Ibadi Islam

Ibadi Islam is a living tradition within Islam. Also written Ibadiyya, Ibadism.

Origin

Founders named in the sources: Jabir b. Zayd (first Basran imam), 'Abdallah b. Ibad (eponym). No founding year is given below, because the sources read do not agree on one and a date has not been chosen for them. J. C. Wilkinson (Oxford University Press) locates the movement's origin with Jabir b. Zayd in Basra 'at the beginning of the second/eighth century', operating under a series of imams in secrecy; his successor was Abu 'Ubayda Muslim b. Abi Karima and the third Basran imam al-Rabi' b. Habib. Full imamates were established first in North Africa under the Rustamids of Tahert and, a couple of decades later, in Oman, where Ibadism 'manifested itself periodically as a full Imamate down to the second half of the twentieth century'. The name derives from 'Abdallah b. Ibad. No founding year is given by the sources reached.