Rethinking the Islam/Modernity Binary: Ali Shariati and Religiously Mediated Discourse of Sociopolitical Development

Abstract

In much of the academic literature on the modern processes of sociopolitical change in Muslim-majority societies, Islam and modernity have been described in oppositional terms. This article examines the development of a religiously mediated discourse of indigenous modernity by prominent twentieth-century Iranian thinker Ali Shariati and his contemporary intellectual followers in post-revolutionary Iran. It asks how Shariati's thought and its new readings by neo-Shariatis may contribute to the current rethinking of the Islam/modernity binary. A case is made that, by giving simultaneous recognition to mobilizational and inspirational capacities of public religion, the discourses of Shariati and neo-Shariatis challenge both Eurocentric and culturalist discourses of social and political change, while also presenting a social democratic alternative to the vision of indigenous modernity advanced by the advocates of Islamic liberalism.

Keywords::

• Culturalism
• culture
• democracy
• Iran
• Islam
• Islamic liberalism
• Islamism
• modernity
• multiple modernities
• public religion
• secularism
• sociopolitical development
• tradition
• Shariati
• neo-Shariatis
• Soroush

Notes

¹ See further J. Rawls (1997) The Idea of Public Reason Revisited, University of Chicago Law Review 64(3), pp. 765–807; R. Rorty (2005) An Ethics for Today: Finding Common Ground Between Philosophy and Religion (New York: Columbia University Press); and J. Habermas (2006) Religion in the Public Sphere, European Journal of Philosophy, 14(1), pp. 1–25.

² C. West (2004) Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight against Imperialism, p. 161 (New York: The Penguin Press).

³ I take the term Islamicate from Kathryn Babayan and Afsaneh Najmabadi, who themselves borrow it from Marshall G. S. Hodgson. The designation, as Babayan and Najmabadi explain, intends to highlight ‘a complex of attitudes and practices that pertain to cultures and societies that live by various versions of the religion Islam.’ See K. Babayan & A. Najmabadi (2008) Preface, in: K. Babayan & A. Najmabadi (eds) Islamicate Sexualities: Translations Across Temporal Geographies of Desire, p. ix (Cambridge, MA: Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University).

⁴ See further P. Berger (1967) The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (Garden City, NY: Doubleday); T. Parsons (1977) The Evolution of Societies (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall); T. Luckmann & K. Dobbelaere (1981) Secularization: A Multidimensional Concept, Current Sociology, 29(2), pp. 1–21; B. Wilson (1985) Secularization: The Inherited Model, in: P. E. Hammond (ed.) The Sacred in a Secular Age, pp. 9–20 (Berkeley: University of California Press); W. Schluchter (1989) Rationalism, Religion, and Domination: A Weberian Perspective, trans. Neil Solomon (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press).

⁵ W. H. Swatos Jr. & K. J. Christiano (1999) Secularization Theory: The Course of a Concept, Sociology of Religion, 60(3), pp. 211–212.

⁶ T. Asad (1999) Religion, Nation-State, Secularism, in: P. van der Veer & H. Lehmann (ed.) Nation and Religion: Perspectives on Europe and Asia), pp. 178–179 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press).

⁷ D. Lerner (1958) The Passing of Traditional Society: Modernizing the Middle East, p. 405 (New York: Free Press).

⁸ A. Salvatore (2009) Tradition and Modernity within Islamic Civilization and the West, in: M. Khalid Masud, A. Salvatore & M. van Bruinessen (eds) Islam and Modernity: Key Issues and Debates, p. 4 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press).

⁹ E. Gellner (1992) Postmodernism, Reason and Religion, p. 5 (London: Routledge).

¹⁰ S. P. Huntington (1996) The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, pp. 45–46 (New York: Simon and Schuster).

¹¹ S. Lakoff (2004) The Reality of Muslim Exceptionalism, Journal of Democracy, 15(4), p. 138.

¹² B. Lewis (1990) The Roots of Muslim Rage: Why So Many Muslims Deeply Resent the West, and Why Their Bitterness Will Not Be Easily Mollified, The Atlantic Monthly, 266(3), pp. 47–58.

¹³ Idem (2004) The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror, p. 120 (New York: Random House).

¹⁴ See Idem (2002) What Went Wrong, TheAtlantic Monthly, 289(1), pp. 43–45.

¹⁵ P. Norris & R. Inglehart (2004) Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide, p. 146 (New York: Cambridge University Press).

¹⁶ Ibid, pp. 4, 166.

¹⁷ Ibid, pp. 22–24.

¹⁸ See further C. Smith (1996) Disruptive Religion: The Force of Faith in Social Movement Activism (New York: Routledge); L. Diamond, M. F. Plattner, & P. J. Costopoulos (eds) (2005) World Religions and Democracy (Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press); K. Stoeckl (2010) The Impact of the Return of Religion on Theoretical Approaches to Democracy and Governance in the Social and Political Sciences, Sociology Compass, 4(6), pp. 354–364; and E. Mendieta & J. VanAntwerpen (eds) (2011) The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere (New York: Columbia University Press).

¹⁹ J. Casanova (1994) Public Religions in the Modern World, pp. 62, 105, 133 (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press).

²⁰ Idem (2001) Civil Society and Religion: Retrospective Reflections on Catholicism and Prospective Reflections on Islam, Social Research, 68(4), p. 1051; also see idem (2005) Catholic and Muslim Politics in Comparative Perspective, Taiwan Journal of Democracy, 1(2), pp. 89–108.

²¹Casanova, Civil Society and Religion, p. 1062.

²² Ibid, pp. 1075–1076.

²³ J. Casanova (2011) Cosmopolitanism, the Clash of Civilizations and Multiple Modernities, Current Sociology, 59(2), pp. 252–267; also see, idem (2008) Public Religions Revisited, in: H. de Vries (ed.) Religion: Beyond a Concept, pp. 101–119 (New York: Fordham University Press).

²⁴Casanova, Public Religions Revisited, p. 106.

²⁵ See, for example, M. Featherstone, S. Lash & R. Robertson (eds) (1995) Global Modernities (London: Sage); S. Lash (1999) Another Modernity, a Different Rationality (Oxford: Blackwell); D. P. Gaonkar (ed.) (2001) Alternative Modernities (Durham, NC: Duke University Press); F. Dallmayr (2002) Dialogue Among Civilizations: Some Exemplary Voices (New York: Palgrave Macmillan); S. N. Eisenstadt (ed.) (2002) Multiple Modernities (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction); C. Taylor (2004) Modern Social Imaginaries (Durham, NC: Duke University Press); and M. Sadria (ed.) (2009) Multiple Modernities in Muslim Societies: Tangible Elements and Abstract Perspectives (London: I. B. Tauris).

²⁶ A. Salvatore (2009) From Civilizations to Multiple Modernities: The Issue of the Public Sphere, in: M. Sadria (ed.) Multiple Modernities in Muslim Societies, pp. 19–20.

²⁷ A. B. Sajoo (2002) Introduction: Civic Quests and Bequests, in: A. B. Sajoo (ed.) Civil Society in the Muslim World: Contemporary Perspectives, pp. 16–17 (London: I. B. Tauris).

²⁸ See further N. Göle (2000) Snapshots of Islamic Modernities, Daedalus, 129 (1), pp. 91–117; A. B. Sajoo (2008) Muslim Modernities and Civic Pluralism, ISIM Review, (21) pp. 28–29; and M. Mahdavi (2009) Universalism from Below: Muslims and Democracy in Context, International Journal of Criminology and Sociological Theory, 2(2), pp. 276–291.

²⁹ F. Dallmayr (2011) Whither Democracy? Religion, Politics and Islam, Philosophy and Social Criticism, 37(4), p. 442.

³⁰ Ibid, p. 445.

³¹ See, for example, E. Abrahamian (1982) Ali Shari'ati: Ideologue of the Iranian Revolution, MERIP Reports, (102), pp. 24–28; H. Dabashi (1983) Ali Shariati's Islam: Revolutionary Uses of Faith in a Post-Traditional Society, Islamic Quarterly, 27(4), pp. 203–222; A. Sachedina (1983) Ali Shariati: Ideologue of the Iranian Revolution, in: J. L. Esposito (ed.) Voices of Resurgent Islam, pp. 191–214 (New York: Oxford U Press); and M. Abedi (1986) Ali Shariati: The Architect of the 1979 Islamic Revolution of Iran, Iranian Studies, 19(3–4), pp. 229–234.

³² See, for example, A. Mirsepassi (2006) Religious Intellectuals and Western Critiques of Secular Modernity, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 26(3), pp. 416–433; A. Bayat (2005) Islamism and Social Movement Theory, Third World Quarterly, 26(6), pp. 891–908; F. Jahanbakhsh (2001) Islam, Democracy and Religious Modernism in Iran (1953–2000): From Bazargan to Soroush (Leiden, Boston, Koln: Brill); and M. Moaddel (2005) Islamic Modernism, Nationalism, and Fundamentalism: Episodes and Discourse (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press).

³³ See further M. Sadri (2001) Sacral Defense of Secularism: The Political Theologies of Soroush, Shabestari, and Kadivar, International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society, 15(2), pp. 257–270; B. Ghamari-Tabrizi (2004) Contentious Public Religion: Two Conceptions of Islam in Revolutionary Iran, A. Shariati & A. Soroush, International Sociology, 19(4): pp. 504–523; M. Mahdavi (2011) Post-Islamist Trends in Post-Revolutionary Iran, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, 31(1), pp. 94–109; and M. Mahdavi (2014) One Bed and Two Dreams? Contentious Public Religion in the Discourses of Ayatollah Khomeini and Ali Shariati, Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses, 43(1), pp. 25–52.

³⁴ R. Alijani (1389/2010) Seh Shariati dar ayineh zehn-e ma: Islam-garay-e enghelabi, motefaker-e mosleh, rend-e aref [Three Shariatis in our Perceptions: Revolutionary Islamist, Reformist Intellectual, Artful Mystic], p. 29 (Tehran: Ghalam).

³⁵ A. Shariati (2010) ‘Estekhraj va tasfieh manab-e farhangi’ [Extraction and refinement of cultural resources], Collected Works 20, Ali Shariati: The Complete Collection of Works [CD ROM] (Tehran: Shariati Cultural Foundation); see also A. Shariati (1978) Ma va Iqbal: majmooeh-e asaar, 5 [Iqbal and us: Collected works, 5], p. 44 (Aachen, Germany: Hosseinieh Ershad).

³⁶ A. Shariati (2010) ‘Nameh beh Ehsan’ [Letter to Ehsan], Collected Works 1, Ali Shariati: The Complete Collection of Works [CD ROM] (Tehran: Shariati Cultural Foundation).

³⁷ Ibid, Arezooha [Aspirations], Collected Works 25.

³⁸ Ibid.

³⁹ Ibid, Collected Works 22, p. 231, and quoted in R. Alijani (1387/2009) Rend-e kham: Shariati-shenasi jeld-e yekom: zamaneh, zendegi, va arman-ha [The Unattached Free Thinker: Shariatiology, vol. 1: Era, Life, and Ideals], p. 140 (Tehran: Ghalam).

⁴⁰ Shariati (2010) Bazgasht beh khish [Return to the Self], Collected Works 4.

⁴¹ R. Alijani (1388/2009) Shariat va gharb [Shariati and the West], pp. 32, 47 (Tehran: Ghalam).

⁴² F. Fanon (1963) The Wretched of the Earth, pp. 315–316 (New York: Grove Press).

⁴³ Shariati, Collected Works, 1, p. 110, and quoted in Alijani, Shariati va gharb, p. 17.

⁴⁴ A. Shariati (1993) Religion vs. Religion, trans. L. Bakhtiar (New Mexico: Abjad Book Designers & Builders).

⁴⁵ Alijani, Seh Shariati, p. 29.

⁴⁶ Shariati, Ma va Iqbal, pp. 25, 116.

⁴⁷ N. R. Keddie (2005) Sayyid Jamal al-Din ‘al-Afghani’, in Ali Rahnema (ed.) Pioneers of Islamic Revival, 2nd ed., p. 12 (New York: Zed Books).

⁴⁸ M. Iqbal, quoted in Jawid Iqbal (1384/2005) Moghadameh [Introduction], in Kolliaat-e Iqbal Lahori [Poetry Collection of Iqbal Lahori], pp. 24–25 (Tehran: Elham).

⁴⁹ M. Iqbal (1962) The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, p. 156 (Lahore: Ashraf).

⁵⁰ Ibid, 173.

⁵¹Ehsan Shariati (N.d.) Shariati andishmand-e azadi [Shariati, the Thinker of Freedom] Tehran: Ali Shariati Information Center. Available at http://drshariati.org/show.asp?id = 30, accessed November 2, 2012.

⁵² Shariati, Collected Works, 2, pp. 176–177, and quoted in Alijani, Rend-e kham, p. 190.

⁵³Shariati, Khodsazi-e enghelab [Revolutionary Self-Preparedness], Collected Works 2.

⁵⁴ Shariati, Nameh beh Ehsan.

⁵⁵ E. Shariati (1379/2000) Nayandishideh mandeh hay-e falsafi andisheh-ye mo'alem Shariati [The Philosophical Unthoughts of the Thought of Teacher Shariati], in: B. Shariati (ed.) Dar hashiyeh matn [On the Margins of the Text], p. 9 (Tehran: Shahr-e Aftab).

⁵⁶ S. Shariati (1377/1998) Dar bareh sharaiet-e emkan-e moderniteh dini [On the Conditions for the Possibility of Religious Modernity], in: B. Shariati (ed.) Dar hashiyeh matn, pp. 162–163; and H. Yousefi Eshkevari (1377/1998) Edameh-ye projeh na-tamam [Continuing an Unfinished Project], Interview with Reza Khojasteh Rahimi, Toos, 764, p. 30.

⁵⁷ S. Shariati (2011) Karbord-e farhang [The Function of Culture], Sara Shariati Internet Archives. Available at http://sarahshariati.blogspot.ca/2011/04/blog-post_5280.html, accessed February 25, 2013.

⁵⁸ Idem (2011) Eslah dini beh masaabeh eslaah ejtemaaei? [Religious Reform as Social Reform?], Sara Shariati Internet Archives. Available at http://sarahshariati.blogspot.ca/2011/04/blog-post_3728.html, accessed February 6, 2013.

⁵⁹ R. Alijani (N.d.) Shariati dar bastar sonati gozashteh va jameh-e motakaser konooni [Shariati in his Traditional Social Context and our Pluralistic Contemporary Society], Ali Shariati Information Center. Available at http://www.alishariati.ir/show/?id = 205, accessed May 14, 2012.

⁶⁰ Idem (1377/1998) Shariati va naghadi-e sonnat [Shariati and the Critique of Tradition], Iran-e Farda, 4, p. 22.

⁶¹ S. Shariati (1381/2002) Chehreh jahani-gar, chehreh jahani-zadeh: siasat jahani kardan va ravand tarikhi jahani shodan [The Globalizer Face and the Globalized Face: An Evaluation of Globalizing Policies and the Process of Globalization], in: B. Shariati (ed.), Khodkavi-e melli dar asr-e jahani shodan [National self-examination in the age of globalization], pp. 149–159 (Tehran: Ghasidehsara).

⁶² Ibid, p. 158.

⁶³ S. Shariati, Dar bareh sharaiet-e emkan-e moderniteh dini, p. 133.

⁶⁴ Ehsan Shariati (N.d.) Interview with Hossein (Mesbahian) Rahyab (unpublished).

⁶⁵Alijani, Rend-e kham, p. 215.

⁶⁶ Author Interview with Reza Alijani, Internet/Skype, November 20, 2012.

⁶⁷ R. Alijani (2011) Pre-secular Iranians in a Post-secular Age: The Death of God, the Resurrection of God, trans. M. Mahdavi & S. Saffari, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 31(1), p. 31.

⁶⁸ Ibid, p. 32.

⁶⁹E. Shariati (N.d.) Shariati si-o seh saal bad [Shariati after Thirty Three Years], Ali Shariati Information Center. Available at http://www.drshariati.org/show.asp?ID = 171&q = , accessed September 9, 2012; see also E. Shariati (1357/1979) ‘Na-e bozorg’ [The Big No], in: Vijenameh Yekomin Saalgard [First anniversary special issue], pp. 51–56.

⁷⁰ See A. Shariati (1356/1977) Khodsaazi enghelabi: majmooeh asaar 2 [Revolutionary Self-Preparedness: Collected Works, 2] (Tehran: Hossienieh Ershad).

⁷¹ Alijani, Rend-e kham, p. 135.

⁷² A. Shariati, Collected Works, 1, p. 79, and quoted in Alijani, Rend-e kham, p. 150.

⁷³ A. Shariati, Collected Works, 1, pp. 97–98, and quoted in M. Aliakbari (1386/2007) Ghera-ati falsafi az yek zed-e filsoof: derang-haayii degar-andishaaneh dar matni bi-payan beh nam-e doctor Ali Shariati [A Philosophical Reading of an Anti-Philosopher: Alternative Reflections on an Endless Text called Dr. Ali Shariati], p. 156 (Tehran: Ghalam).

⁷⁴ A. Shariati (2010) Erfan, barabari, azadi [Spirituality, Equality, Freedom], Collected Works 2, Ali Shariati: The Complete Collection of Works [CD ROM], Tehran: Shariati Cultural Foundation.

⁷⁵ Alijani, Rend-e kham, p. 193.

⁷⁶Ehsan Shariati (N.d.) Erfan, barabari, azadi beh masabeh yek projeh [Spirituality, Equality, Freedom as a Project], Ali Shariati Information Center. Available at http://drshariati.org/show/?id = 626, accessed December 22, 2012.

⁷⁷ Author Interview with Alijani (see Footnote 66).

⁷⁸ S. Shariati (1385/2006) Paradoxhaay-e vojdan-e asheghaneh dar negah-e Shariati [The paradoxes of the loving conscience in Shariati's thought), Madreseh, 3. Available at http://drshariati.org/show/?id = 123, accessed March 2, 2011.

⁷⁹ E. Shariati (1391/2012) Manaviat dar sepehr-e omoomi [Spirituality in the Public Sphere), Etemaad, no. 2421, 28 Khordad/17 June. Available at http://www.etemadnewspaper.ir/Released/91-03-28/226.htm#204247, accessed December 10, 2012.

⁸⁰ Alijani, Pre-secular Iranians in a Post-secular Age, p. 28 (emphasis in original).

⁸¹ Ibid.

⁸² E. Shariati (N.d.) Goft-e-goo-ye rooznameh Etemaad ba Ehsan Shariati [Etemaad newspaper's interview with Ehsan Shariati], Ali Shariati Information Center. Available at http://drshariati.org/show/?id = 96, accessed September 9, 2013.

⁸³ S. Shariati, Dar bareh sharaiet-e emkan-e moderniteh dini, p. 158.

⁸⁴ A. Shariati (2010) Azadi, khojasteh azadi [Freedom, Joyous Freedom), Collected Works 2, Ali Shariati: The Complete Collection of Works [CD ROM] (Tehran: Shariati Cultural Foundation).

⁸⁵Ali Shariati Information Center (N.d.) Mizgerd-e nasim-e bidari dar barresi amoozeh-hay-e shariati [Nasim-e Bidari's roundtable on Shariati's teachings]. Available at http://drshariati.org/show/?id = 212, accessed July 27, 2012.

⁸⁶ Ibid.

⁸⁷ Alijani, Rend-e kham, pp. 117–137.

⁸⁸ R. Alijani (1376/1997) Tashaio sorkh, ya tashaio seh-rang-e irani [Red Shi'ism or Tricolored Iranian Shi'ism], Iran-e Farda, 34, p. 31.

⁸⁹Mizgerd-e nasim-e bidari.

⁹⁰ A. Soroush (1378/1999) Bast-e tajrobe-ye nabavi [The Expansion of Prophetic Experience] (Tehran: Serat).

⁹¹ Author Interview with Sara Sharaiti, telephone, November 28, 2012; and Author Interview with Alijani (see Footnote 66).