The Emergence of Modern Shi'ism

This book takes a fresh look at the foundations of modern Islam. Scholars often locate the origins of the modern Islamic world in European colonialism or Islamic reactions to European modernity. However, this study focuses on the rise of Islamic movements indigenous to the Middle East, which developed in direct response to the collapse and decentralization of the Islamic gunpowder empires. In other words, the book argues that the Usuli movement as well as Wahhabism and neo-Sufism emerged in reaction to the disintegration and political decentralization of the Safavid, Ottoman, and Mughal empires.

The book specifically highlights the emergence of Usuli Shi‘ism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The long-term impact of the Usuli revival was that Shi‘i clerics gained unprecedented social, political, and economic power in Iran and southern Iraq. Usuli clerics claimed authority to issue binding legal judgments, which, they argue, must be observed by all Shi‘is. By the early nineteenth century, Usulism emerged as a popular, fiercely independent, transnational Islamic movement. The Usuli clerics have often operated at the heart of social and political developments in modern Iraq and Iran and today dominate the politics of the region.

 

CONTENTS

Preface

 

Introduction

The Triumph of neo-Usulism

The Eighteenth-Century Moment

Contemporary Shi‘ism and its Roots

Shi‘i Knowledge and Authority

Summary of Chapters

 

Chapter 1 The Times and Places of Reform in the Modern World

Introduction

The Place of Modernity

The Time of Modernity

World Systems and Multiple Modernities

Creation of the Modern World

Tradition and Change: From Pre-Modern to Modern

 

Chapter 2 Shi‘ism and the Emergence of Modern Iran

Introduction

Safavid Centralization of Iran (1501-1722)

Decentralization of Iran (1722-85)

Qajar Recentralization of Iran (1785-1925)

Conclusion

 

Chapter 3 Shi‘ism and the Emergence of Modern Iraq

Introduction

Ottoman and Mamluk Rule in Iraq

Shi‘ism and Arab Tribes in Southern Iraq

Conclusion

 

Chapter 4 Wahid Bihbihani: Shi‘i Reviver and Reformer

Introduction

Reviver of the Eighteenth Century

Bihbihani's Early Life

Bihbihani in Bihbihan

Usuli-Akhbari Dispute in Karbala'

The Historical and Mythical Bihbihani

Conclusion: Why Usulism Prevailed

 

Chapter 5 Wahid Bihbihani's Usuli Network in Iraq and Iran

Introduction

Usuli-Qajar Alliance

Bihbihani's Students in Iraq

Sayyid Muhammad Mahdi Tabataba'i "Bahr al-'Ulum” (Najaf)

Shaykh Ja‘far al-Najafi "Kashif al-Ghita'” (Najaf)

Mirza Muhammad Mahdi Shahristani (Karbala')

Sayyid ‘Ali Tabataba'i (Karbala')

Bihbihani's Students in Iran

Mirza Abu al-Qasim Qummi (Qum)

Mulla Ahmad Naraqi (Kashan)

Muhammad Ibrahim Kalbasi (Isfahan)

Muhammad Baqir Shafti (Isfahan)

Additional Students of Bihbihani

Conclusion

 

Chapter 6 Wahid Bihbihani's Conception of Islamic Law

Introduction

Bihbihani's Legalistic Conception of Knowledge

Four or Five Sources of Usuli Shi‘i Law?

1 The Qur'an

2 Traditions (Hadith)

3 Consensus (ijma‘)

4 Reason (‘aql)

5 Transference (ta‘diyya) vs. Analogy (qiyas)

Language (lugha) and Custom (‘urf)

Conjecture of Mujtahids

Conclusion

 

Chapter 7 Founding Fathers of Modern Islam

Introduction

Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab and the Wahhabi Movement

Ibn Idris and Neo-Sufism

Political Influence of the Reformers

Knowledge and Authority

Opponents of the Reformers

Primary Concerns of the Reformers

Conclusion

 

Glossary

Notes

Bibliography

Index