There are those of the Sunnah tradition that identify the beginning of Shia’sm as one named Abdalla Ibn Saba, whom they claim is a Jewish convert and an insincere one (closeted Jew). It is said that he spread the idea that Ali ibn Abu Talib (Imam Ali as) was God on earth. Many Shias agree that this person existed.
Let us examine the shia narriations regarding Imam Ali as burning those that believed he was Allah swt in Kufa. (credit https://shiascans.com/). The first narration is from Al-Kafi:
A group came to Ameer Al-Mu’mineen (عليه السلام), and they said: “Peace be upon you, O our Lord (rabbanaa)! So he asked for their repentance, but they refused to do so. So he dug a ditch for them and lit a fire in it and dug a ditch to its other side and conveyed between them. So when they did not repent he threw them in the ditch and lit in the other ditch until they died.
Al-Kulayni’s Al-Kafi, vol. 7, p. 258-259, hadith no. 18, authenticated with a hassan i.e. good good/reliable grading by Al-Majlisi in his Mir’at Al-‘Uqul, vol. 23, p. 401
Here, we see that Imam Ali as in fact did burn a group of people who believed he was Allah swt.
Next we will look at what Ayatollah Khoe relayed from Kashshi’s Rijal.
Hisham bin Salim, who said that he heard it from Abi Abdillah (Ja’far Al-Sadiq) when he told that Abdullah bin Saba’ called (to people) the lordship/divinity of the Chief of the Believers, ‘Ali. Upon that ‘Ali ordered him to repent, but he refused. Then ‘Ali let him burn in fire.”
Kashshi’s Rijal, p. 107, hadith no. 171, Sahih (Authentic) to Al- Khoie in Mu’jam Rijal Al-Hadith by “Ayatollah” Al-Khoie, vol. 11, p. 205.
Here, we see that the story is also found in Rijal by Kashshi. What does this mean?
The one and only point I am trying to make is that there were a group of people who believed Imam Ali was Allah swt. Imam Ali himself, after they would not repent, burned them. Now, there are some sunni sources that relay that Imam Ali was angry with these individuals also because they gave Imam Ali preference over Abu Bakr and Omar, and spread lies that he hated them. I will not address those points here. I only seek to point out that human pychology of exaggeration towards to Imams. It existed from the beginning, and we see Imam Ali was against attributing divinity to him. Because of this, the exaggerators had to change their wording. They started saying that, well the Imams are not God, but they helped create the earth and possess other such divine attributes. We have hadiths from Imam Jafar Al Sadiq and Imam Ali Rida of how they dealt with those claims. These will be addressed in separate articles.
Those that believed Imam Ali as was God, did not go away after that. they believed more so that he was Allah swt and their proof was their belief that only Allah can punish with fire. The disease of ghuluw remains until today, where many shias use word games to justify the Imams’ powers of providing rizk, creation, purpose, remembrance, duaas, and so on. Imam Ali, after he burned them, did not correct the belief and ever state he is God’s appointee on earth and that he has powers.
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