2008/01/07 by William F. Tucker · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Aesthetics #Ancient history #Archaeology #Archaeology and Historical Studies #Context (archaeology) #Families in Therapy and Culture #Historical and Linguistic Studies #History #Indigenous #Islam #Islamic Studies and History #Law #Millenarianism #Ninth #Period (music) #Philosophy #Political science #Politics #Qur’anic Interpretation Studies #Religious studies #Sociology #Theology
paper · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511512094
openalex publication_date 2008/01/07 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/15
Mahdis and Millenarians is a discussion of Shiite groups in eighth- and ninth-century Iraq and Iran, whose ideas reflected a mixture of indigenous non-Muslim religious teachings and practices in Iraq in the early centuries of Islamic rule. It demonstrates the period's fluidity of religious boundaries. Particular attention is given to the millenarian expectations and the revolutionary political activities of these sects. Specifically, it seeks to define the term 'millenarian', to explain how these groups reflect that definition, and to show how they need to be seen in a much larger context than Shiite or even Muslim history. The author concentrates, therefore, on the historical-sociological role of these movements. The thesis of the study is that they were the first revolutionary chiliastic groups in Islamic history and, combined with the later influence of some of their doctrines, contributed to the teachings of a number of subsequent Shiite or quasi-Shiite sectarian groups