In terms of myself spiritually in Islam, I admittedly am still dealing with my own dilemmas.
While the epistemology of both Judaism and Christianity is pretty laughably weak, Islam is a different situation.
When it comes to Islam, Sunnism is pretty easy to reject for it's central premise having no doctrinal basis and for it being undeniable that Muhammad chose Ali as his successor, it's repeated very plainly many times before his death. Ali is more than obviously the appointed successor, this created massive issues for people like Umar and Abu Bakr. Ali was quite consistent in his claim as appointed successor afterwards also.
The occam's razor of the Sunni position of Ali being their 4th Caliphate, is that if he was the fourth Caliphate according to them, then as he claimed to be Imam right after Muhammad's death (and Muhammad appointed him as such) then logic dictates that Ali was the rightful successor, not Abu Bakr.
Election holds no water against divine appointment. Muhammad was not 'elected' as a Prophet, Moses was not 'elected' as a Prophet. James (brother of Jesus), Joshua (son of nun), etc were not 'elected' as Successors of Jesus and Moses respectively. They were both appointed directly by their respective patriarchs.
The Davidic Israelite Kingship was not 'elected' it was passed down through blood, as appointed by God.
However when it comes to Shi'ism itself I hit a brick wall in some aspects.
I love and admire the 11 prior Imams, however when it comes to the 12th Imam (the Mahdi/Qa'im in Ghayba) there is the issue of his hiddenness. This of course has a beautiful mystical angle, but it isn't that far from the Christian idea of the Holy Spirit guiding the Church (yada yada) or individual Christians (in the case of Protestants).
Whereas Ismailism in general is a little too syncretic, albeit a noble endeavor. It's epistemology however is a little flimsy and it's Imamate reduces the importance of Imams. The Aga Khan has said some good stuff but he is nowhere near advanced in knowledgeable in Islam as any of the even smaller 'saint' figures in Islamic history (whether mystics, philosophers or jurists).
The present state of Nizari Ismailism makes me confident that if the Ismaili line is correct, that the Nizari line isn't.
The Nizaris of the Alamut period (famously called the "Assassins" or the "Hasishins") were truly special though, and inspired me a lot when I first got into Islam.
The Tayyibi side of Ismailism is also interesting but they tend to fall under the same area as Twelver Shi'ism, in that they each have a last Imam that went into hiding. Now, for Twelvers, while we had four Babs (Gates) who were deputies for the Hidden Imam during his minor occultation, the Tayyibi sects have their Da'is (like authoritative missionaries, kind of) who are left as authority.
I have an interest in, and respect for, the Tayyibis, but it's the same dilemma but in another aspect.
It seems that all forms of Islam fail under the epistemic measurement. It doesn't mean that Muslims as a whole have false beliefs or anything, but that there appears to be no truly valid authority. In many ways this has been approached in very reactionary ways by movements such as the Salafis/Wahhabis, Deobandis, Barelvis and other modernist-Sunni reactionary conservatist 'reform' movements.
Sunnism itself is though an anachronism. It built itself up from the antagonisms against the Shia, from day one. It's predecessor is the Ahl al-Hadith movement. The Sunnis fully came into fruition in the 11th century and never existed as a sect before then. They are basically a systematic syncretism of many counter-Shia movements.
On the other hand the "Quran-alone" people also lack authority as well, as they tend to be like the Protestants of Islam (if various forms of Sunnism wasn't already) in the Sola Scriptura thing. Like Protestants it falls into the 'seventy sects' idea with individual interpretations taking precedence over any unified authoritative interpretation of the text.
The whole topic between all of these groups is quite nuanced and a difficult conversation that all of these groups will never want to truly try to figure out together. Strong biases always creep in and nobody is exempt from succumbing to such things.
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