Imam Ja'far as-Sadeq (A.S.), the founder of the famous academy in Madinah

On 17th of the Islamic month of Rabi al-Awwal in 83 AH, Imam Ja'far as-Sadeq (AS), the 6th Infallible Successor of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) was born in Medina. His period of imamate or divinely-decreed leadership was 34 years, starting in 114 AH at the martyrdom of his father, Imam Mohammad Baqer (AS) and ending in 148 AH with his own martyrdom at the age of 65, as a result of a fatal dose of poisoning by Mansour Dawaniqi, the 2nd self-styled caliph of the usurper Abbasid regime.

The jockeying for political power of the Islamic state by the Omayyads and the Abbasids, provided the 6th Imam with an opportunity, albeit brief, to groom a generation of scholars in different fields, including theology, Qur'anic sciences, hadith, medicine, astronomy, mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany, history, ethics, etc.

His famous academy of Medina at its height had 4,000 scholars studying different branches of knowledge, including the Father of Chemistry, Jaber bin Hayyan (Geber to medieval Europe). The founders of the four schools of jurisprudence of what later came to be known as the Sunni sect were directly or indirectly indebted to him.

In short, the 6th Imam was the reviver of the genuine teachings of Islam and the pristine practice and behaviour of his ancestor, the Prophet. In other words, his school of jurisprudence, the Fiqh al-Ja'fari, unlike other schools, is not any innovation or guesswork but the unsullied shari'ah of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).