the imamate. The imamate is to Shi'a Islam what the caliphate is to Sonni Islam. It is the name given to the Shi'a vision of what the polity or system of governance envisioned by Islam should be, which is comprehensive and integral and lead by an Immaculate Imam who is designated by God to the office. Whereas Volume Five deals with the theoretical aspects of what the imamate should be, Volume Six explains what it actually turned into and why, taking as its starting point the Sermon at Ghadir Khomm and ending with the tragedy of the massacre of the Prophet's grandson Imam Hosayn on the plain of Karbala.
