What is the difference between Sunni and Shia Islam?
Islam’s principal division is between Sunnis and Shias. Their differences relate to the attitudes towards leadership of the Muslim community, not to disagreements over belief. The division arose in the very earliest days of Islam as we know it today, immediately on the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632. He had not named a successor, and the majority (Sunnis) believed that whoever was best able to protect the faith should be the leader (Caliph). They elected Abu Bakr, one of the Prophet’s closest companions, to the role, which was seen as political rather than spiritual. The minority (Shias) believed that the leadership should stay within Muhammad’s family and favoured Ali, the Prophet’s son-in-law. For Shias the leader had not only a political role but was held to be divinely inspired, an imam. The Sunni-Shia divide was exacerbated when first Ali and later also his son Husayn, the Prophet’s grandson, were murdered by other Muslims. Sufism, the mystical aspect of Islam, crosses the S
