Shah Abdol-Azim Shrine

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox religious building

The Shāh Abdol-Azīm Shrine (Template:Langx; Template:Langx)Template:Efn is a Twelver Twelver Shi'ite funerary monument and religious complex, located in Rey, in the province of Tehran, Iran. The complex contains the tomb of ‘Abdul ‘Adhīm ibn ‘Abdillāh al-Hasanī<ref name="kamil">Template:Cite book</ref> (aka Shah Abdol Azim). Shah Abdol Azim was a fifth generation descendant of Hasan ibn ‘Alī<ref name="kamil"/> and a companion of Muhammad al-Taqī.<ref name="kamil"/> He was entombed here after his death in the 9th century CE.

Adjacent to the shrine, within the complex, include the mausolea of Imamzadeh Tahir (son of the fourth Shia Imam Sajjad) and Imamzadeh Hamzeh (brother of the eighth Twelver Imām - Imām Reza).

The complex was added to the Iran National Heritage List in 1942, administered by the Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization of Iran. The complex is one of the holiest sites in Twelver Shi'ism.

BackgroundEdit

Abdol Azim migrated to Ray out of persecution<ref name="kamil"/> and subsequently died there. A piece of paper was found in his pocket outlining his ancestry as being: ‘Abdul ‘Adhīm son of ‘Abdillāh son of ‘Alī son of Hasan son of Zayd son of Hasan ibn ‘Alī.<ref name="kamil"/> Shah Abdol Azim was sent to Ray (modern-day Tehran) by Imam Reza.

History and designEdit

Ibn Qūlawayh al-Qummī (d. 978 CE) "includes the shrine in his Kāmil al-Ziyārāt, one of the earliest pilgrimage guides for the Shiʿa, which suggests that the tomb of ʿAbd al-Aẓīm was already of some importance by the tenth century."<ref>Ibn Qūlawayh al-Qummī, Kāmil al-Ziyārāt (Beirut, 1418/1997), pp. 536–537</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The tomb of Abdol-Azim had also come under the patronage of Sunni rulers at times, a notable example being the mausoleum constructed over Abdol-Azim's tomb in the 1090s CE by orders of the Seljuk vizier Majd al-Mulk Asʿad b. Muḥammad b. Mūsā.<ref>ʿAbd al-Jalīl b. Abū al-Ḥasan al-Qazwīnī (fl. 1189), Kitāb al-Naqḍ (Tehran, 1371/1952), p. 220</ref><ref>W. Barthold, An Historical Geography of Iran (Princeton, 1984), p. 127</ref><ref>Sheila Blair, The Monumental Inscriptions from Early Islamic Iran and Tran-soxania (Leiden, 1992), p. 185</ref><ref>Leisten, Architektur für Tote, pp. 240–241.</ref>

This door has an inscription in Thulth script.

Notable burialsEdit

{{#invoke:Labelled list hatnote|labelledList|Main article|Main articles|Main page|Main pages}} In addition to Abdol-Azim al-Hassani, the shrine is the burial site for many notable individuals, including members of the Qajar family, and many notable political figures, scholars, and clerics, from the Medieval period to contemporary times.