Treatise about Islamic factions, their teachings and their belief from Muhammad b. Pir ’Aii al-Bargili

Abstract

Muhammad b. Pir ’Aii al-Bargili (929-981/1523-1573), the well known Islamic scholar, within a large opus of his work, wrote a book on Islamic factions, their teachings and their belief. The title of the book as »Tuhfat al-mustaršidin fi bajani medahibi firaq al-Muslimin«. It is a short treatise on the best-known groups of Islamic factions and their fundamental attitudes on which they developed the theories different from the teaching of the orthodox Islam.

At the beginning of the book al-Bargili discusses the teaching of the orthodox Islamic wing and then the teachings of six large factoins including twelve sectes of each of them. The way in which the author classifies them is not identical with the classifications made by other well-known authors and heresyographers engaged in this phenomenon such as: al-Bagdadl, aš-Šahrastani, Ibnu Hazm, al-Eš'ari and others. The mother factions in al-Bargili's opinion are: Gabriyya, Qadariyya, Karramiyya, Mu'attaliyya, Rafidiyya and Nawasibiyya.
Al-Bargili's book is the only one of this kind in the possession of Gazi Husref Bey Library discovered up to now which serves as a proof that only authentic teachings of Islam have always prevailed in our provinces and that no faction has ever been supported or rooted here.
Since some places in the book are not quite clear and intelligible, the whole translation of the book is accompanied with necessary notes, which, to our belief, will be useful to those readers who are less familiar with the teachings of Islamic factions.