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Abstract
This paper argues that the mature form of the political doctrine of the Ayatollah Khomeini (1902–89), Iranian Shiite religious authority and architect of the Islamic Republic of Iran, grew out of an encounter with the modern understanding of the state and the concept of sovereignty. Khomeini’s political doctrine, called the Absolute Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist, although based on a religious foundation, should be studied as a break with the traditional understanding of political power in Shiism. It will be argued that such a political doctrine can play the same role as the Christian rhetoric of the early modern political thinkers played, pave the way for modernization of Shiite political thought, and prepare the ground for a modern temporal conception of politics.
Notes
1 Schmitt, Political Theology, 36.
2 See Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age.
3 Leviathan, chs. 31 beginning, 32 beginning. For an influential theological interpretation of Hobbes’ thought see Martinich, The Two Gods of Leviathan.
4 Locke, The Second Treatise of Government, §§31–35. For a classic theological interpretation of Locke's political philosophy see Dunn, The Political Thought of John Locke, 12.
5 The Prince, VI, XXVI.
6 The innovative and radical character of Khomeini's absolutist turn from the point of view of the history of Shiʿite Islamic jurisprudence is discussed in Mohsen Kadivar's writings. See Kadivar, “La Naissance du ‘ Souverain Juriste’”; Kadivar, Nazariyyeh-hā-ye dowlat dar feqh-e shiʿeh, 21ff; Kadivar, “Qalamrow-e Hokumat-e Dini az Didgāh-e Imam Khomeini,” pp. 128ff. See also Mavani, “Analysis of Khomeini's Proofs for al-Wilaya al-Mutlaqa.”
7 Martin, Creating an Islamic State, 40.
8 Amanat, “From ijtihad to wilayat-i faqih,” 130.
9 Dabashi, Theology of Discontent, 41.
10 Khomeini, Governance of the Jurist, 74.
11 Kadivar, Nazariyeh-hā-ye dowlat dar feqh-e shiʿeh, 97–104; Hossainzadeh, “Ruhollah Khomeini's Political Thought,” 129–50.
12 Al-Hilli, Tadhkirat al-Fuqahā, 9:393–8; Al-Āmoli, Wasāʾil al-shiʿa, 15:55–6.
13 The quietist attitude apparently existed even in the pre-occultation period, as it is reported that the Sixth Imam, originator of much of Shiʿite doctrines, asked his followers to abstain from every political action, even going so far as prohibiting purely verbal dispute with the opponents. Al-Āmoli, Wasāʾil al-shiʿa, 6:xxii.
14 Al-Hilli, Sharāyiʿ al-Islām, 1:341–2.
15 Greenfield, “Die geistlichen Schariagerichte in Persien und die moderne Gesetzgebung,” 157–8; Floor, “The Secular Judicial System in Safavid Persia,” 11.
16 Karaki, Rasāʾil al-Muhaqqiq al-Karaki, 1:142–3.
17 Eʿtemād al-Saltaneh, Tārikh-e Muntazam-e Nāseri, 3:1493.
18 Algar, Religion and State in Iran, 1785-1906: The Role of the Ulama in the Qajar Period, 57.
19 Narāqi, Wilāyat al-faqih: bahth min kitāb ʿavāyed al-ayyām.
20 For a collection of his political writings see Khorasani, Siyasatnameh-e Khorasani.
21 Nāʾini, Tanbih al-umma wa tanzih al-milla. For an English translation see “Exhortation of the Faithful and Purification of the Nation.”
22 Floor, “Judicial and Legal Systems v. Judicial System in the 20th Century.”
23 For a good summary of these events see Moin, Khomeini: Life of the Ayatollah, 92–128.
24 Khomeini, Kashf al-Asrār, 223, 233.
25 Ibid., 258.
26 Khomeini, Governance of the Jurist.
27 Ibid., 19.
28 Ibid., 32.
29 Ibid., 56.
30 See ibid., 9.
31 Ashraf, “Charisma, Theocracy, and Men of Power in Postrevolutionary Iran,” 132.
32 Khomeini, Sahifeh-ye Eimām, 20:426–7.
33 Moslem, Factional Politics in Post-Khomeini Iran, 74.
34 Khomeini, Governance of the Jurist, 29.
35 Majles-e Showrā-ye Eslāmi, Surat-e Mashruh-e Mozākerāt-e Showrā-ye Bāznegari-e Qānun-e Asāsi-e Jomhuri-e Eslāmi-e Iran, 1:58.
36 Held, “The Development of the Modern State,” 83; Poggi, The Development of the Modern State, 60–1; Wilson, Absolutism in Central Europe, 1; Clark, The Seventeenth Century, 91–3. For the state of debate see Sommerville, “Early Modern Absolutism in Practice and Theory,” 117–30; Cuttica, “A Thing or Two about Absolutism and Its Historiography.”
37 Manent, Metamorphoses of the City, 320.
38 Leviathan, 43, beginning.
39 Ibid., 29, para. 15.
40 Ibid., 18, para. 9 and 23, para. 6.
41 The best contemporary example is Ayatollah Sistani, the Shiʿite authority for most Iraqi Shiʿites, who like many other Shiʿite religious authorities does not adhere to this doctrine and has consistently avoided interfering in political affairs. See Nasr, The Shia Revival, 173.
42 Khomeini, Governance of the Jurist, 56, 76. Already in his 1983 paper on Khomeini's political doctrine, Hamid Enayat observed the contradiction between Khomeini's political regime and plurality of religious authorities in traditional Shii jurisprudence: Enayat, “Iran: Khomeini's Concept of the ‘Guardianship of the Jurisconsult’,” 172. This contradiction was later on resolved by the absolutist turn in Khomeini's doctrine. See also the remarks by Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi during the discussions of the council for the revision of the constitution in 1989: Majles-e Showrā-ye Eslāmi, Surat-e Mashruh-e Mozākerāt-e Showrā-ye Bāznegari-ye Qānun-e Asāsi-ye Jomhuri-ye Eslāmi-ye Iran, 1:181.
43 Leviathan, 39, end.
44 This is also reflected in a statement by Ayatollah Sanei, a former high-ranking government official: in a gathering of pro-regime religious leaders dedicated to the discussion of the doctrine of the Absolute Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist, he asked whether this type of government is not a form of arbitrary rule. Homa Katouzian shows his agreement by likening the statement to hitting “the nail on the head.” See Katouzian, The Persians: Ancient, Mediaeval and Modern Iran, 347–8. See also Mavani, “Khomeini Concept of Governance of the Jurisconsult (Wilayat al-Faqih) Revisited.”
45 Katouzian, The Persians: Ancient, Mediaeval and Modern Iran, 348.
46 Hallaq, The Impossible State, 50, 52, 158.
47 Ibid., 51.
48 In this regard one should say that the first version of Khomeini's political doctrine remained a type of premodern traditional regime lacking true sovereign power, because it was subordinate to the sharia and was bound by the sovereign will of the Islamic law.
49 Surat-e Mashrooh-e Mozakerat-e Shora-ye Baznegari-e Ghanoon-e Asasi-e Jomhoori-e Eslami-e Iran, 1:58.
50 These articles were later republished in Hajjarian, Az Shahed-e Ghodsi ta Shahed-e Bazari.
51 Hajjarian's thesis is discussed at length in Matsunaga, “The Secularization of a Faqih-Headed Revolutionary Islamic State of Iran.”
52 Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, 33, 89.
53 Because Khomeini's political ideas appeared as reactions to efforts by the Pahlavi regime to modernize the Iranian society, some have found it significant that in practice modernization is made possible through the foundation of the Islamic regime. For instance, see the discussion of the welfare state in Iran in Harris, A Social Revolution. Harris claims that the Islamic Republic successfully implemented welfare policies that created the grounds for the 1979 revolution. A comparable perspective can be found in Ghamari-Tabrizi, “The Divine, the People, and the Faqih,” 211–39.
54 “[T]he epochs suddenly spring up like sprouts. The epochs can never be derived from one another much less be placed on the track of an ongoing process.” Heidegger, The Principle of Reason, 91.