Ismaili

A branch of the Ismaili known as the Saaabiyin or Seveners held that Ismail's son, Muhammad, was the seventh and final Imam (a belief inaccurately but commonly ascribed to Ismailis as a whole). There is still a small Sevener Ismaili community in parts of Saudi Arabia to this date.

The "Hashishin" issue

The Ismaili sect (specifically, the Nizari sub-sect) also gave rise to the Hashishin (the original "Assassins"; the sect whose nickname gave rise to the word) under the leadership of Hasan Ibn Al Sabbah. The Ismaili Assassins were allegedly created to revive the Shi'a Ismaili caliphate in Egypt, which had been destroyed by the Sunni Seljuks. Their primary tactic was to kill the Sunni leaders in as public a place as possible - usually at Friday prayers. Prior to doing so it was rumored that they smoked hashish in order to be able to go through with their assassinations. Recent research indicates that this is most probably just a legend however.

Related Topics:
Nizari - Hashishin

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The Ismailis had previously attempted conventional military conquest and converting regional leaders, only to be crushed by the great powers that surrounded them. They then adopted the policy of assassinating those dedicated to exterminating Ismailis as a defensive measure. Assassinations also served a secondary, psychological purpose in that the assassins would not run away after killing their target. Instead, they would stand stoically awaiting their fate and praying, making no attempt to escape in a bid to make their actions appear less underhanded and to impress observers with their piety and strength (and thereby gain supporters if not converts). Their ability to do so without showing any outward signs of fear is another possible source of the hashish legend, as it was assumed that it was the influence of the drug that helped them remain so calm.

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Assassins were selected by the Imam, and the criteria he looked for were those that could conduct a successful assassination; devoted to the cause, clever, strong, skilled and able to act and think quickly. It is unlikely that the assasins could have successfully gained access to and killed as many prominent figures as they did if they were regular hashish users.

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The word assassin has its origins in this legend. The Oxford English Dictionary --an institution known for its etymological thoroughness-- traces the word assassin to the Arabic hashshash or hashishiyy, meaning "hashish-eater", but this may be a bastardization rooted in the legend of the hashish and the similarity between the word hashishiyun (the plural of hashishiyy) and an earlier phrase used within the Ismaili groups - assasayun (those who form the base), a term sometimes used by early Ismailis to describe themselves.

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