Mahdi-Negaran: The First Five Centuries

According to the Iran Book News Agency (IBNA), quoting the public relations of the Mow’ud Asr Cultural and Artistic Institute, the book “Mahdi-Negaran,” a commentary on the history of Hadith compilation and the authorship of Mahdavi books, was published by the Mow’ud Asr Cultural and Artistic Institute.

The term “Mahdi-Negar” is a brilliant lexical compound recently coined by Esmaeil Shafiei Sarvestani to describe the efforts and struggles of authors who dedicated their lives to writing and compiling the precious existence of Hazrat Baqiyatullah al-A’zam, Qa’im al-Muntadhar, Hujjat ibn al-Hasan, Mahdi Maw’ud (may Allah hasten his reappearance). These are authors who spent their entire lives preserving, recording, and writing narrations issued by the infallible Imams, which were transmitted through one or more intermediaries and then registered and written down by these authors.

The publisher writes in the opening pages of this text: “This collection was initially chosen as an introduction to the ‘Encyclopedia of Mahdavi Authors and Narrators,’ but we regretted the idea that the story of many faithful and Mahdavi-believing researchers, who with full diligence passed on collections of Hadiths, narrations, and written works through all arduous ups and downs, and from the black hands of rulers and blind bigots, to present-day people, should be forgotten.”

This book includes topics such as the evolution and history of Hadith compilation, the story of the narration and fabrication of prophetic Hadith, the hardships faced by Shia scholars and authors, the mission of propagating Mahdism at the pinnacle of Islamic history, and the evolution of Mahdavi books and authors. The author, by expressing the concept of expectation as an inherent part of human existence, refers to Imam Mahdi (AS) as the heart of the world of possibilities and the perfect human.

A section of the book mentions: “In recent years, the book ‘Mu’jam Mahdawiyyah fi al-Riwayat al-Tafsīriyyah’ (Lexicon of Mahdism in Interpretive Narrations) by the esteemed researcher Morteza Abdi Charli has been published. In this extensive three-volume collection, researchers have referred to interpretive narrations to cite 363 verses (related to Mahdism) and declared the number of related surahs to be 91. In this collection, regarding the reason for the expansion of Quranic discussions on the topic of Mahdism, it is stated: ‘If not all discussions of Mahdism, at least a major part of its discussions, because they are instances of the unseen and hidden, cannot be explained and discovered except by recourse to the Book and Sunnah. And the best helper for those interested in understanding true Mahdism, free from subtleties and distortions, are those interpretive narrations that have emerged from a special combination of Quran and Hadith and are full of pure subtleties and delicacies that should be the source of correct Mahdavi thought.’ (Page 50)

The author divides the evolution and history of Hadith compilation into two periods: the presence of the infallible Imams and the period of occultation. He addresses the Hadith heritage of Amir al-Mu’minin Ali (AS) and Lady Fatimah (SA), and then examines the eras of Imam Hasan al-Mujtaba (AS), Imam Hussein (AS), Imam Zayn al-Abidin Sajjad (AS), and the Sadiqayn. He also briefly refers to the period from Imam Kadhim (AS) to Imam Hasan al-Askari (AS) and states that 1,695 books by 603 individuals have been recorded as statistics for the companions of the infallible Imams.

In another section, we read: “From the very beginning of Hadith collection, narrators and authors struggled with the problems of their time. Sulaym ibn Qays was one of the first Mahdavi authors, who was imprisoned by Ibn Ziyad during the uprising of Imam Hussein (AS). In 75 AH, when Hajjaj ibn Yusuf came to power, he fled from Iraq because Hajjaj sent for him first due to his friendship and clear history with the Household of the Holy Prophet (PBUH). Sulaym, in this forced exile at the age of 77, came to Iran and reached a city named Nowbandjan near Shiraz in Fars province, where he passed away and was buried.” (Page 157)

The book “Mahdi-Negaran: The Evolution and History of Hadith Compilation and the Authorship of Mahdavi Books” was written by Esmaeil Shafiei Sarvestani, and Mow’ud Asr Publications published this book in one hundred copies and 172 pages.