CHAPTER 9 THE ZAYDIS OF YEMEN
INTRODUCTION
In the rugged mountains of northern Yemen live some four hundred Zaydi tribes with a total of some five million members. For over one thousand years they have been the dominant community in the Yemen, often fighting against the Sunni Shafi'i tribes and the smaller Isma'ili and Twelver Shi'a communities. Their Imams were the heads of the Yemeni state until 1962.
The Zaydis are a Shi'a movement which split off the main group in the 9th century after the death of the fourth Shi'a Imam, 'Ali Zain al-'Abidin. The Zaydis recognised his younger son Zayd as Imam rather than his older brother Muhammad al-Baqir who was acknowledged by the majority. They accepted Zayd as their fifth Imam (which is why they are also called fivers), and the Zaydi Imamate survived from that time well into the twentieth century.
Zaydis are the most moderate of the Shi'a groups and the nearest to the Sunnis in their theology. They say that they are a "fifth school" of Islam (in addition to the four Sunni orthodox schools). Their religious moderation was however coupled with political extremism as they believed it their duty to rebel against any illegitimate ruler.
The Zaydis do not elevate 'Ali and his descendants to semi-divine status as do the Isma'ilis and the Twelver Shi'a. They simply preferred his rule and that of his descendants through Fatimah to any other.
Zaydis established themselves in Yemen at the end of the 9th century and it is their only remaining centre today. Another Zaydi state existed for a while south of the Caspian Sea from 864 to 1126.
ZAYDI DOCTRINE
The question of the succession to Muhammad, the Caliphate or Imamate, lies at the heart of the Zaydi separation from the Sunnis. The Yemeni tribes were first converted to Islam by 'Ali ibn abi-Talib himself and they naturally supported his claims to the Caliphate. Later they were happy to accept the Zaydi Imams of 'Ali's line and their teaching.
The Zaydis teach that Muhammad had secretly designated 'Ali as his successor, a fact hidden from many in the early community. This ignorance excused the community from the guilt of infidelity when they appointed Abu-Bakr and 'Umar as Caliphs before 'Ali. As 'Ali, the most excellent candidate for the Caliphate (Imamate), had not claimed his rights by force of arms, the Caliphates of Abu-Bakr and 'Umar could be accepted as legitimate, though not the best. ('Uthman's claims to the Caliphate are however generally rejected).
Any suitable descendent of 'Ali through Fatimah, Muhammad's daughter, can be elected as Imam. He is not considered to be sinless and infallible, and he has to demonstrate his ability to rule by being an Islamic scholar and by actively claiming political power from the illegitimate rulers. Success in battle and the death of rival claimants is seen as a sign of God's election. Special emphasis is placed on the candidate's piety, moral integrity and courage. The Imam can lose his status by breaking any of the qualifying conditions. Rival claims to the Imamate have often divided the Zaydi community and there were long periods without a legitimate Zaydi Imam.
The long list of accepted Imams has never been fully agreed on by all Zaydi groups. Many Zaydi rulers did not claim the Imamate because they did not fulfill all the requirements, especially that of religious learning, They were seen as Da'is who represented the real Imam.
Zaydis believe it is their duty to revolt against unjust Imams and to establish right and justice by force. A new Imam's claims become legally binding on the community by two actions that also constitute his bid for the support of the tribes: the issue of a call to allegiance (da'wah), followed by an uprising against the illegitimate ruler.
Many Zaydi Imams have been scholars who have written most of the sect's religious writings.
Zaydis reject Sufism and it was outlawed in Yemen. They believe that the Qur'an was created. They do not believe in a hidden Imam who will return at the end of the age (their Imams were always visible). They also oppose the doctrine of Taqiya (dissimulation), accepted by all other Shi'a groups.
The Zaydi Imam was regularly elected from 'Alid families until 1891 when the Imam Muhammad ibn-Yahya Hamid ad-Din started a hereditary dynasty which survived until 1962.
HISTORY
Zayd ibn-'Ali, the brother of the fifth Twelver Shi'a Imam Muhammad al-Baqir, was the founder of the movement. He led a Shi'a rebellion against the Umayyads but was defeated and killed in 740. His son Yahya suffered a similar fate in 743.
The Zaydi movement was first based in Kufa, near to the 'Abbassid capital of Baghdad. The Zaydis joined the various Shi'a rebellions led by descendants of 'Ali which were all suppressed by the authorities. In the second half of the ninth century some Zaydis founded two states in remote mountainous regions which offered a refuge from the power of the central authorities.
The first was established by a descendant of 'Ali, Hassan ibn Zayd, in 864 in the inaccessible mountains of Tabaristan (Mazandaran of today) on the southern coast of the Caspian sea. This state collapsed in 900 but was revived in 914 by the Zaydi Imam al-Nasir al-Utrush who succeeded in converting many of the Zoroastrian inhabitants of the regions of Daylam and Gilan (west of Tabaristan) to the Zaydi faith. The Zaydi Caspian communities survived until the sixteenth century, when they were forcibly converted to Twelver Shi'ism by the Safavid Persian Shah Tahmasp.
The other Zaydi state was founded in 897 by the Imam al-Hadi in Sa'dah in the mountains of northern Yemen. The Zaydi Imams brought about the real Islamisation of the northern tribes, who had previously professed a mere nominal allegiance to Islam. Even today some Yemeni tribes are fairly ignorant of Islamic law and retain heathen practices and pre-Islamic tribal laws that often conflict with the Shari'a.
In the mid-12th century a Zaydi Imam managed to extend his rule into north Arabia and southward to the Yemeni lowlands, but most of the time their control was limited to the highlands of North Yemen. During their long rule the Imams used the military force of the warlike Zaydi mountain tribes in their many wars of defence and expansion. The Zaydis fought for centuries against other local dynasties loyal to the 'Abassids, Fatimids, Ayyubis and Mamelukes, surviving them all. Secure in their mountain fortresses they have ferociously defended their independence and fought off the foreign powers (Egypt, Ottomans) who controlled lower Yemen and tried to extend their rule to the North.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries two Zaydi sects arose in Yemen, the Mu'tarrifiya and the Husayniya. This engendered strife amongst the various Zaydi factions until both sects disappeared in the fourteenth century. Relations with the Caspian Zaydis were sporadic, but most of the Caspian Zaydi literature had reached Yemen by the twelfth century.
There was also conflict between the Zaydis and the Isma'ilis who had settled in the Yemen at almost the same time. The Isma'ili power however dwindled after the fall of the Fatimids and only a few Isma'ili pockets remain in the Yemen today.
In 1536 the Ottomans invaded the country. Qasim the Great (Imam from 1597 to 1620) fought them, and under his son Muhammad the Zaydis expelled the Ottomans from Yemen (1635) and invaded south Yemen and the Hadramaut creating their greatest territorial expansion which however only lasted for a brief time. During the 17th century the Zaydi capital was removed from the northern city of Sa'da to the more centrally located San'a.
The Zaydi Imams ruled the Yemen as a medieval Islamic state under the Shari'a (Islamic religious law), doing their best to isolate it from all foreign influences.
The Ottomans invaded Yemen again in the middle of the nineteenth century, but their occupation of the north (starting in 1870) was never complete. In the Zaydi areas the Imams retained some political and spiritual autonomy. Imam Muhammad (1891-1904) of the Hamid ad-Din family renewed the fight against the Ottomans. He also changed the one thousand year old elective Imamate into a hereditary dynasty.
His son, Imam Yahya (1904-48) continued the war against the Ottomans. The modern state of Yemen acquired its independence under him in 1918, with the departure of Ottoman forces at the end of WWI when the Imam was able to impose his rule over the entire country. He succeeded in uniting and pacifying the quarrelsome mountain tribes by a mixed policy of punishing dissident tribes, clever political marriages and hostage taking.
Imam Yahya continued the insular policies of his father. During the latter part of his reign the economy stagnated, emigration grew, and merchants and intellectuals were alienated from the regime. Growing opposition to his rule led to the formation of the Free Yemenis, a nationalist movement in exile. In 1948 the Free Yemenis killed Imam Yahya, but their uprising was defeated by his son Ahmad (1948-62), who also crushed another uprising in 1955.
The independent Yemeni state came into territorial conflict with the growing power of Saudi Arabia. This led to war in 1934 in which the victorious Saudis dictated the treaty of Ta'if (1934) which forced the Imams to accept Saudi control over three provinces claimed by San'a - Asir, Najran and Jizan. This has remained a thorny issue in the relations between the two countries ever since.
During the 1950s and 60s, Britain initiated a policy of merging the Sultanates and Emirates of the Aden Protectorate into a single federation. This resulted in friction between the Imam and Britain over border demarcation. Looking for allies, the Imam turned to Egypt, and in 1958 North Yemen joined Egypt and Syria in forming the Union of Arab States (UAR).
Many Yemenis grew increasingly frustrated by the contrast between the stagnating poverty of their country and the political and economic development in other Arab states. On the death of Imam Ahmad in 1962 a group of nationalist officers seized power in San'a and proclaimed the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR). The royalists rallied around Imam al-Badr, Ahmad's son who had escaped from San'a, and civil war broke out between the Republican government backed by Egypt and the Royalist tribes backed by Saudi Arabia. The Egyptian forces finally left after their defeat by Israel in the six day war of 1967.
There followed much intermittent fighting between various factions, several heads of state being assassinated. In 1979 Ali Saleh became head of state and he succeeded in reconciling the diverse groups and in bringing some stability to the country. Despite its republican form, Yemen remains a Zaydi stronghold where the mountain tribes still rule themselves under the umbrella of the central government.
In 1990 North and South Yemen were united in a Republic of Yemen creating a large geographical entity with 12m inhabitants of which 53% are Sunni and 46% Zaydi. There are also small Isma'ili and Twelver Shi'a communities.
SOCIETY
Zaydi tribal society is still very conservative, with many pre-Islamic and Islamic traditions determining customs and behaviour. Houses in the fortified mountain villages are generally multi-storey buildings, quite different to the one or two storied houses common in most other Arab lands. Most Zaydi tribesmen carry the traditional curved dagger (Jambia) and a gun around with them at all times. Feuding is still endemic to their society. The chewing of Qat (a locally grown drug), usually sitting on cushions in a guestroom (Mafrai) at the top of one of the multi-storeyed houses, is a very widespread social custom with a negative impact on society. Much good agricultural land is used for cultivating Qat as a cash crop rather than for basic food products.
Yemeni oral literature has many proverbs, parables, and poems. The written literature deals mainly with Islamic theology, history, biography and poetry. Tribal dances of pre-Islamic origin are performed by men and boys alone, dancing with their daggers in their hands.
Some 2 million N. Yemenis work abroad, mainly in Saudi-Arabia and in the Gulf states, and their remittances help the country survive. During the Gulf War almost a million of them were deported by Saudi-Arabia who was angered by the pro-Iraqi stand of the Yemeni authorities.
In spite of attempts at modernisation, the civil wars have sapped Yemen's wealth and impoverished the population. The country's social welfare system is extremely underdeveloped, and many Yemenis still suffer from poor health and malnutrition, the infant mortality rate being one of the highest in the Middle East. Many diseases are endemic. Adult illiteracy is still high. There is a great need for improvements in health, sanitation, education, agriculture, infrastructure, etc.
The discovery of oil deposits has raised hopes of an improved economic situation in the coming decades.
EVANGELISM
In spite of having had strong pre-Islamic Christian and Jewish communities, Yemen has been one of the most isolationist and fanatic anti-Christian countries for 1300 years. It still is one of the most closed countries in the world, fiercely opposed to Christianity in any form.
All Christians were expelled from the Arabian peninsula, including Yemen, during the rule of the Caliph Umar in the 7th century.
In modern times, the American Presbyterians were the first to start work in Yemen in 1941.
Following the revolution of 1962, the new government in 1964 invited Christian agencies to start health and educational projects. The Baptists opened a clinic in Ta'iz and a hospital in Jibla. Discreet witnessing was at first allowed, but later strictly forbidden. Christian workers with other aid agencies are also forbidden to share their faith or to hand out literature.
Limited medical work has been almost the only avenue of outreach in Zaydi Yemen. Some literature distribution was carried out by solitary hikers moving from village to village in the highlands. Christian radio broadcasts from FEBA-Seychelles are clearly received and many listen. A new door opening up is that of "tentmakers" - Christians employed in needed secular jobs in the Yemen who have a burden for personal friendships with Yemenis.
There is a handful of Yemeni believers. Their only fellowship was closed by the authorities in 1974 and since then they are lonely and isolated.
