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

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Juan Cole
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Extract

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.

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Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , Winter 1985 , pp. 3 - 34
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1985

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References

Notes

1. See Algar, Hamid, Religion and State in Iran 1785–1906: The Role of the Ulama in the Qajar Period (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969), pp. 33–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. These events have been studied in Lockhart, Laurence, The Fall of the Safavi Dynasty and the Afghan Occupation of Persia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958)Google Scholar; idem., Nadir Shah (Lahore: al-Irfan, repr. 1976); Perry, John R., Karim Khan Zand: A History of Iran, 1747-1779 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lambton, A. K. S., “The Tribal Resurgence and the Decline of the Bureaucracy in the Eighteenth Century,” in Naff, T. and Owen, R., eds., Studies in Eighteenth Century Islamic History (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1977), pp. 109–29Google Scholar; Huart, Clement, Histoire de Baghdad dans les temps modernes (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1901)Google Scholar; Nawras, A. M. K., Hukm al-mamalik fi al-ᶜIraq, 1750-1831 (Baghdad: Wizarat al-A'lam, 1975)Google Scholar; Longrigg, S., Four Centuries of Modern Iraq (Oxford: at the Clarendon Press, 1925)Google Scholar; and Ricks, Thomas M., “Politics and Trade in Southern Iran and the Gulf, 1745-1765” (Ph.D dissertation: Indiana University, 1974).Google Scholar

3. See Hamid Algar, “Shi'ism and Iran in the Eighteenth Century,” in Naff and Owen, Studies, pp. 288-302.

4. Arjomand, Said Amir, “The Office of Mulla-Bashi in Shi'ite Iran,” Studia Islamica 57 (1983), 135–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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6. Ibid., 2: 206-08. See the discussion in Lambton, A. K. S., State and Government in Medieval Islam: An Introduction to the Study of Islamic Political Theory: The Jurists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), Chap. XV.Google Scholar

7. Chardin, voyages, 3: 208.

8. Lambton, State and Government, p. 285.

9. The following analysis is based on Aqa Ahmad Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal-i jahan-nama,” Persian MS add. 24,052, foll. 17b-43b, British Library, London.

10. Khvansari, Muhammad Baqir, Rawdat al-jannat fi ahwal al-ᶜulama' wa's-sadat, 8 vols. (Tehran: Maktabah-'i Ismaᶜiliyan, 1970), 2: 118–23Google Scholar; for his social context see Arjomand, Said Amir, “Religious Extremism (Ghuluww), Sufism and Sunnism in Safavid Iran: 1501-1722,” Journal of Asian History 15 (1981): 24–28.Google Scholar

11. Chardin, Voyages, 3: 82.

12. Ibid., 3: 310.

13. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 2: 78-93; Arjomand, “Religious Extremism,” pp. 28-29.

14. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” foll. 33b-34a. For Mazandarani see Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 4: 118-20.

15. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 2: 360-65.

16. Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” pp. 55-60.

17. See Ghulam ᶜAli Azad Bilgrami, Ma'athir al-Kiram, Vol. 2 (Lahore: Matbaᶜ-i Dukhani-yi Rifah-i ᶜAmm, 1913): 116–19.Google Scholar

18. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 20b.

19. For Shi'ism in Awadh see Juan R. I. Cole, “Imami Shi'ism from Iran to North India, 1722-1856: State, Society and Clerical Ideology in Awadh” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1984); for Murshidabad in Bengal see Mohsin, K. M., “Murshidabad in the Eighteenth Century,” in Ballhatchet, K. and Harrison, J., eds., The city in South Asia, Pre-modern and Modern (London: Curzon Press, 1980), pp. 71–84Google Scholar; Bhadra, G., “Social Groups and Relations in the Town of Murshidabad 1765-1793,” Indian Historical Review 2 (1975): 312–338Google Scholar; Calkins, Philip B., “The Formation of a Regionally Oriented Ruling Group in Bengal 1700-1740,” Journal of Asian Studies 29 (1970): 799–806.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20. Chaudhry, Sushil, “The Rise and Decline of Hughli-a Port in Medieval Bengal,” Bengal Past and Present 86, 1 (1967) 33–67Google Scholar; Furber, Holden, “Glimpses of Life and Trade on the Hugli 1720-1770,” Bengal Past and Present 86, 2 (1967): 13–23Google Scholar; Gupta, Ashin Das, “Trade and Politics in 18th Century India,” Richards, D. S., ed., Islam and the Trade of Asia (Oxford: Bruno Cassirer, 1970), p. 199Google Scholar. For Shi'i institutions in Hughli see Hassein, Syud, “Haji Mahomed Muhsin and the Hughli Imambarah,” Bengal Past and Present 2 (1908): 62–73Google Scholar and Hasan, S. M., “The Hooghly Imambarah, Its Madrasah and the Library,” Bengal Past and Present 87 (1968): 217–33.Google Scholar

21. Cf. Keddie, Nikki R., “The Roots of the Ulama's Power in Modern Iran,” Scholars, Saints and Sufis: Muslim Religious Institutions in the Middle East since 1500, idem., ed., 2nd ed. (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 211–229.Google Scholar

22. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” foll. 36a, 44a-45b; Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” p. 316.

23. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 38; for this viceroy see Datta, K., “Alivardi Khan,” in Sarkar, Jadunath, ed., The History of Bengal: Muslim Period 1200-1757 (Patna: Academia Asiatica, 1973).Google Scholar

24. Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” pp. 388-405.

25. Mohsin, “Murshidabad,” pp. 80-81; Bihbahani, ‘Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 137b.

26. Cf. Basu, Purnendu, Oudh and the East India Company, 1785-1801 (Lucknow: Maxwell Co., 1943), pp. 20ff.Google Scholar

27. The best account of the doctrines involved remains Scarcia, G., “Intorno alle controversie tra Aḫbari e Uṣūlī presso gli Imamiti di Persia,” Rivista degli Studi Orientali 33 (1958): 211–250.Google Scholar The account of Algar, Religion and State in Iran, pp. 33-41 contains errors and is dated. Aqa Muhammad Baqir did not study with his father in Karbala, but in Isfahan; he lived thirty years in Bihbahan, rather than briefly passing through; he died in 1790, not 1803, and the Usuli revival he led was a feature of the Zand period rather than coinciding with the rise of the Qajars.

28. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 4: 143-46. Andrew Newman, in a personal communication, first pointed out the continuing appeal of Akhbarism in the provinces.

29. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 7: 96-105; Sayyid Iᶜjaz Kinturi, Husayn, Kashf al-hujub wa'l-astar ᶜan al-kutub wa'l-asfar, ed. Husayn, Muhammad Hidayat (Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1330/1912), p. 289.Google Scholar

30. For Niᶜmatu'llah see Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 8: 150-59; for his son ᶜAbdu'llah see ibid., 4: 257-61.

31. For a brief autobiography written in 1768 a few years before his death, see al-Bahrani, Yusuf, Lu'lu'at al-Bahrayn, ed. Mahmud Sadiq, S. (Najaf: Matbaᶜat al-Nuᶜman, n.d.), pp. 442–51Google Scholar; see also Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 8: 203-08.

32. Lockhart, The Fall of the Safavi Dynasty, pp. 115-16; Lorimer, J. G., Gazeteer of the Persian Gulf, ‘Oman, and Central Arabia, 2 vols. (Calcutta: Superintendent Government Printing, India, 1908-15, repr. 1970), 1: 836Google Scholar; Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” pp. 77-78.

33. al-Bahrani, Lu'lu'at al-Bahrayn, pp. 442-43; Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 8: 205.

34. For Tabataba'i, see ibid., 7: 203-09; for Niraqi, 7: 200-03 and Muhammad ᶜAli Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim al-athar dar ahval-i rijal-i dawrah-'i Qajar, 2 vols. (Isfahan: Matbaᶜ-i Muhammadi, 1958), 2: 360–64.Google Scholar

35. For Qummi see Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 4: 122-25.

36. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 45a.

37. Muhammad Shafiᶜ Varid Tihrani, Tarikh-i Nadir-Shahi, ed. Sha'bani, Riza (Tehran: Chapkhanahha-yi Zar, 1349 s.), p. 31Google Scholar; Mirza Muhammad Mihdi Kawkab Astarabadi, Tarikh-i Nadiri, trans. Jones, William as The History of the Life of Nadir Shah (London: J. Richardson, 1773), pp. 46–63Google Scholar; Lockhart, Nadir Shah, pp. 67-77.

38. ᶜAli Davvani, Ustad-i kull Aqa Muhammad Baqir b. Muhammad Akmal maᶜruf bih Vahid-i Bihbahani (Qumm: Chapkhanah-'i Dar al-ᶜIlm, 1958), p. 130.Google Scholar

39. Lockhart, Nadir Shah, pp. 77-78.

40. Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” pp. 68-69.

41. Davvani, Ustad-i kull, pp. 129-30.

42. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 46b.

43. Ibid., fol. 45b, mentions only the marriage into the merchant family. See Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 1: 223-24 for the other alliance. Cf. Davvani, Ustad-i kull, pp. 140-42.

44. Lockhart, Nādir Shāh, p. 99.

45. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 1: 235-37.

46. Astarabadi, Tarikh-i Nadiri, Jones trans., pp. 66-67; Sayyid ᶜAbdu'llah as-Suwaydi, Mu'tamar an-Najaf (Cairo: al-Matbaᶜah as-Salafiyyah, 1393/1973), pp. 16–17Google Scholar; Algar, “Shi'ism and Iran,” pp. 291ff.

47. ᶜAbdu'llah as-Suwaydi, Mu'tamar an-Najaf, pp. 39ff.; Astarabadi, Tarikh-i Nadiri, Jones trans., pp. 105-06; Lockhart, Nadir Shah, pp. 99-102.

48. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 1: 127-29.

49. Lockhart, Nadir Shah, p. 255; Astarabadi, Tarikh-i Nadiri, Jones trans., p. 111.

50. Kelly, J. B., Britain and the Persian Gulf 1795-1880 (Oxford: at the Clarendon Press, 1968), pp. 35–36.Google Scholar

51. Nami Isfahani, Muhammad Sadiq Musavi, Tarikh-i gitigusha dar tarikh-i khandan-i Zand, ed. Nafisi, Sa'id (Tehran: Iqbal, 1317 s.), pp. 137–39Google Scholar; Perry, Karim Khan Zand, pp. 113-16; Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” p. 266.

52. Tunikabuni, Mirza Muhammad, Qisas al-ᶜulama’ (Tehran: Kitabfurushi-yi ‘Ilmiyyah-'i Islamiyyah, n.d.), p. 201.Google Scholar

53. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 2: 95.

54. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 47a.

55. Sayyid Muhammad Mihdi's father, Murtaza, had been the prayer leader in Yazdigird: Sayyid ‘Abbas Ardistani, “al-Hisn al-matin fi ahwal al-wuzara’ wa's-salatin,” 2 vols., Arabic MSS 235a-b, 1: 17, National Archives of India, New Delhi.

56. The ethnic dimension of the Usuli-Akhbari struggle has been pointed out by ᶜAbbas Amanat, “The Early Years of the Babi Movement: Background and Development” (Ph.D. dissertation, Oxford, 1981), pp. 13ff.

57. See Ricks, “Politics and Trade,” p. 268.

58. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 2: 363.

59. For Niraqi see Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 7: 200-03 and for Shahristani, Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 2: 611-14. The two Arab figures will be treated below.

60. Nami Isfahani, Tarikh-i giti-gusha, pp. 180-81; Perry, Karim Khan, p. 171.

61. ᶜAbdu'r-Rahman as-Suwaydi, Ta'rikh hawadith Baghdad wa'l-Basrah min 1186 ila 1192 H./1772-1778 M., ed. ᶜImad A. Ra'uf (Baghdad: Wizarat ath-Thaqafah wa'l-Funun, 1978), pp. 41ff.Google Scholar; Perry, Karim Khan, p. 170.

62. Cf. McNeill, William H., Plagues and Peoples (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1976), p. 232Google Scholar for the similar effect of Hindu pilgrimage in India on the spread of disease.

63. ᶜAbdu'r-Rahman as-Suwaydi, Ta'rikh, p. 43.

64. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” foll. 47b-48a.

65. “A'inah-'i haqq-nama,” Rijal Shiᶜah, Persian MS 1, fol. 25b, Nasiriyyah Library, Lucknow. This anonymous biography of Sayyid Dildar ᶜAli Nasirabadi, written in Lucknow around 1815, represents an important and hitherto untapped source for the history of Shi'ism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

66. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 2: 316; Khvansari, Rawdat, 2: 105-06.

67. ᶜAbdu'r-Rahman as-Suwaydi, Ta'rikh, p. 48; Nami Isfahani, Tarikh-i giti-gusha, p. 181.

68. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 2: 360-64.

69. Francklin, William, observations Made on a Tour from Bengal to Persia in the years 1786-7 (London: T. Cadell, 1790), pp. 62–63Google Scholar; Muhammad Hashim Asaf Rustamu'l-Hukama', Rustam at-tawarikh, ed. Mushiri, M. (Tehran: n.p., 1969), pp. 404–405Google Scholar; and Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” fol. 49a. But cf. Perry, Karim Khan, pp. 220-21.

70. Muᶜallim Habibabadi, Makarim, 2: 343-46.

71. Bihbahani, “Mir'at al-ahwal,” foll. 48a-49b.

72. Khvansari, Rawdat, 2: 200.

73. For a similar journey a few years earlier see Niehbur, Carsten, Reisebeschreibung nach Arabien und den umliegenden Ländern, 2 vols. (Graz: Akademische Druck-u. Verlagsanstalt, repr. 1968), 2: 240–42.Google Scholar

74. This and succeeding paragraphs are based on “A'inah-'i haqq-nama,” foll. 48a-49b and Sayyid Iᶜjaz Husayn Kinturi, “Shudhur al-ᶜiqyan fi tarajim al-aᶜyan,” 2 vols. Buhar Collection, Arabic MSS 278-279, 1: 136-37, National Library, Calcutta. For the issue of consensus (ijma’) see Löschner, Harald, Die dogmatischen Grundlagen des šiᶜitischen Rechts (Cologne: Karl Heymans Verlag, 1971), pp. 111–147.Google Scholar

75. Khvansari, Rawdat al-jannat, 6: 104-05. Originally a student of the Akhbari Sayyid Sadru'd-Din Qummi, he went over to Bihbahani's Usulism.

76. For this issue see Löschner, Grundlagen, pp. 101-09.

77. “A'inah-'i haqq-nama,” fol. 49b.

78. Ibid., foll. 20b-24a.