Does Imam Hasan’s Treaty with Mu‘awiya Refute Zaydi Standards?

Question

As a Twelver Shi’i, one objection I have to the Zaydi school is that it is considered a condition for the Imam to take up arms and rise up against oppressors. That being said, it is known that Hasan b. Ali agreed to form a peace treaty with Mu’awiya b. Abu Sufyan who was an oppressor. Is this not a contradiction highlighting that Hasan b. Ali did not actually fit the criteria of an imam by Zaydi standards?

Answer

It is not a condition for the Imam to take up arms per-se, the condition is that the Imam should have the ablility to do so when necessary as a means of establishing justice. In this instance, it was a condition of the peace treaty that Mu’awiya would entrust authority to Imam Hasan after his death. In other words, Imam Hasan would have attempted to establish justice without the need for bloodshed. This can be found in works from all schools of thought. Ibn Babawayh from the Twelver school records and comments on this, as does Ibn Kathir (d. 701 AH) with a chain of transmission within Al-Bidaya wa’l-Nihaya:

Ibn Abu Khaithama — Harun ibn Ma’ruf— Dhamra — Ibn Shawthab said: “When Ali was killed, Al-Hasan marched with the people of Iraq, and Mu’awiya marched with the people of Levant (Al-Sham) and they met. Al-Hasan disliked the idea of fighting, so he pledged allegiance to Mu’awiya so that Al-Hasan would be the heir after him (as a condition for his pledge).”

“وقال ابن أبي خيثمة: ثنا هارون بن معروف، ثنا ضمرة، عن ابن شوذب قال: لما قتل علي سار الحسن في أهل العراق، وسار معاوية في أهل الشام، فالتقوا فكره الحسن القتال، وبايع معاوية على أن جعل العهد للحسن من بعده”

Sources

Ilal al-Sharayi’ by Ibn Babawayh (d. 381 AH), p. 81.

Al-Bidaya wa’l-Nihaya by Ibn Kathir (d. 701 AH), vol. 8, p. 45.