From Bidʿa to Sunna: The Wilāya of ʿAlī in the Shīʿī Adhān

From Bidʿa to Sunna: The Wilāya of ʿAlī in the Shīʿī Adhān

Although the wilāya of ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib-the attestation of his spiritual and temporal authority-has always been professed by the Shiīʿa and has appeared in their ritual and other practices (such as coinage) in various forms, its inclusion in the adhān (call to prayer) was once generally rejected by Shīʿī scholars. It is now, however, a distinctive feature of the adhān in use among the Twelver Shīʿa. This paper traces and explains how this change came about and how it was eventually justified by the leading scholarly authorities of the community, especially from the Safavid era and later.