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Shi'ite Leadership: In the Shadow of Conflicting Ideologies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

David Menashri
David Menashri*
Affiliation:
Shiloah Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, Tel Aviv University
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Extract

The revolution in Iran stands out as a striking exception to other Middle Eastern coups of the twentieth century. While the latter have mostly been of a military-putsch type, in Iran, an apparently stable regime was toppled by a civilian, predominantly clerical, leadership capable of calling forth mass participation on a vast scale, neutralizing the army, and forcing the shah into exile. This religious leadership was strong and resourceful enough to weld its components together and to overcome ideological barriers that elsewhere, and in other circumstances, would have precluded joint action. But in Iran—where political cooperation among divergent groups has been a recurrent feature for the past hundred years—the clergy, the National Front, other middle-of-the-road liberals, and the left were able to make common cause. Reviewing the period from 1890 to the mid-1960s, Nikki Keddie writes: “Although it is a truism that politics makes strange bedfellows…the alliance between much of the religious leadership of Iran and the most advanced Westernized political activists is virtually without parallel either in the Islamic or the non-Islamic world.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 13 , Issue 1-4: Iranian Revolution in Perspective , 1980 , pp. 119 - 145
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1980

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References

Notes

1. Nikki R. Keddie, “Origins of the Religious-Radical Alliances in Iran,” Past and Present, No. 34 (July 1966), p. 70.

2. Shari'atmadari (aged 77) is a Turkish-speaking native of Azerbaijan. In the early 1940s he moved to Qom and gradually established himself as one of the most prominent mojtaheds. From 1970 to Khomeini's return, he was the highest-ranking mojtahed in Iran.

3. David Menashri, “Strange Bedfellows: The Khomeini Coalition,” The Jerusalem Quarterly, No. 12 (Summer 1979), pp. 34-48. For the chronicle of the crisis in Iran, and the different position adopted by the two, see: “Iran” in Legum, Colin (ed.), Middle East Contemporary Survey, Vol. II, 1977-78 (New York: Holmes and Meier Publishers, 1979), pp. 463–512Google Scholar, Vol. III, 1978-79, pp. 488-558; Vol. IV, 1979-80, in print.

4. On the changes in Islam, Shi'ite as well as Sunnite, as related to sociopolitical circumstances, see: Keddie, Nikki R., “Iran: Change in Islam; Islam in Change,” International Journal of Middle East Studies II (1980), pp. 527–542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5. In 1960-61, a number of religious leaders contributed papers to a seminar on selection and functions of the marja'e taqlid. The papers were published in Tehran in 1962: Bahsi dar Bar-ye Marja'iyyat va Rohaniyyat. These were discussed by Lambton, Ann K. S. in: “A Reconsideration of the Position of the Marja’ al-taqlid and the Religious Institution,” studia Islamica XX. (1965), pp. 115–135.Google Scholar

6. For more information on the differences of the bases of power between the Shi'ite and Sunnite ulama and their political implications in Iranian history, see: Binder, Leonard, “The Proofs of Islam: Religion and Politics in Iran,” in Makdisi, George (ed.), Arabic and Islamic Studies in Honor of Hamilton A. R. Gibb (Leiden: Brill, 1965), pp. 113–140Google Scholar; Keddie, Nikkie R., “The Roots of the Ulama's Power in Iran,” in Keddie, Nikkie R. (ed.), Scholars, Saints and Sufis: Muslim Religious Institutions in the Middle East since 1500 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), pp. 211–229Google Scholar; Hamid Algar, pp. 221-255.

7. See, for example, Ettela'at, Tehran, February 1, May 31, August 29, 1979. See also interviews with Shari'atmadari in The New Yorker, December 18, 1978; El-Pais, November 25, as quoted by Foreign Broadcast Information Service: Daily Report, Middle East and North Africa (DR), November 27, 1979.

8. Al-Ahram, Cairo; December 14, 1979.

9. Kayhan, Tehran, February 5, 1979.

10. Ettela'at, May 19 and May 31, 1979.

11. Ettela'at, May 31, 1979.

12. Kayhan, February 5; International Herald Tribune, Paris (IHT); February 12, 1979.

13. Radio Paris, November 2—DR, November 2, 1978.

14. Der Spiegel, Hamburg, August 27, 1978.

15. Kayhan, February 5, 1979. See also: IHT, October 31, 1978. In fact, Shari'atmadari deliberately refrained from using the term “imam Khomeini” and preferred the term “ayatollah” or just “mister.”

16. Le Figaro, Paris, January 1979.

17. Elevatherotipia, Athens, February 7, 1979; DR, February 8, 1979.

18. Al-Hawadith, Beirut, January 26, 1979.

19. Ettela'at, January 24, 1979.

20. Kayhan, February 24; Agence France Presse (AFP), Paris, January 28, 1979; DR, January 30, 1979.

21. Ruhollah Khomeini, al-Hukumah al-Islamiyyeh (n.p. 1970), pp. 41-2. A collection of lectures given by Khomeini to theological students at Najaf, Iraq in the late 1960s.

22. Ibid., p. 53. See also: Akhavi, Shahrough, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: Clergy-State Relations in the Pahlavi Period (New York: State University of NY, 1980), p. 169.Google Scholar

23. The New Yorker, December 18, 1978; Kayhan and Ettela'at May 19, 1979.

24. Kayhan, January 24, 1979.

25. Ettela'at, May 31, 1979.

26. Ettela'at, January 28, 1979. See also: Ettela'at, August 31, 1978.

27. Ettela'at, January 28, 1979; Le Monde, Paris, July 17, 1979.

28. Ettela'at, May 31, 1979.

29. Radio Tehran, July 30, 1979; British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Summary of World Broadcasts, the Middle East and Africa, August 1, 1979. Similar views are expressed in an interview with Shari'atmadari in: Ettela'at, January 28, February 1 and 5, May 19, 1979; Kayhan, May 19, 1979; al-Watan, Kuwait, May 25, 1979

30. Le Monde, July 17, 1979.

31. The Guardian, London, May 18, 1979.

32. See the views of the National Front, Iranian Association of Jurists, the National Democratic Front, and the Freedom Movement (all expressed at the time they still were cooperating with Khomeini) appearing in: Bamdad, Tehran, November 27, 28, 30, 1979; The Guardian, November 30, 1979; NYT, December 2, 1979.

33. Hairi, Abdul-Hadi, Shi'ism and Constitutionalism in Iran (Leiden: Brill, 1977), pp. 102, 235.Google Scholar

34. The relevant article of the constitution reads: “It is hereby declared that it is for the learned doctors of theology (the mojtaheds)…to determine whether such laws as may be proposed are or are not comfortable to the rules of Islam, and that it is therefore officially enacted that (for the purpose of such review) there shall at all times exist a committee composed of not less than five mojtaheds or other devoted theologians.” For English text see: Browne, Edward G., A Brief Narrative of Recent Events in Persia (London, 1959), pp. 87–101.Google Scholar

35. Khomeini, Ayatollah Ruhollah, Kashf al-Asrār (Tehran: Zafar, 1979: first published in 1943/44), pp. 232–233.Google Scholar

36. Keddie, Islam in Change, p. 536.

37. Khomeini, op. cit., p. 12. See also, Akhavi, p. 163.

38. Der Spiegel, August 27, 1978; Ettela'at, August 29 and 31, September 1 and 3, 1978; IHT, October 31, 1978.

39. Kayhan International, Tehran (KI), October 31, 1978.

40. AFP, October 28, 1978; DR, October 31, 1978.

41. Al-Watan, May 25, 1979.

42. Keddie, Islam in Change, pp. 531-532.

43. Khomeini, Kashf al-Asrar, pp. 221-288. See also, Akhavi, pp. 163-164.

44. Millward shows that Khomeini defended constitutional monarchy until 1963: William Millward, “The Islamic Political Theory and Vocabulary of Ayatollah Khomeini, 1941-1963.” Paper delivered at Middle East Studies Association Conference, Salt Lake City, Utah, 1970, in preparation for publication, as cited in Keddie, Islam in Change, p. 541.

45. Akhavi, p. 167.

46. Khomeini, op. cit., pp. 34-37, al-Mustaqbal, Paris, January 13, 1979; al-Safir, January 18 and 19, 1979.

47. Radio Tehran, May 7, 1979; DR, May 8, 1979.

48. The full text of the constitution is given by Kayhan, November 17, 1979.

49. Radio Tehran, December 17, 1979; BBC, December 19, 1979.

50. Ettela'at, August 14, 1979.

51. Radio Tehran, July 30, 1979; BBC, August 1, 1979.

52. Le Monde, July 17, 1979. Similarly, see his interviews: Ettela'at, May 31, August 14, 1979; Bamdad, December 3, 1979.

53. Ettela'at, May 31, 1979; Cambio 16, Madrid, December 23, 1979; DR, December 28, 1979.

54. Radio Tehran, August 14, 1979; BBC, August 15, 1979.

55. See, for example, Khabarnameh-ye Jebheh-ye Melli (organ of the National Front), No. 7 (October 30, 1978); No. 21 and 22 (November 21 and 22, 1978).

56. Radio Tehran, May 10, June 19, July 17, 1979; DR, May 14, June 20, 1979; BBC, July 19, 1979; The Guardian, September 18, IHT, October 5, 1979.

57. Khomeini, Kashf al-Asrar, p. 334.

58. Kayhan, May 29, 1979.

59. Ettela'at, September 29, 1980.

60. Al-Safir, January 18-20, 1979.

61. The Guardian and DT, December 11 and 12, 1979.

62. The Guardian, January 5, 1980.

63. KI, October 31, 1978.

64. Ettela'at and Kayhan, February 5, 1979. For similar expressions, see: AFP, October 28, 1978; DR, October 30, 1978; Ettela'at, February 1 and May 31, 1979; al-Watan, May 25, 1979.

65. Bamdad, December 8, 1979.

66. Menashri, MECS, Vol. III, pp. 497-501; Akhavi, pp. 171-180.

67. Ettela'at, September 3, 1978.

68. Upon his nomination, Bakhitiyar claimed that he had the support of “nine out of ten ayatollahs” who, although favoring a compromise with the shah along the lines he proposed, did not dare to openly defy Khomeini. Shari'atmadari, whose “support” Bakhtiyar was claiming, neither expressed unequivocal opposition to Bakhtiyar's government nor spoke in its support. Even though he was compelled to deny statements by Bakhtiyar that could have implied a measure of support for his government, Shari'atmadari still managed not to come out clearly against it.

69. Ha'aretz, Tel Aviv, December 14, 1978.

70. Kayhan, May 19, 1979; Ettela'at, May 18, August 12 and 14, 1979; Le Monde, July 17, 1979.

71. Ettela'at, May 30, 1979.

72. Radio Tehran, September 14, 1979; DR, September 15, 1979.

73. Cumhuriyet, March 16, 1979.

74. Radio Tehran, February 13, 1979; DR, February 14, 1979.

75. Kayhan, May 13 and 19, 1979; The Guardian, May 18, 1979; El Pais, November 25, 1979; DR, November 27, 1979.

76. El Pais, November 25, 1979; DR, November 27, 1979; al-Ahram, December 14, 1979.

77. Radio Tehran, July 30, 1979; DR, August 1, 1979.

78. For an analysis of the differences between the draft and the final version of the constitution, see Menashri, MECS, Vol. III, pp. 522-524 and Vol. IV (in print).

79. Cambio 16, Madrid, December 23, 1979; DR, December 28, 1979. See also: Bamdad, December 8, 1979; The Middle East, January 1980.

80. Radio Tehran, December 6, 1979; BBC, December 8, 1979; NYT, December 6, 1979; IHT and DT, December 7, 1979; Bamdad, December 8, 1979.

81. El-Pais, November 25, 1979; DR, November 27, 1979. Also quoted in NYT, November 26, 1979.