Re: 'Ali's speech upon the death of Abu Bakr (ra)
@Das - You are sidestepping the argument. All I am saying now both you and Icon are ok with the concept of a divinely guided leader/Imam for Muslims.
I thought you just didn't believe in the concept of Imamat and please don't bring 12ers in this discussion. You can disagree with them, all you want on the need of 11 others.
The bottom line is that you do subscribe to the concept.
You blame 12ers for revisionist history, but I learned history from sunni books. In the other thread on sahabas you are yourself talking about creating new paradigms in Islam.
Jews live on the sympathy of Holocaust and there is a whole movement out there which is trying to revise the history as it has been recorded and show the true light of how Jews were not the ultimate victims of Holocaust, there were gypsies and other nationalities too. The number of 6 million is highly exaggerated, there were no gas chambers (which they prove wiht scientific evidence) and how Jews killed millions of germans post world war 2 and its been documented very effectively in the book eye for an eye which is very difficult to get hold of and jews have created books by same name to obscure it.
So my dear friend, if history is written by victors and is always distorted then there is no problem in revisiting and correcting it. If you accuse shias of revisionism then there are very solid arguments for that (not that I am accepting your argument of revisionism) and many of them you have listed yourself.
Bottom line once again - as much as you and our friends in Ahle-Sunnat deny it, there comes a time where all of you (mainstream) accept the need for divinely appointed Imam.
I will pray that rather than feeling like that you have lost an argument, you look it as an opener to your heart and mind and accept the divine system of guidance. Insha' Allah