SMHMShaheed Mudassir Hussain Mehdi
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علي الرضا

Imam Ali al-Rida

peace be upon him

الرضاal-Ridathe one who is pleasing to God
أبو الحسنAbu l-Hasanhis kunya
عالم آل محمد'Alim Al Muhammadthe learned one of the family of Muhammad
الصابرal-Sabirthe patient
الرضيal-Radithe content
الوافيal-Wafithe faithful

His life

  1. Ali ibn Musa ibn Ja'far ibn Muhammad ibn Ali ibn al-Husayn ibn Ali ibn Abi Talib, the eighth Imam; his kunya was Abu l-Hasan. Some sources say al-Ma'mun gave him the title al-Rida (al-Irshad of al-Shaykh al-Mufid; Manaqib Ibn Shahrashub), but Imam al-Jawad said in a hadith that God gave his father this title ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida of al-Shaykh al-Saduq). Al-Sabir, al-Radi and al-Wafi are among his other titles (A'yan al-Shi'a).
  2. Born in Medina, by the best-known report on 11 Dhu al-Qa'da 148 AH (765); al-Kulayni gives 148 AH (al-Kafi), as most historians do. Other reports give Dhu al-Hijja or Rabi' al-Awwal, and some give the year 153 AH.
  3. Al-Shaykh al-Saduq records that his mother was a bondwoman named Tuktam, whom Imam al-Kazim renamed Tahira when she bore him; she was also called Najma, Sakan al-Nawbiyya, al-Arwa and Samana, and her kunya was Umm al-Banin. Another report says Hamida, mother of Imam al-Kazim, bought her and gave her to her son ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida).
  4. Imam al-Kazim's designation of him was narrated by Dawud ibn Kathir al-Raqqi, Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Ammar, Ali ibn Yaqtin and others (al-Irshad). Dawud al-Raqqi asked who the Imam after him would be; Imam al-Kazim pointed to his son and said: This is your imam after me (al-Irshad).
  5. His Imamate lasted twenty years, 183 to 203 AH, through the caliphates of Harun al-Rashid, al-Amin and the first five years of al-Ma'mun (I'lam al-Wara of al-Tabrisi). Most of the Shia, the great companions of Imam al-Kazim among them, accepted his Imamate; a group who stopped at his father were called the Waqifiyya (Firaq al-Shi'a of al-Nawbakhti).
  6. He lived seventeen years of his Imamate in Medina. He said: I would sit in the mosque of the Prophet, and the scholars of Medina referred to me for their problems when they could not solve a problem, and I answered them (I'lam al-Wara). The Sunni historian Ibn al-Najjar wrote that he gave fatwas in the Prophet's mosque in his twenties (Dhayl Tarikh Baghdad).
  7. In 200 or 201 AH al-Ma'mun brought him from Medina to Khorasan by way of Basra, escorted by Raja' ibn Abi l-Dahhak, a kinsman of al-Fadl ibn Sahl (Tarikh al-Ya'qubi); al-Shaykh al-Mufid names the escort as al-Juludi and says a group of the family of Abu Talib was summoned with him (al-Irshad). His route was kept away from Kufa and the Shia towns, for fear the Shia would gather around him (Majmu'a-yi Athar of Murtada Mutahhari).
  8. At Nishapur the hadith scholars asked him for a hadith before he left. Ishaq ibn Rahawayh narrates that he put his head out of his litter and said that he heard from his father Musa ibn Ja'far, from his fathers, each from his father, back to Ali ibn Abi Talib, from the Messenger of God, from Gabriel, from God: 'the sentence 'There is no god but Allah' is my stronghold, thus whoever enters my stronghold shall be safe from my punishment.' As his litter moved on he called out: With its conditions, and I myself am one of those conditions (al-Tawhid of al-Shaykh al-Saduq).
  9. Because every narrator in it is an infallible Imam, back to the Prophet, from Gabriel, from God, it is called Silsilat al-Dhahab, the Golden Chain. Al-Saduq narrates it in al-Tawhid, al-Amali, Ma'ani al-Akhbar and 'Uyun Akhbar al-Rida; al-Shaykh al-Tusi narrates it in al-Amali without the closing words. Al-Saduq explains that one of the conditions of There is no god but God is acknowledging his Imamate, as the Imam appointed by God whom one must obey (al-Tawhid).
  10. Sunni sources report that ten, twenty or thirty thousand people heard it and wrote it down (al-Fusul al-Muhimma of Ibn al-Sabbagh; al-Sawa'iq al-Muhriqa of Ibn Hajar al-Haytami), though only a few, such as al-Qunduzi, record its closing words (Yanabi' al-Mawadda). Ahmad ibn Hanbal is reported to have said that if this chain were recited over a madman he would recover (al-Sawa'iq al-Muhriqa; Tadhkirat al-Khawass).
  11. In Merv al-Ma'mun offered him the caliphate, then the succession; he refused both. Al-Ma'mun then threatened him, recalling that Umar's council of six had ordered the beheading of any member who refused. The Imam answered: So, I accept only if I do not give command and do not prohibit, I neither give fatwa, nor do I judge, I neither assign anyone to any task, nor do I change anything's position. Al-Ma'mun accepted the condition (al-Irshad).
  12. Al-Ma'mun took the pledge to him as heir on Monday, 7 Ramadan 201 AH (817), had people wear green, the colour of the Alids, in place of Abbasid black, had sermons given and dinars and dirhams struck in his name (Tarikh al-Ya'qubi). The poet Di'bil al-Khuza'i was at the ceremony and received a gift from the Imam (al-Irshad).
  13. The Imam knew al-Ma'mun's aim, and told him: You seek to make people say that Ali ibn Musa is fond of the material world. Asked why he had accepted, he said: I accepted this under duress ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida).
  14. Al-Ma'mun held sessions in Merv where the Imam debated scholars of other faiths and schools: the Christian Catholicos (al-Jathaliq), the Jewish Exilarch (Ra's al-Jalut), Zoroastrian scholars, Imran al-Sabi, Abu Qurra and al-Marwazi, on the oneness of God, the Imamate and more (al-Ihtijaj of al-Tabrisi). Al-Saduq writes that al-Ma'mun brought high-level scholars against him out of envy, to devalue his reasoning, but none of those scholars met Imam al-Rida except that they admitted to his superiority and accepted his proofs ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida).
  15. In the middle of these debates, when he heard the call to prayer he left the session, telling those who asked him to continue: I will pray and come back ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida). When his own gatherings in Merv drew crowds, al-Ma'mun sent Muhammad ibn Amr al-Tusi to scatter the people, and the Imam cursed al-Ma'mun ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida).
  16. Asked by al-Ma'mun to lead the Eid prayer, he went out barefoot, as the Prophet did, saying takbir at every step; the commanders dismounted, took off their shoes and walked weeping behind him. Al-Fadl ibn Sahl warned al-Ma'mun that the people would be won over, and the Imam was called back before he reached the prayer ground (Hayat-i Fikri wa Siyasi-yi Imaman-i Shi'a of Rasul Ja'fariyan).
  17. He did not hide the doctrine of the Imamate: he called himself the one whose obedience is obligatory, while telling the Shia to be wary and not spread these words in public (al-Kafi 1:187). Asked by al-Ma'mun to write on the truth of Islam, he wrote of the oneness of God, the prophethood of Muhammad and the Imamate of Imam Ali and the eleven Imams after him ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida).
  18. He ate with his servants even after he was named heir ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida). In a bathhouse a man who did not know him asked him to wash him, and he did; when the man learned who he was and apologised, the Imam calmed him and went on washing him (Manaqib Ibn Shahrashub). Giving his shirt to Di'bil, he said he had prayed a thousand rak'as every night for a thousand nights in it, and finished the Qur'an a thousand times in it (al-Amali of al-Tusi).
  19. Reports of his martyrdom differ: the last day of Safar, 17 Safar, 21 Ramadan and other days, in 202, 203 or 206 AH. Most scholars give 203 AH (818); al-Kulayni gives Safar 203, at the age of fifty-five (al-Kafi), and al-Tabrisi the last day of Safar (I'lam al-Wara).
  20. Al-Shaykh al-Mufid narrates that al-Ma'mun had Abd Allah ibn Bashir let his nails grow, gave him a poison like tamarind to work into them, and had him press pomegranate juice for the Imam, who died two days later (al-Irshad). Al-Ya'qubi says he died near Tus, in the village of Nawqan, after three days' illness, and that Ali ibn Hisham gave him a poisoned pomegranate (Tarikh al-Ya'qubi); al-Saduq's reports name grapes, or grapes and pomegranate ('Uyun Akhbar al-Rida). The Sunni Ibn Hibban wrote that he was martyred by the poison al-Ma'mun gave him, on a Saturday in 203 AH (al-Thiqat).
  21. Al-Ma'mun buried him in the house of Humayd ibn Qahtaba al-Ta'i in the village of Sanabad (al-Irshad), where his shrine in Mashhad now stands and is visited by millions every year. Ibn Hibban wrote that he visited the grave many times while in Tus, and whenever a difficulty came upon him he prayed there and it was removed (al-Thiqat). Ibn Khuzayma, a leading Sunni traditionist, showed such reverence and humility at the grave that those with him were astonished (Tahdhib al-Tahdhib of Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani).
  22. His wife Sabika was of the family of Mariya, wife of the Prophet (al-Kafi; I'lam al-Wara). Al-Shaykh al-Mufid names no child of his but Muhammad, Imam al-Jawad (al-Irshad); other sources name more. Al-Tabari records that al-Ma'mun married his daughter Umm Habib to him in 202 AH (Tarikh al-Tabari).
  23. Among his companions were Yunus ibn Abd al-Rahman, Ali ibn Mahziyar, Safwan ibn Yahya, Muhammad ibn Sinan, Zakariyya ibn Adam, al-Rayyan ibn al-Salt, Di'bil al-Khuza'i and his servant Muwaffaq; some count 367 companions and narrators (Hayat al-Imam Ali ibn Musa al-Rida of al-Qarashi). Many of his hadiths and answers are gathered in 'Uyun Akhbar al-Rida.

Days

  1. 148 AH765 CEBorn in Medina, 11 Dhu al-Qa'da
  2. 183 AH799 CEBecomes Imam on his father's martyrdom
  3. 201 AH816 CETaken to Khorasan; the Golden Chain hadith at Nishapur
  4. 201 AH817 CEMade heir to al-Ma'mun under duress, 7 Ramadan
  5. 202 AH817 CETravels with al-Ma'mun toward Iraq
  6. 203 AH818 CEMartyred near Tus, end of Safar; buried at Sanabad, today Mashhad

Family

موسى الكاظمImam al-Kazim
علي الرضاImam al-Rida
سبيكةSabika
محمد الجوادImam al-Jawad

In the Qur’an

يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوٓاْ أَطِيعُواْ ٱللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُواْ ٱلرَّسُولَ وَأُوْلِي ٱلۡأَمۡرِ مِنكُمۡۖ فَإِن تَنَٰزَعۡتُمۡ فِي شَيۡءٖ فَرُدُّوهُ إِلَى ٱللَّهِ وَٱلرَّسُولِ إِن كُنتُمۡ تُؤۡمِنُونَ بِٱللَّهِ وَٱلۡيَوۡمِ ٱلۡأٓخِرِۚ ذَٰلِكَ خَيۡرٞ وَأَحۡسَنُ تَأۡوِيلًا ٥٩

O you who have faith! Obey Allah and obey the Apostle and those vested with authority among you. And if you dispute concerning anything, refer it to Allah and the Apostle, if you have faith in Allah and the Last Day. That is better and more favourable in outcome.

The verse of those vested with authority · An-Nisaa 4:59

وَمَآ أَرۡسَلۡنَا مِن قَبۡلِكَ إِلَّا رِجَالٗا نُّوحِيٓ إِلَيۡهِمۡۖ فَسۡـَٔلُوٓاْ أَهۡلَ ٱلذِّكۡرِ إِن كُنتُمۡ لَا تَعۡلَمُونَ ٤٣

We did not send [any apostles] before you except as men to whom We revealed. Ask the People of the Reminder if you do not know.

The verse of the People of the Reminder · An-Nahl 16:43

Peace be upon you, O friend of God.

Peace be upon you, O proof of God.

Peace be upon you, O light of God in the darkness of the earth.

Peace be upon you, O truthful one, the martyr.

Sources