Imagining the End: Visions of

da'i

) was in charge

of  an ‘Island’ (

jazira

) where he established a communistically-organized

‘abode of  migration’ (

dar al-hijra

), so designated after the model built by the

Prophet after his migration to Medina, and raised contributions on behalf  of

the expected Mahdi-Qa'im. The missionaries were directed by the Proof

(

hujja

) of  the Hidden Imam who moved to Salamia in Syria and established

the headquarters of  the clandestine revolutionary movement. Around the

year 



, the Islma'ilis first took up arms in the Yemen.

110

 According to

Halm’s careful reconstruction of  this obscure, early phase of  the movement,

in the late 



s, the Proof  in Salamiya decided to split the mythical Seventh

Imam–Mahdi–Qa'im to its component parts, claiming the Imamate for himself

and designating his nephew (he had no son) the Mahdi, and the latter’s

young son, the Qa'im. The nephew, Sa'id b. al-Husayn, renamed himself

'Abd Allah al-Mahdi and his infant son, Muhammad al-Qa'im. Not only did

the latter become Muhammad b. 'Abd Allah, like the Prophet, but he was also

given the latter’s 

kunya

, Abu'l-Qasim. This decision caused a split in the

Isma'ili movement.

Those who accepted the New Mahdi availed themselves of  secondary

apocalyptic titles. The chief  of  the mission in the Yemen, Ibn Hawshab, as

we have seen, assumed the title of  ‘the Mansur of  the Yemen’. The two sons

of  the missionary Zakaroye, who established an ephemeral state for the Mahdi

in Syria in 



, also put forward apocalyptic claims of  their own. The older

one appeared with the name Yahya b. Zakaroye, or rather named himself

Yahya b. Zecharaia (presumably John the Baptist) whom the Qur'an mentions

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122

Judaism, Christianity and Islam

as one of  the prophets and blesses ‘on the day he is born and the day he dies

and the day he is raised alive’ (Q. 



:

 

). He claimed to be a descendant of

Muhammad b. Isma'il, and maintained that his crippled arm was a miraculous

sign. He was named the Shaykh by his followers who called themselves the

Fatimids (after the daughter of  the Prophet, Fatima, from whom the Imams,

including Muhammad b. Isma'il, descended), and was also known as the Man

of  the She-Camel (

sahib al-naqa

), as he claimed the camel mare he rode on

the battlefield was divinely guided, evoking the She-Camel of  God (

naqat

Allah

) (Q. 



:

 

), whose killing by the nation of  the prophet Salih brought

about their destruction. When the Shaykh fell in battle, his brother, al-Husayn,

saw to the disappearance of  his body, and took over the leadership of  the

Fatimids. He claimed his birthmark was his sign, and accordingly became

known as the Man of  the Birthmark (

sahib al-shama

), and his aide and cousin

assumed the obscurely apocalyptic Qur'anic title of  al-Muddathir (‘the one

who covers himself ’).

111

 In the autumn of  



, while the Mahdi remained in

hiding in Palestine, the Man of  the Birthmark had the Friday sermon read

in the name of  ‘the Lord of  the Age (

sahib al-zaman

), the Commander of  the

Faithful, the Mahdi’.

112

 The uprising for the Mahdi was suppressed by the

forces of  the caliph, and the Mahdi himself  fled from Palestine to Egypt, and

thence to Sijilmasa in North Africa. He was robbed by bandits who took his

books of  astrological oracles and secret writings. The books on political

astrology, which were later recovered in Egypt by his son al-Qa'im, can safely

be assumed to have contained the prediction of  the passing of  world domina-

tion from the Arabs at the Conjunction of  Saturn and Jupiter in the year 



(



–



).

113

 As was pointed out, in the year 



, the missionary who had been

active on the Mahdi’s behalf  in North Africa in fact established the Fatimid

state for 'Abd Allah al-Mahdi who was in due course succeeded by his son,

Muhammad al-Qa'im.

114

 The messianic manifestation of  the Qa'im-Mahdi

was realized triumphally as the succcesive reigns of  the Fatimid Mahdi and

the Fatimid Qa'im. The Fatimids conquered Egypt in 



, and their empire,

extended to Egypt and Syria, lasted two more centuries until it was over-

thrown by Saladin (Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi) in 



. Against the backdrop of

this imperial ‘realized Mahdism’, the Fatimid Caliph al-Mu'izz declared that

his name and those of  other Fatimid Imams had been inscribed at the base

of  the divine throne and read by Adam.

115

The Isma'ilis who refused to accept the authority of  the new Mahdi and

remained faithful to the apocalyptic belief  in the imminent return of  Muham-

mad b. Isma'il as the Mahdi-Qa'im after the schism, became known as the

Qarmatis (Qarmatians) after their putative original leader, Hamdan Qarmat.

The Qarmatians predominated in the ‘islands’ of  Iraq and Bahrain (al-

Bahrayn), and they succeeded in establishing a state in the latter region shortly

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123

Messianism, Millennialism and Revolution

after the schism. At the beginning of  the tenth century, the Qarmatians

proclaimed the sovereignty of  the Qa'im-Mahdi in their communally organized

state which was remarkably egalitarian and, in theory, collectively governed.

The tenth-century geographers Muqaddasi and Ibn Hawqal report respectively

that in the Qarmatian state there was a ‘treasury (