Mehdi Rahimi

The Unknown Imams: The Life and Thought of Their Eminences, the Imams Musa Ibn Ja'far Al-Kadhim, Muhammad Ibn Ali Al-Jawad, Ali Ibn Muhammad Al-Hadi, and Hasan Ibn Ali Al-Askari Mehdi Rahimi

The Unknown Imams provides for the first time in English an accessible historical record of the life and thought of the Four Unknown Imams. It is a sad reality that no historical record of their lives and thoughts has been readily accessible to the wider Muslim community or to the English-speaking world at large to date. These incredible personalities were peerless exemplars of the Prophetic Sunna, which is why their words and actions still ring true today.




The Unknown Imams introduces the many dimensions of the noble characters of these luminous exemplars in a highly accessible and engaging narrative form that is suitable for all ages and ranges of understanding. Once one reads the accounts of the lives of these Imams, each chapter of which is like experiencing the uncovering of a priceless treasure trove. What rings true is that they were indeed divinely inspired and guided personalities, whose words and deeds are exemplary assets that will serve the community until the Resurrection.




The reader of these informative chapters in the lives of the hitherto unknown Imams will come away with a sense of intimacy with these illustrious personalities, and with a sense of how each of them interacted with their followers, their detractors, and the ruling authorities of their times, and is sure to feel a genuine sense of deep affection and love for them. At the same time, their histories will necessarily also impart a sense of grief, sorrow and outrage for the cruel and unjust ways they were all treated by the reigning Abbasid caliphs of their respective times.