Soufrit

Sufriti Ziyadites ( Arabicصفرية زيادية ) - one of the "moderate" Kharijite movements, followers of Ziyad ibn al-Asfar. Sufrites did not consider the territories subject to their opponents Dar al-harb (territory of the war), they considered it a duty to speak out against the “wicked” authorities, but they forbade women and children to be taken prisoner. In the VIII-IX centuries in North Africa there was a Sufritic state of Midrarids ^[1] .

As for the origin of the name "soufrit" there are several opinions:

• Some said that the name of Sufrit comes from pallor ( Sufra ) on their faces due to zealous worship and asceticism.
• Others said that the name comes from the name of Sufrit leader Ziyad ibn al-Asfar ( Arabic: زياد بن الأصفر ). But there is also disagreement in this: some called Abdullah ibn Saffar, al-Numan ibn Sufr, or al-Muhallab ibn Abu Sufr, the leader of the Sufrit ^[2] .

They parted with the Azraquites , Nadjadim and Ibadites in some matters. So, they did not consider an unbeliever one who agrees with them in the faith, but shies away from jihad ; they did not abolish the punishment for adultery ( zina ) in the form of stoning and did not recognize the children of polytheists as unbelievers and did not kill them. The Sufrites said: “A person who commits such actions for which there is an article of punishment does not violate the name [action] for which he is punished, like adultery, theft, slander, as a result of which he is called an adulterer, thief, slanderer, and not an unbeliever, polytheist. But because of those grave sins, regarding which - due to their great importance - there is no article of punishment, for example neglect of prayer, flight from the advancing army, he becomes an unbeliever. "

Ziyad ibn al-Asfar said: "We are believers before us, but we don’t know, maybe before Allah we have departed from the faith." Also: “Polytheism is twofold: polytheism as obedience to the shaitan and polytheism as idolatry . Unbelief [also] is twofold: unbelief as a denial of divine mercy and unbelief as a denial of divine authority. And renunciation is twofold: renunciation of violators of the law is Sunnah , and renunciation of unbelievers is the injunction of the [Quran]. ”

One of the leaders of the Sufrites, ad-Dahhak al-Hariji (killed in Kufa by his followers after a dispute with Abu Jafar al-Ahwal), allowed Muslim women to marry unbelievers in a country of “prudent concealment of faith” ( takiya ), but not in a country where you can openly profess Islam ^[3] .