The inheritance of uncles and the inheritance of daughters is an issue on one side of which were the Abbasids and on the other side stood the Alawites. In the jahiliyyah age (the pre-Islamic period in Arabia) only the Male offspring had the right to inherit from their ancestors. With the coming of Islam, however, this prejudiced practice was abolished.
In their struggle against the Umayyads and their coming in to power, the Abbasids extensively used rallying cries belonging to Alawites and their followers. In the beginning, they even attributed the legitimacy of their rule to Ali ibn Abi Talib, through Abu Hashim's will. Soon, the rise of differences between the Abbasids and Alawites Caused the former to distance themselves from the latler and claim that the khiafah was the heritage of Abbas , the uncle of the Prophet. Based on the jahili practice that girls do not inherit from their ancestors , they claimed Abbas, the only son of Abd-ul- Muttalib (the Prophet's grandfather) who was still alive at the time of Muhammad's Passing, to be the true heir to the Prophet.
ln contrast, by citing Passages of the Qur¨an and resorting to rational explanations, the Alawites tried to reject the Abbasid pretense. And hence, the controversy over the inheritance of uncles and the inheritance of daughters was aroused in the political and intellectual circles around the Muslim Khilafah.
In this concise article, we have tried to discuss the genesis of the concept of the inheritance of uncles, its roots, and the Alawite reaction, in particular that of the Ahl-al-Bayt (the Prophet's Household), to it
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