A Reflection on the Preference of Opposing the Sunnis in Light of Delimitation of the Scope of Sunnis

The present paper seeks to determine the scope of Sunnis and explain its position and role in the accurate understanding of the preference of opposing Sunnis and has pursued this important work through clarifying the intensional, conceptual and extentional scopes of Sunnis and limiting the thematic domain of agreement and opposition. The discussion is concentrated on the point that the indiscipline found in Imamia sources in opposing Sunnis as a preferrer in the area of contradiction of traditions without taking into account the historical conditions surrounding the age of the issuance of traditions, has led to a sort of confusion and mistake and even extreme and untrue application of this preference in the field of Islamic jurisprudence. Due to the existence of this problem, the authors have tried to provide useful conclusions including the established amount of applying this preferrer and probable solutions to apply it on a regulated basis through criticizing and analyzing the current opinions concerning the denotation of Sunnis.