Sunni and Shia Islam

In Our Time

BBC

History

4.6 • 9.2K Ratings

🗓️ 25 June 2009

⏱️ 43 minutes

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and guests Amira Bennison, Robert Gleave and Hugh Kennedy discuss the split between the Sunni and the Shia. This schism came to dominate early Islam, and yet it did not spring at first from a deep theological disagreement, but rather from a dispute about who should succeed the Prophet Muhammad, and on what grounds. The supporters of the Prophet's cousin Ali argued for the hereditary principle; their opponents championed systems of selection. Ali's followers were to become the Shia; the supporters of selection were to become Sunnis.It is a story that takes us from Medina to Syria and on into Iraq, that takes in complex family loyalties, civil war and the killing at Karbala of the Prophet's grandson. Husayn has been commemorated as a martyr by the Shia ever since, and his death helped to formalise the divide as first a political and then a profoundly theological separation.Amira Bennison is Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge; Robert Gleave is Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter; Hugh Kennedy is Professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
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0:44.3	forward slash radio for. I hope you enjoy the program.
0:47.2	Hello in 618 near carbla in Iraq a man was killed in battle His name was Hussein and he was the grandson of
0:54.2	the Prophet Muhammad. His death, considered to be a martyrdom, was a crucial
0:58.4	episode in the growing split between two groups of Muslims who had come to be known as the Sunni and the Shia.
1:05.0	And yet this dispute didn't begin violently.
1:07.2	Arguably, it was not at first of political or theological
1:10.3	sism, but a personal disagreement. And the two groups agree on many of the fundamentals of religion.
1:16.7	So how did this profound split develop with me to discuss the division between the Sunni
1:20.8	and the Shia, are Amira Benison, senior lecturer in Middle Eastern
1:24.4	and Islamic studies at the University of Cambridge. Robert Gleeve, Professor of Arabic
1:29.3	Studies at the University of Exeter, and Hugh Kennedy, professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental
1:34.4	and African Studies at the University of London.
1:37.1	Amira Benison, the Prophet Muhammad died in 632 and the fledgling Islamic State had to choose a new leader.
1:44.4	And this was a crucial moment.
	...

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