1) The main idea of the Early History section of the chapter is to clarify what Shi'ism is and how it started. There are a lot of details explaining the different successors to Muhammad and who belonged to each group. For example, Shi'ites believe that the real successor to Muhammad is Ali, his son in law and cousin, instead of Abu Bakr (the father of A'isha, favorite wife of Muhammad), Umar, and Uthman (his successors). After Abu Bakr and his successors died, Ali took their place as Muhammad's successor, which created much unrest. This unrest involved the Battle of the Camel and the oppression of the Abbasids.

2)While reading the article I came accross a sentence that said that A'isha was very much against Ali's rule while Muhammad's daughter and Ali's wife, Fatimah, supported the Shia community. Therefore, I researched a little more online to understand this difference of though between the two family members. Apparently, A'isha was jealous of the attention Muhammad was giving Ali instead of Abu Bakr, her father, and was unhappy about the pride Muhammad had for his daughter. A'isha simply chose her father after her husband's death and Fatimah chose her husband after her father's death. Two very important women of Islam chose two completely different paths which I find very interesting for the history of Islam.