The Reasons behind the Disagreements among the Today's Shiites over the Recognition of the Referent of Imam

Surveying the history of Shia in the very time of Ahl-al-Bayit(The family of the prophet) ,shows that, when every one of them was martyred, some of the people in the Shiite society were left with perplexity in recognizing the referent of the Imam, leading to the emergence of varied tendencies in this regard. Some have said these perplexities and disconformities represent the forgery of the texts indicative of the names of Imams. However, to reject this reasoning, one can say there is another hypothesis, claiming these texts had already existed but were concealed due to dissimulation (Taqieh). And this has established the ground for the other parameters to affect the emergence of these disagreements. These parameters include the role of the elites; the teachings of Mahdiism and its related challenges; the kind of the Shiite community’s attitude towards the available criteria for recognizing the referent of Imam; and finally, the existing distance between some Shiites and the leadership center of Shiite community.