Shi'i Clerics in Iraq and Iran, 1722–1780: The Akhbari-Usuli Conflict Reconsidered

Abstract

It has long been held that the eighteenth century was a pivotal one in the history of Imami Shi'i thought and jurisprudence in Iraq and Iran. At the beginning of this era, it is said, the previously dominant Usuli school declined, and the conservative Akhbari school came to the fore. This intellectual revolution coincided with the fall of the Safavid dynasty in Iran and the disestablishment of Shi'ism under the Afghans and then Nadir Shah. Standard accounts would have us believe that Akhbarism became dominant. Then late in the century, as the Qajars came to power, the Usuli school staged a comeback in the shrine cities of Iraq and subsequently in Iran.This version of events, deriving from published nineteenth-century Usuli works, contains elements of truth. But an examination of manuscript sources from the period and of later biographical dictionaries suggests that the standard view needs revision.

State, Religion, and Revolution in Iran, 1796 to the Present

“…Algar (1969) suggests that Sheikh Morteza al- Ansari (d. 1864) was the first, while Hairi (1977), Cole (1983), and Moussavi (1985) recognize Sheikh Mohammad Hassan al- Najafi (d. 1850) as the bearer of the title. I side with the implicit argument of Amanat (1988) and doubt the precision of the other scholars.…”

“…The reemergence of Sufism was also tinged with Indian mysticism (Amanat 1989;Cole 1988). Indian Sufism passed through Iran on its way to Ottoman lands, and Indian scholars traveling to study in Mecca and Medina had to travel through Iran, making it at least a temporary home for many of them.…”

“…Keddie (1981c) and Richard (1995) have touched upon this controversy. Amanat (1989), Algar (1969) and Cole (1983Cole ( , 1988, have presented more detailed analyses discussing the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. Algar (1995aAlgar ( , 1995b, Arjomand (1984a), and Mottahedeh (1985) have delved into the historical background.…”

“…There is a loose consensus among scholars about the Shi'i ulama of Iran and their role in the immediate pre-Qajar period, though their methods of articulation and some of their observations vary (Algar 1969;Arjomand 1984aArjomand , 1984bArjomand , 1988aArjomand , 1988bCole 1983Enayat 1982;Keddie 1981cKeddie , 1983: Beginning with the reign of the Shah Tahmasp, from 1533 to 1576, the Safavid exported the ulama from Arab lands (now Lebanon and Bahrain) to support their Shi'i claims to power within the then majority Sunni Iranian population and against their Sunni rival, the Ottoman Empire. The ulama, through Safavid patronage, became a part of the ruling elite, and they maintained their influence after the Safavid's fall and their forced immigration to the shrine cities of Ottoman Iraq.…”

Hindu City and Just Empire: Banaras and India in Ali Ibrahim Khan's legal imagination

“…In the early eighteenth century, many such Usuli families, losing the dominance they had enjoyed in Safavid Iran, moved to India, first to Bengal and then to Awadh. 43 Eventually, such scholars would come to impose a rationalist and clericalist orientation on the Awadh state in the early nineteenth century. 44 But if not specifically Shi'a, a rationalist-empiricist approach aimed at training experts in adjudication and administration was already manifest in the hugely popular curriculum called Dars-i Nizamiyya which was taught at and disseminated by the Firangi Mahall madrassa at Lucknow, endowed by the Mughal emperors.…”