The doctrine of the occultation, which is the theology that heavily influences the Iranian Revolution, is central to Twelver Shiʿite theology because it provided a rationale for the continued guidance of God when his divinely-appointed Imam was no longer publicly accessible. Twelvers believe that the twelfth Imam was concealed by God and did not die but remains alive until he returns as the promised Mahdi.

This concept, however, developed first into a theological crisis of epic proportions in the year 874 CE. That year marked the point at which the Imam whose presence alone made continuous divine guidance possible could no longer be found in public. Imam Hasan al-ʿAskari, the eleventh Imam of Imami Shiʿism, passed away without publicly producing a son to succeed him. The question this raised went far beyond deciding who should lead the community next. If God had guaranteed that there would always be a divinely appointed Imam to lead the community, what did it mean when there simply was not? As Said Amir Arjomand shows, occultation was invented in the middle of precisely this crisis surrounding the Imamate and succession. It then underwent numerous theological developments that would permanently transform Twelver Shiʿism.

Developed out of that crisis was the claim that Imam Hasan al-ʿAskari had secretly fathered a son. This son, it was claimed, was living in occultation: concealed from public view but still very much alive and properly serving as Imam. What is fascinating about this claim is not merely that it managed to endure. It is how the claim eventually developed. Slowly, occultation helped transform the Imamate from a principle of legitimate succession revolving around ʿAli’s descendants. It became fully integrated into Shiʿi ideas about how humanity receives divine salvation. The once tentative solution to a crisis of leadership became a comprehensive explanation for how the law, religious authority, and community life could survive in the Imam’s physical absence.

What makes occultation historically significant is how theologians transformed a succession crisis into a durable theological system. Shiʿism did not get around the crisis by declaring the Imam physically unnecessary. Rather, it got around the crisis by building a theological framework in which the Imam could be absolutely necessary without being ordinarily accessible. Shiʿi theologians therefore had to explain how the Imam could remain necessary even when believers could no longer reach him.

The Crisis That Forced Theology to Develop

It would be a mistake to read back the final form of the occultation doctrine into the ninth century. When developed in later centuries, Twelver theology understands the occultation as follows: there was (and is) a twelfth Imam. He went into occultation, communicated with the community through agents for a time, then stopped communicating through agents, and will one day return as qaʾim or the Mahdi. But this full theology was not yet in place at the time of Hasan al-ʿAskari’s death. Rather, Arjomand reconstructs a lengthy process in which ideas that were originally intended as chiliastic responses were integrated into systematic theology and law. (Chiliastic means related to the belief in a coming thousand-year period of divine rule or earthly peace, often associated with the Messiah’s reign.)

The reason that succession could produce such a theological development was because of the Imam’s role in earlier Imami thought. Summarizing his argument at one point, Arjomand describes the Imams as charismatic figures, authoritative teachers, and figures at the center of a “religious economy” structured by divine guidance. During the centuries before the occultation doctrine developed, their role had made each of their deaths a........

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