Analysis and Critique of Succession of Prophet Muhammad in theWorks of Orientalists

Succession of Prophet Muhammad has drawn attention of orientalists due to its historical aspects and in terms of the results and consequences. Researchers such as Madelung have discussed this subject independently, while others like Halm, Schemail, Lalani and Watt have discussed it partially in their respective works. They didn’t follow the same aims, so they didn’t achieve the same results. Some researchers considered the Holy Quran, as their reference, however they could not comprehend its true meaning. Some of them made reference to the Hadiths (traditions) which were not valid in terms of reporters and the chain of narrators; also some researchers made reference to sources with one-sided judgments on this subject. Generally, the works of orientalists suffer from deficiencies. Some of them admitted the succession of Abu-Bakr, only few of them admitted the succession of Ali ibn Abi Talib with uncertainties, while none of them entirely accepted the fact that Ali ibn Abi Talib was the true successor of Prophet Muhammad, although they admitted the superiority of him over the other caliphs. The main reason of such attitudes is that the majority of orientalists favor Sunni opinions. Therefore, in the present paper apart from the analysis and critique of some orientalists’ opinion on this subject, this question will be discussed: What are the bases of orientalists’ approaches on the succession of Prophet Muhammad?