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Ayatollah vs Imam - What's the difference?

ayatollah | imam |

As nouns the difference between ayatollah and imam

is that ayatollah is a religious leader in Twelver Shi'ism while imam is a Shi'ite Muslim leader.

ayatollah

English

Alternative forms

* ayatolla

Noun

(wikipedia ayatollah) (en noun)
  • A religious leader in Twelver Shi'ism.

    • imam

    English

    Alternative forms

    * imaum

    Noun

    (wikipedia imam) (en noun)
  • A Shi'ite Muslim leader.
  • One who leads the salat prayers in a mosque.

    • Quotations

    * 1901': Now it chanced that in one of the mosques was an '''Imam . (''footnote:'' The person specially appointed to lead the prayers of the congregation and paid out of the endowed revenues of the mosque to which he is attached) — John Payne, ''Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp * 2001': But then there's a Christian cleric and an '''imam on each of the country's three regional censorship boards, in Kaduna, Lagos and Onitsha, although more than one producer told me that the brown envelope worked the same magic here as in any other Nigerian Government department. — ''London Review of Books, 10 May 2001 * 2004': In the 1980s, roughly six hundred young Algerian men, many of them protégés of Muslim Brothers from Egypt and Wahhabi '''imams from Saudi Arabia, went to Afghanistan to join the anti-Soviet jihad. — ''London Review of Books, 7 Oct 2004, p.3

    Anagrams

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