Ahl al-Bayt | History, Meaning, Family, & Today | Britannica (original) (raw)

Arabic:

“People of the House,”

Ahl al-Bayt, designation in Islam for the holy family of the Prophet Muhammad, particularly his daughter Fāṭimah, her husband ʿAlī (who was also Muhammad’s cousin), their sons al-Ḥusayn and Ḥasan, and their descendants.

The Shiʿah closely identify this family with the imams, whom they regard as the legitimate holders of authority in the Muslim community, the infallible bearers of sacred knowledge, and the source of messianic deliverance in the end time. Since the 12th and 13th centuries most Sufi orders have included members of the Prophet’s family in their elaborate spiritual lineages (_silsilah_s), which they trace back to the Prophet through ʿAlī.

Aside from Mecca, shrines containing the remains of members of the Prophet’s family and their heirs are the most popular Muslim pilgrimage centres. These include the shrines of ʿAlī in Najaf, Iraq; Ḥusayn in Karbala, Iraq, and Cairo, Egypt; ʿAlī al-Riḍā in Mashhad, Iran; and Khwājah Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī in Ajmer (western India). In many Muslim societies, people known as sharifs and sayyids hold privileged status by descent from the holy family. Among those claiming such status in the 20th and 21st centuries were King Hassan II of Morocco, King Hussein of Jordan, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, and Abū al-Aʿlā al-Mawdūdī of India/Pakistan.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Adam Zeidan.