Examples of Fatimid Realpolitik

Let us look at this more closely. The [Oh Shi]...i Imam Ja...far al-Sadiq died in 148/765 after which his Da...wa split into two major factions disputing the succession of his sons Isma...il and Musa. Ja...far's two eldest sons, ...Abd Allah and Isma...il were by his first wife Fatima bint al-Husayn b. al-Hasan b. Ali b.Abi Talib. It seems from our sources that Ja...far had designated his second son Isma...il for succession as Imam.(1) However, Isma...il died in 145/762 during his father's lifetime.(2) A conflict then arose on the question whether Isma...il's son [Imam Muhammad] or the former's brother Musa should succeed. It seems that there was a compromise arrived at for uniting the Shi...i ranks under the Imamate of Ja...far's eldest son ...Abd Allah.(3) ...Abd Allah did not live long(4) and the conflict now re-surfaced in the Da...wa. Those supporting Musa, were later called Ithna ...Ashariya and others supporting Muhammad, the son of the deceased Isma...il, were known as the Isma...iliya. One faction of the Isma...iliya, namely alMubarakiya, believed in the return of Muhammad b. Isma...il after he went underground and disappeared. This doctrine was restated by the Qarmatians a century and a half later and is considered the original doctrine of the Isma...ilis by S. M. Stern(5) and Wilfred Madelung(6). The Fatimid al-[Al-Mahdi] is claimed by them to have reneged on it. The implication of this interpretation is that since Muhammad b. Isma...il never returned, the Fatimids had neither doctrinal nor physical continuity from the early Shi...i Imam Ja...far al-Sadiq. The question arises that if al-Mahdi's ancestor was ...Abd Allah, then why did the movement originally center on Muhammad b. Isma...il? Al-Mahdi's letter explains the zig-zag succession between the lines of ...Abd Allah and Isma...il and it is quite likely that on the disappearance of Muhammad b. Isma...il, ...Abd Allah's son, ...Abd Allah II assumed Imamate and the leadership of the movement. The two lines of ...Abd Allah and Isma...il appear in the letter to be closely cooperating during the satr period, which could have been the origin of the theory of the mustaqarr (real) and mustawda... (trustee) Imams. When al-Mahdi states that his ancestor ...Abd Allah was also called Isma...il,(12) he wanted to capitalize on the prestige of the original nass by Ja...far al-Sadiq on Isma...il. When alMahdi says that the name Muhammad was constantly used in the satr period for the Imams,(13) it was a con