ABSTRACT
How long did the Khārijites continue to call their imams khalīfa and amīr al-muʾminīn? According to E. A. Salem, they abandoned both titles at some point, apparently after they had begun to establish local dynasties: ‘The title of “Commander of the Believers” is of early usage, at a time when the Khawārij were vigorously undertaking the conversion of the Muslim empire into a model Khāriji state. Since then the title of “Imam” has been more consistently adhered to, while “khalifa” was completely forsaken.’ 1 On the basis of Salem, Crone and Hinds conjectured that the Khārijites rejected the caliphal title because it was generally taken to stand for khalīfat allāh, ‘deputy of God’, which did not seem an appropriate title for a Khārijite ruler. 2 But in fact neither Salem’s claim nor Crone and Hinds’ conjecture is correct. With the exception of the Ibāḍīs of Arabia, all the Khārijites who established local dynasties are on record as having applied the title of khalīfa and/or amīr al-muʾminīn to their imams; and though the Arabian Ibāḍīs did deem it wrong for a local imam to style himself amīr al-muʾminīn (and thus, presumably, also khalīfa), this was not because they disapproved of the title ‘deputy of God’. In what follows I shall substantiate these points in reverse order.
