Posted on 01/25/2015 10:52:12 AM PST by george76
the split began during a power struggle of who would lead Islam after the death of the Prophet Mohammed in 632 AD. A conflict developed between those who wanted the growing religion headed by qualified leaders and those who believed authority belonged to the direct heirs of Mohammed.
The Prophet’s son-in-law, Ali, ruled as caliph for five years before being assassinated. His sons, Hassan and Hussein, were excluded from the succession and both were later killed. Their adherents evolved into the Shia, whose name derives from the term shi’atu Ali, Arabic for “partisans of Ali,”...
Shia devotees would see the death of Hussein in a key battle at Karbala, in what is now Iraq, as a watershed, cementing a sense of grievance and martyrdom.
The Sunni .. see themselves as the true followers
...
Shia Islam became the state religion of Persia, modern Iran, under the Safavid dynasty in the 16th century, but significant Shia communities existed elsewhere in the Middle East.
The advent of the Ottoman Empire imposed a level of co-existence in regions controlled by the largely Sunni Turks, who supplanted the Arab Caliphate, but rivalry persisted between the Ottomans, and their successor nation states, and Shia Persia for centuries.
But the gradual decay of the Ottoman empire in the 19th and early 20th centuries would help stir the embers of the conflict between Shia and Sunni.
...
The historic enmity between Persia and the Ottomans has translated into a modern struggle between Sunni-controlled states and modern Iran’s Islamic Republic, the main Shia bulwark
...
Yemen, now sliding into a new phase of instability, is the latest venue for the proxy war between Sunni and Shia powers
(Excerpt) Read more at ca.news.yahoo.com ...
It’s like two wolves fighting over who will devour the Lamb.
Let ‘em slaughter each other.
Two gangs of one death-cult.
For most of us, our knowledge of Islam doesn’t extend much past an awareness that it is divided into different sects, much as Christianity is.
They had to get that in there.
[and 85-90% of the world's Muslims are Sunni, IOW, Shiites kill twice as many per capita]
For Christians to read about islam is like that Star Trek episode where the evil version of the crew with the bearded Spock is beamed aboard the ship.
1.6 billion blood thirsty idiots can’t resolve a minor succession issue after 1400 years and they’ve convinced themselves their good wants them to rule the world.
Sure.
“Good” s/b “god”
allah is neither, BTW.
My thoughts as well...Our foreign policy should be to stir the pot and furnish both sides with small arms as needed to keep them equal...sponsor a war of attrition until there is only a handful of each side left
Qualified leaders? What qualified them to be leaders? Was it their assassinations and murders, just like mob bosses?
The author must have gotten paid by the Saudis.
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