in full Shaykh Aḥmad ibn Zayn al-Dīn Ibrahim al-Aḥsāʾī
born 1753, Al-Hasa, Arabia
died 1826, near Medina
Founder of the heterodox Shīʽite Muslim Shaykhī sect of Iran.
He traveled widely in Persia and the Middle East. In 1808 he settled in Yazd, Persia, where he attracted followers with his interpretation of Shīʽism. He claimed knowledge from visions of Muhammad and the imams and contended that the imams were originally beings of divine light who participated in the creation of the world. Orthodox Shīʽite theologians declared him an apostate in 1824; he died two years later on pilgrimage to Mecca, but the Shaykhī sect survived him.