Competing Orthodoxy in the Islamic World: Sunnis Versus Shi’as

Religious conflicts in the Middle East are not only confined to Christianity and Islam. The political landscape in the region is complicated by the fact that religious conflicts occur within Muslims themselves. The sectarian conflicts between the two major Islamic sects, namely, Sunni and Shi’a Islam, have continued throughout a thousand years after the death of Prophet Muhammad. Ironically, both sects follow Prophet Muhammad’s teachings and share many similarities on Islamic belief. Moreover, both claim itself as orthodox Islam. This chapter begins by investigating why a religious group seeks and claims orthodoxy. It follows by tracing out five major methods of a religious group seeking orthodoxy. They are bloodline, dreams, and revelations, branding other religious doctrines as heresies, monopolizing the authority in interpretation of the sacred scripts and building theocracy. Our exploratory argument is applied to the struggles between Sunni and Shi’a Islam in the Middle East.