Khomeini's Long Shadow

1CommentsJoin

Sign-up for free weekly updates from ForeignAffairs.com.

Snapshot

Lebanon’s Shadow Government

Mohamad Bazzi

Hezbollah may have lost Lebanon’s election, but it remains the country’s dominant political force.

Capsule Review

The Shia Revival: How Conflicts Within Islam Will Shape the Future

L. Carl Brown

Essay

When the Shiites Rise

Vali Nasr

By toppling Saddam Hussein, the Bush administration has liberated and empowered Iraq's Shiite majority and has helped launch a broad Shiite revival that will upset the sectarian balance in Iraq and the Middle East for years to come. This development is rattling some Sunni Arab governments, but for Washington, it could be a chance to build bridges with the region's Shiites, especially in Iran.

For many Shiite Muslims, whose religion was born of rebellion, last year's popular uprising in Iran was just the latest in a centuries-long struggle against injustice and tyranny. Now, as the clerical regime consolidates its grip on power a year after the tainted reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran remains torn by what seems to be a hopeless conflict between Islam and democracy. But the 2009 unrest and violent crackdown in Iran were actually battles in a larger war that has been raging for centuries within Shiism -- a war over who should rule the faithful, and how. There is a more moderate, democratic vision of Shiism -- one that has been stifled ever since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution -- that could ultimately resolve the current conflict.

Shiite clerics have long debated their role in politics. The "quietist" school -- rooted in the sect's tradition of seeking to avoid confrontation with powerful rulers -- argues against direct engagement in political matters. The more activist school emphasizes the martyrdom of Shiism's founding figure, Imam Hussein, who advocated rebellion and confrontation. But even within the activist school, there is a debate over the extent of clerical power.

The model of absolute rule that dominates Iran today is just one of several competing doctrines within the Shiite clergy. Wilayat al-faqih (velayat-e faqih in Farsi), or "guardianship of the jurist," triumphed under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran's 1979 revolution. He modeled his doctrine on the concept of absolute rule exercised by the Prophet Muhammad and his successors in the early days of Islam. Khomeini's charisma and political skill overshadowed the more moderate vision of Shiism emanating from the Iraqi city of Najaf. By eclipsing the Najaf school, Khomeini succeeded in combining the role of Shiite theologian with that of political leader of the global Muslim community.

But contrary to popular perception, many Shiite clerics have long opposed Khomeini's vision of an all-powerful supreme leader. They do not want to seize political power directly, whether in Iran, Iraq, or elsewhere. One faction believes that a group of senior clerics should rule by consensus, while another camp argues that leadership should be left to politicians who are devout but not necessarily clerics. The dominant Shiite theological school in Najaf, for example, rejects Khomeini's model. At its heart, the argument is over competing visions of Shiism's essence. Should the faith be defined by a diverse group of scholars living at seminaries and engaging in esoteric theological debates, or should it follow the tradition of absolute political and religious leadership advocated by Khomeini? The outcome of this debate will have profound consequences for Shiites in countries stretching from Lebanon to Pakistan, and especially for the futures of Iran and Iraq.

In the seventh century, there was a violent schism within Islam. One camp argued that the Prophet Muhammad's successor, or caliph, should be chosen from among his closest companions. The other camp insisted that any succession must preserve the prophet's bloodline and, therefore, that his rightful heir was his cousin and son-in-law, Imam Ali. Shiism emerged as a movement called Shia Ali, or the Partisans of Ali. He was passed over three times in a row for the caliphate, until the year 656, when he became the fourth caliph of Islam. But a civil war soon erupted between Ali's partisans in Iraq and his opponents based in Damascus. In 661, Ali was assassinated by a disgruntled follower while praying at a mosque in southern Iraq. Ali was buried in Najaf, and theologians later flocked to the city to establish seminaries.

Nineteen years after Ali's death, his son Hussein led a rebellion against the caliph Yazid in Damascus. Yazid's troops besieged Hussein and a small band of supporters near the Iraqi town of Karbala. According to Shiite lore, Hussein and his followers were cut off from the water of the Euphrates River; over ten days, many starved or died from thirst. Yazid's troops eventually assassinated Hussein and displayed his severed head as they made their way back to Damascus -- a warning to anyone else who dared challenge the caliph's authority. The violent deaths of Ali and Hussein gave rise to the Shiite cult of martyrdom, and Shiism assumed the role of a "pious opposition" to the Sunni majority.

In the early 1500s, the Safavid dynasty established Shiism as the state religion in Iran. As most of the Muslim world fell under the Sunni Ottoman Empire, Shiism became identified with Persia. The Safavid rulers of Iran tried to win legitimacy for their rule from Shiite clerics in Iraq and Lebanon.

Until the nineteenth century, the quietist school of Shiism prevailed: most Shiite clerics steered clear of politics, and Shiites who lived under Ottoman rule in Iraq, Lebanon, and elsewhere did not challenge the dominant Sunni regime. The concept of wilayat al-faqih dates back to the early nineteenth century, but Khomeini reinterpreted it in 1970 while he was exiled in Najaf. In a series of lectures, he grappled with the question of how to create an Islamic state without the Mahdi, the hidden 12th imam whom Shiites regard as infallible and the last rightful successor to the prophet. (Most Shiites believe that their Mahdi vanished in 874, remains in hiding, and will eventually return, like Jesus, to render final judgment on humanity.) Until the 12th imam's return, Khomeini argued, a divinely anointed senior cleric should rule in his stead.