Principles of Faith (Usul al-Din)

Introduction

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful

All praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds. Blessings of Allah be upon our master Muhammad and his Purified Progeny, especially the remaining one from Allah in the earths.

This book is about the Branches of Religion. However, I have placed this foreword with the aim of introducing the Roots of Religion. For instance, when referring to degrees of light, sunlight and candlelight are two different degrees of the reality of light. Likewise, there are different stages of understanding the Roots of Religion.

This introduction is a little sparkle for the travellers of this path. Its purpose is to provide a general understanding rather than a detailed and profound understanding of a research stage.

We have tried to ensure that in this book the preliminaries for the logical proofs are easy to comprehend. For the textual proofs, we have transmitted from traditional books of both Shi’ahs and Sunnis, as well as popular history books.

Our traditions which we have transmitted from these sources are reliable, both in terms of the reporters and what has been reported.

Because the Book and the Sunnah awaken (human) nature and contain the most acceptable laws of wisdom, the use of the light of the verses from the Qur’an and the noble ahadith (traditions) is the basis of the Clear Religion.

Since the general public will use this book, we have not addressed some technical issues. Due to précis, in this small effort, it has not been possible for us to satisfy the topic as it deserved, in terms of study and research. However, the easy cannot be abolished for the difficult. And what cannot be obtained in its entirety should not be left out in its entirety.

Before we begin explaining the Roots of Religion we must mention some preliminaries: