Iran’s current system represents the culmination of centuries of religious thought and a turbulent political history
Iran attempts to balance popular sovereignty with divine authority (1). Iran’s constituion was designed to give more power to its theocratic element. But over time, this element has accumulated much more power and has come to dominate Iran’s democratic institutions. This trend has created an enduring tension within the country – tension that came to a head last month over claims of electoral fraud. Now, the political crisis has progressed into a new phase where the very legitimacy of the system itself is in question. Specifically, the foundation of its theocratic element is being reexamined.
While theories of popular sovereignty and democracy have been studied well, the basis of Iran’s theocracy has not; it is the Vilayat-e-Faqih doctrine (VEF). To understand VEF, we must go back to the very beginnings of Islam and the original Sunni-Shia divide.
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As discussed previously (2), after the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 623 AD, his close companion Abu Bakr assumed the leadership mantle. Though his ascension took place under controversial circumstances, acceptance of Abu Bakr’s leadership quickly became the orthodox view among a majority of Muslims – the Sunni. They maintain that after the Prophet no other held divinely-sanctioned authority, and so the pious were left to choose their leaders and run their own affairs by consultation (shura) and concensus (ijma’). Contemporary Muslim thinkers claim that Islam has contributed towards the theory of democracy with these ideas. But history is less kind. After the immediate successors, leadership among the Muslim community disintegrated over time into a mixture of Dynasties, Empires and Kingships who were no democratic bunch. These rulers skillfully exploited faith by using doctrines of predestination as a shield. They claimed that they ruled because God wills all human activity and, therefore, any opposition to them was opposition to God. This charade survives today in places that need not be named.
Back in the 7th century AD, a group of the faithful insisted that Muhammad had actually nominated a successor: Ali, his first cousin and son-in-law. This group became the Shiat Ali, or the supporters of Ali – they would continue to follow Ali and his designated descendents as divinely appointed guides – Imams. These beliefs later developed as points of doctrine including designation (nass) whereby God’s representatives may legitimately nominate their successor and leadership (imamah) describing the qualities of God’s chosen representatives. However, both Sunni and Shia doctrine developed well after Muhammad’s death, in a time of great intellectual fervor.
The first few centuries of Islam after the Prophet were very productive times for Islamic thought. For the Sunni community, God’s last representative on Earth had departed leaving them to concentrate on canonizing Prophetic traditions and finalizing theological doctrines. Additionally, the faithful engaged in speculative discussions on the nature of God, the Qur’an and the nature of destiny. These discussions required philosophers to combine knowledge of texts and traditions with inner senses of reasoning and morality to achieve a higher level of understanding, an undertaking known as ijtehad – the struggle for knowledge. But in the 10th century ijtehad within the Sunni community came to an abrupt halt mainly as a reaction against rationalist theologians who questioned God’s power by giving more weight to logic, causality and human free will. The Sunni have shunned ijtehad ever since.
The Shia, while also engaged in theological speculation, always had an Imam present. But as a minority movement, the Shia community experienced greater oppression and constant surveillance, which restricted the movement and communication of the Imams. Eventually, the 12th Imam (the eleventh after Ali) was forced to completely seclude himself for mortal fear and used a network of representatives to guide his supporters. Then, the 12th Imam disappeared completely, and the faithful were thrown into disarray. Nevertheless, the faithful, with the help of the Imam’s representatives, quickly settled on the idea that the Imam had only occulted; God had temporarily withdrawn him from the physical world for a later return with Jesus to fight for justice. In the absence of the Imam, the Shia embarked on a gradual but sustained effort in developing a distinctly Shia identity and practice using their own texts and reasoning – the method of ijtehad. But an important question arose; what role did religious scholars play in a community with a spiritual vacuum?
Initially, Shia clerics resisted any community role, which they demonstrated by their stance on collecting religious alms: in the 12th Imam’s time, this charity was collected and administered by the Imam for assisting the poor and communal development. After the Imam, the clerics refused to collect and administer these alms arguing that only the Imam had the authority to do so. This position changed when later Shia scholars successfully argued that someone had to administer this charity, and the clergy were the logical people to do so. This view gained wide acceptance and opened the door towards further clerical involvement including the development of doctrines such as taqleed (imitation) whereby the faithful must seek to emulate a specific cleric’s rulings in terms of religious practice. These clerics are ranked as Grand Ayatollahs, a title that al-Sistani in Iraq and Iran’s Supreme Leader both hold. While embracing taqleed’s call for a greater clerical role in religious practice, al-Sistani practices quietism by shunning a role in politics.
However, some clerics embraced the idea of an overtly political role for the religious scholars. In this spirit, Ayatollah Khomeini, founder of Iran’s Islamic Republic, developed Vilayat-e-Faqih – a theological basis for politically active clergymen. Both taqleed and VEF rely on interpreting various traditions from the 12th Imam where the Imam advises the faithful to “seek out the narrators of my traditions’’ after him because “they are my proof to you” (3). While quite vague, these traditions combined with centuries of thought, debate and discussion set a foundation for a more activist Shia clergy. In this context, VEF represents the furthest reach of clerical authority as a political theory and a religious doctrine.
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VEF translates as ‘Authority of the Jurist’ – the idea that an expert in religious law (the Jurist) has complete authority (Vilayat) over the faithful much the same way as the Imams and the Prophet before them. This Jurist represents the last delegation of God’s absolute authority over His creations – from God, to the Prophets and from the Last Prophet to the Imams and finally to the Jurist. Khomeini formed the VEF doctrine at a time when the Shah governed Iran as its monarch with an iron fist. The self-styled Shehen-Shah (King of Kings) resisted the clerics and oppressed many ordinary Iranians, including the pious. It was these people who came out by the millions to support Khomeini and overthrow the Shah in the 1979 revolution. But they had little idea that Khomeini had a very specific vision for post-revolution Iran – one where the clerics held the final say in all matters.
To Khomeini, the people were always too prone towards moral degradation and corruption to be left in control of their own affairs. Rather, they needed a guide who could steer society towards moral purity. So, Khomeini oversaw the creation of a Supreme Leader within Iran’s constitution – an absolute authority designed to check the people’s excesses. This system heavily relies on the military for support and specifically the Revolutionary Guards division, who as their name suggests, are charged with guarding the Islamic Revolution. This alliance gave birth to a new authoritarian regime based not on a monarch’s claim over his subjects, but God’s right over humankind. And when men inherit God’s authority, they leave no room for men to rule themselves.
And that’s jus’ the tip.
References/Further Reading
(1) Untangling Iran’s Politics, at Jus’ the Tip
(2) Understanding Sunni-Shia, at Jus’ the Tip
(3) The Occultation of the 12th Imam (A Historical Background), Jassim Hussein
(4) How Quarreling Ayatollahs affect Iran’s Crisis, Time Magazine
