Word: imam
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...head of the Islamic empire as well as its religious leader, imperial patronage helped make Sunni Islam the dominant sect. Today about 90% of Muslims worldwide are Sunnis. But Shi'ism would always attract some of those who felt oppressed by the empire. Shi'ites continued to venerate the Imams, or the descendants of the Prophet, until the 12th Imam, Mohammed al-Mahdi (the Guided One), who disappeared in the 9th century at the location of the Samarra shrine in Iraq. Mainstream Shi'ites believe that al-Mahdi is mystically hidden and will emerge on an unspecified date to usher...
...ground running, orchestrating what, by Vatican standards, was a swift response that included conciliatory public statements, a quickly organized meeting with ambassadors from Muslim countries and, ultimately, the success of November's trip to Turkey, where the Pope surprised his critics with a moving prayer together with an imam in Istanbul's Blue Mosque. "Words have great value," says Bertone. "But sometimes gestures can have such an enormous emotional impact that words might not be able to achieve...
...Imam Ali Hussein died 1327 years ago, but for the Shi'ite Muslim faithful in Kabul - and everywhere else - it might as well have been yesterday. There is a vivid intensity to their mourning of the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad with black banners, dirges, funereal marches and somber sermons in mosques - and also by ritual bloodletting and physical mortification. Every year, during the festival of Ashura, Shi'ites symbolically punish themselves for their failure to rally to their imam at the Battle of Karbala and save him from his enemies in a conflict that marked the beginning...
...lacerated back. Slowly the faded cotton darkens with blood. "Their presence gives us power." Indeed, the presence of an audience appears to egg on the penitents. The strikes are harder in the presence of video cameras and camera phones. Still, he says that he feels no pain. "Our imam was killed, his blood was shed for Islam, so we shed our blood for Islam. The pride eclipses the pain...
...Yamani, planned to lead his followers into Najaf and kill the Shi'a religious leaders there. Chief among the targets would have been Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani, the most revered Shi'a cleric in Iraq. His rivals slain, al-Yamani planned to lead his followers into the Imam Ali shrine, the resting place of Mohammad's son-in-law and one of Shi'a Islam's holiest sites...