Mūsā ibn Muḥammad al-Mubarqaʿ (Arabic: موسى بن محمد المبرقع) was a descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Musa was the son of Muhammad al-Jawad (d. 835) and the younger brother of Ali al-Hadi (d. 868), the ninth and tenth Imams in Twelver Shia. He is known to be a common ancestor of the Ridawi sayyids, who descended from the Islamic prophet Muhammad through Ali al-Rida (d. 818), the eighth Imam in Twelver Shia and Musa's grandfather. He was known by the title al-Mubarqaʿ (Arabic: المبرقع) probably because he covered his face with a burqa' (Arabic: بُرقَع, lit. 'veil') to remain anonymous in public. Traditions narrated by him are cited by some Twelver scholars, including al-Kulayni and al-Mufid.

Biography

Musa al-Mubarqa' was the younger son of Muhammad al-Jawad (d. 835), the ninth Imam in Twelver Shia.^[1][2][3] His elder brother Ali al-Hadi (d. 868) succeeded their father al-Jawad as the tenth Imam.^[3] Musa had two or four sisters, named variously in the sources.^[1] The Twelver theologian al-Mufid (d. 1022) names them as Fatima and Amama, while the biographical source Dala'il al-imama lists them as Khadija, Hakima, and Umm Kulthum. This book is attributed to al-Tabari al-Saghir, the eleventh-century Twelver scholar. The Sunni historian Fakhr Razi (d. 1209) adds Behjat and Barihe to these names, saying that none of them left any descendants.^[4] The children of al-Jawad were all born to Samana,^[4] a freed slave (umm walad) of Moroccan origin.^[5] It is through Ali and Musa that the lineage of al-Jawad continued.^[4] In particular, the Ridawi line of sayyids leads to Musa. These are the descendants of the Islamic prophet Muhammad through Ali al-Rida (d. 818), the eighth Imam in Twelver Shia and Musa's grandfather.^[6]

Musa was a small child when his father al-Jawad died in 835 CE at the age of about twenty-five, probably poisoned at the instigation of the Abbasid caliph al-Mu'tasim (r. 833–842).^[7][1][8] The will attributed to al-Jawad stipulates that his elder son Ali would inherit from him and be responsible for his younger brother Musa and his sisters. This will can be found in Kitab al-Kafi, a collection of Shia traditions compiled by the prominent Twelver traditionist al-Kulayni (d. 941).^[2][3] There was also an oral designation (nass) of Ali as the next Imam, delivered to a close confidant by al-Jawad.^[9][9] After his death, this testimony was corroborated by a small assembly of Shia notables,^[10] and the majority of his followers thus accepted the imamate of Ali,^[7][11] who is commonly known by the titles al-Hadi (lit. 'the guide') and al-Naqi (lit. 'the distinguished').^[5] A small group also gathered around Musa but soon returned to his brother Ali after the former dissociated himself from them.^[3][11] Musa later settled in Qom,^[6] a rising Shia center in the modern-day Iran.^[12][5] Traditions narrated by him are cited by some Twelver scholars, including al-Kulayni in his al-Kafi, al-Mufid in his al-Ikhtisas, and Shaykh Tusi (d. 1067) in his Tahdhib al-osul.^[6] Musa was known by the title al-Mubarqa' (Arabic: المبرقع) probably because he covered his face with a burqa' (Arabic: بُرقَع, lit. 'veil') to remain unidentified in public. He died in Qom in 909 CE and the construction of his current shrine was sponsored by the Safavid king Tahmasp I (r. 1524–1576).^[6]

Footnotes

References