{"id":6704,"date":"2024-07-10T07:43:51","date_gmt":"2024-07-10T07:43:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/al-mawrid.org\/questions-en\/2024\/07\/10\/hadith-about-twelve-imams\/"},"modified":"2025-11-16T21:49:31","modified_gmt":"2025-11-16T16:49:31","slug":"hadith-about-twelve-imams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/al-mawrid.org\/questions-en\/hadith-about-twelve-imams\/","title":{"rendered":"Hadith About Twelve Imams"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3>Question<\/h3>\n<p>My question is about the <em>hadith<\/em> about the twelve <em>imams.<\/em> What is your opinion about that <em>hadith<\/em>? Is it authentic? If it is than who are those <em>imams<\/em> which are addressed? Shi\u2019is are very much certain that the referred to <em>imams<\/em> are their <em>imams.<\/em> If we say they are wrong then who are the <em>imams<\/em>? If the Shi\u2019is are right then why don\u2019t we accept their views?<\/p>\n<h3>Answer<\/h3>\n<p>As for the Hadith you mentioned, there are a number of points to consider:<\/p>\n<div>1.  Hadith on itself is not a source of deriving our obligatory beliefs.  Any obligatory belief needs to have its establishment in the Qur&#8217;an. If  you know of any verses of the Qur&#8217;an that says we need to follow certain  individuals after the Prophet (sws) then you need to follow that verse,  otherwise people who hold a belief based on Ahadith like what you  mentioned need to answer the question that why the clear book of  guidance that is supposed to include everything for our guidance has not  mentioned an obligatory belief.<\/div>\n<div>2.  The Hadith you referred to is narrated by Jabir ibn Thamura who at the  time was only a kid. He says that the Prophet (sws) said those words in  presence of people. The fact that this Hadith is only narrated by Jabir  is quite suspicious.<\/div>\n<div>3.  The Hadith is not about 12 Imams. It is about 12 Amirs. Amir means  someone who has the power in hand. From among the Imams of Shia only Ali  (rta) and for a very brief time Hassan (ra) had power.<\/div>\n<div>4.  The Hadith does not direct Muslims to follow these 12 Amirs. In fact it  does not even say that these 12 Amirs are rightly guided ones. It  merely says that at their time Islam is in powerful position. If it was  an obligation to follow these Amirs then (beside the fact that it had to  come in the Qur&#8217;an as well) the Prophet (sws) would have made sure that  everyone had heard it and would have made it very clear that following  them were obligation.<\/div>\n<div>5.  History informs us of existence of only 11 of the Shia Imams. There is  no reliable historical evidence about the existence of the 12th Imam of  Shia. The existence of the 12th Imam of Shia is mostly argued based on  theological and philosophical reasoning rather than any hard historical  facts.<\/div>\n<p><strong>Answered by:<\/strong> Farhad Shafti<\/p>\n<p><strong>Date:<\/strong> 2015-02-13<\/p>\n<button class=\"simplefavorite-button\" data-postid=\"6704\" data-siteid=\"1\" data-groupid=\"1\" data-favoritecount=\"0\" style=\"\">Favorite <i class=\"sf-icon-star-empty\"><\/i><\/button>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My question is about the <em>hadith<\/em> about the twelve <em>imams.<\/em> What is your opinion about that <em>hadith<\/em>? Is it authentic? If it is than who are those <em>imams<\/em> which are addressed? Shi\u2019is are very much certain that the referred to <em>imams<\/em> are their <em>imams.<\/em> If we say they are wrong then who are the <em>imams<\/em>? If the Shi\u2019is are right then why don\u2019t we accept their views?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14147,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1191],"tags":[1269,1396,1218],"class_list":["post-6704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-muslim-sects","tag-imam","tag-imamat","tag-shiaism"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Hadith About Twelve Imams - Al-Mawrid Queries<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/al-mawrid.org\/questions-en\/hadith-about-twelve-imams\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hadith About Twelve Imams - Al-Mawrid Queries\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My question is about the hadith about the twelve imams. 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