Shaykhism (Arabic: الشيخية‎) is an Islamic religious movement founded by Shaykh Ahmad in early 19th century Qajar Iran. It began from pure Shi‘a doctrine of the end times and the day of resurrection. Today the Shaykhi populations retain a minority following in Iran and Iraq. In the mid 19th century many Shaykhis converted to the Bábí and Bahá'í religions, which regard Shaykh Ahmad highly.

The primary force behind Shaykh Ahmad's teachings is the Twelver Shi'a belief in the occultation of the Twelfth Imam. Twelver Shi'ah believe there were twelve Imams starting with Ali and ending with Muhammad al-Mahdi. While the first eleven Imams died, the twelfth is said to have disappeared, to return "before the day of judgment" and "fill the Earth with justice and make the truth triumphant". This messianic figure is called the Mahdi.

The Shaykhís believed that since Muslims require the guidance of the Mahdi, there must be an individual on Earth who is capable of communicating with him. This personage would be described as the "perfect Shi'a", and Shaykh Ahmad was the first to adopt that position. Due to this unique capability, the leader of the sect attained a quasi-divinity in the eyes of his followers.

Wafa Sultan (Arabic: وفاء سلطان‎; born June 14, 1958, Baniyas, Syria) is a medical doctor who trained as a psychiatrist in Syria, and an American author and critic of Muslim society and Islam.

Sultan was born into a large traditional Alawite Muslim family in Baniyas, Syria.

Although Sultan wanted to be a writer, and would have preferred to study Arabic literature, she studied at the Medical faculty at the University of Aleppo due to pressure from her family, stating that she was shocked into secularism by the 1979 atrocities committed by Islamic extremists of the Muslim Brotherhood against innocent Syrians, including her witnessing while she was a medical student the machine-gun assassination of her professor, Yusef al Yusef, an ophthalmologist from the university who was renowned outside Syria. "They shot hundreds of bullets into him, shouting, 'Allahu Akbar!' " she said. "At that point, I lost my trust in their god and began to question all our teachings. It was the turning point of my life, and it has led me to this present point. I had to leave. I had to look for another god." She worked for four years as a psychiatrist in a hospital.