Imam Reza (AS), the Eighth Infallible Heir to the Holy Prophet Muhammad (SAWA)

Compiled by: Syed Ali Shahbaz
On 11th of the Islamic month of Zil-Qa'dah in 148 AH, Imam Reza (AS), the 8th Infallible Heir to Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) was born in the city of Medina, two weeks after the martyrdom of his grandfather, Imam Ja'far Sadeq (AS). His father was Imam Musa Kazem (AS) while his mother was the pious lady of Berber ethnicity from North Africa, named Najmah.
He was 35 years old when the divinely-decreed mantle of Imamate came to rest on his shoulders following the martyrdom in Baghdad of his infallible father in the year 183 AH. For the next 17 years he ably guided the ummah from his ideological and academic base in Medina, and as a result, his popularity spread throughout the Muslim World and beyond.
This alarmed Mamoun, the 7th self-styled caliph of the usurper Abbasid regime, who forced the Imam to leave Medina and come to distant Khorasan where the city of Merv was his capital.
Here the crafty caliph forced the Prophet's Heir to agree to become his Heir Apparent although the middle-aged Imam was over twenty years his senior. The plan was to confine the Imam to the court and thereby drive a wedge between him and the ummah.
However, to the bewilderment of the caliph, when the Imam's popularity increased, he had him martyred treacherously through a fatal dose of poison in 203 AH at the age of 55. Imam Reza (AS) was laid to rest in the suburbs of the city of Tous, which soon grew into Mashhad-ar-Reza or the Martyrdom Place of Imam Reza (AS), and is a world famous centre of pilgrimage today.