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Islam is a civilization as well as a major world religion, with some 1.3 billion Muslims scattered across almost every region of the globe, especially in the Middle East (the birthplace of Islam), Asia and Africa. Currently, around 15 per cent of the Muslim population of the world belong to various communities or different branches […]
Arrival: The first significant wave of Muslims arrived between 1875 and 1912 in USA and the period is a turning point in the history of Shiism in USA. Shias and Sunnis who got to USA at about the same time, worshiped together, shared similar experiences, and encountered the same challenges. Among the early immigrants were […]
Most of the scholars of Islamic movements in Nigeria tend to erroneously believe that Shiism in Nigeria is a result of the Iranian Revolution of 1979. There has been a passive Shia community in northern Nigeria since the early colonial period. Lebanese traders were the first Shia community in northern Nigeria and they constituted an […]
Most Saudi Shias live in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia; in the al-Ahsa oasis and in the town of Qatif. There is also a Twelver Shia community in Medina (nakhawila), and an Ismaili Shia community in Najran, on the border to Yemen. The number of Saudi Shia is a disputed issue due to its […]
The emergence of Shia community in Lebanon can be traced back to the 7th century AD and the first Arab conquests. Their numbers were very limited and they were mainly concentrated in the Kessrouan region, a Maronite population center today. Immigration: Shia immigration would remain important in the following centuries as these minority populations of […]
In many articles Shias and Alevis are considered to be different sects while in some other the latter is known as a blanket term for a large number of different Shia communities, whose actual beliefs and ritual practices differ. Since the biggest Shia population in Turkey belongs to this group, a separate blog post is […]
Iraq’s ethnic and religious diversity Iraq’s population is predominantly Muslim. This population consists of nearly two thirds of Shia population in Iraq and the other third is mainly Sunni. This means that Iraq is one of the few countries in which Shia Muslims are a majority. One of the main features of this country is […]
Shia communities have always been seen as a minority which means that an overwhelming majority of Muslims are Sunnis and the Shia population statistics in the world prove that they generate about 10-13% percent of Muslims. It is estimated that there are between 154 million and 200 million Shia Muslims in the world today. Shia […]
Reaching independence in Azerbaijan was followed immediately by the debates on concepts of liberalism, nationalism, secularism and religion. Prominent among these concepts are terms such as secularism and nationalism, which characterize Azerbaijani society. Nearly every politician frequently uses the term “liberal values” or “the establishment of a democratic regime”, but most of them are nationalists […]
To know more about the history of Shiism in Azerbaijan we need to know some basic facts about Shiism itself. As we know, Shia Islam has several branches, like Zaydiyya (Fiver Shia Islam), Ismaili (Sevener Shia Islam), Isna Ashari (Twelver), Alawits etc. Most Azerbaijani Muslims belong to Twelver Shia Islam, based on Jafari Madhab, the […]