Iranian Intellectuals and the West, 1960-1990

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Orientalism in reverse; Iranian intellectuals and the West, 1960- 1990

Boroujerdi, Mehrzad, Ph.D.

The American University, 1990

UMI 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ORIENTALISM IN REVERSE: IRANIAN INTELLECTUALS AND THE WEST, 1960-1990 by Mehrzad Boroujerdi submitted to the Faculty of the School of International Service of The American University in Partial Fulfillment of The Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in International Relations

Signatures of Committee:

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Date 1990 The American University 7)1? Washington, D.C. 20016

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MEHRLAD BOROUJERDI

1990

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. To My Mother and to the Memory of My Father

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ORIENTALISM IN REVERSE; IRANIAN INTELLECTUALS AND THE WEST, 1960-1990

BY MEHRZAD BOROUJERDI ABSTRACT This dissertation seeks critically to deconstruct the ontological and epistemological premises underlying the process of identity formation of contemporary Iranian intellectuals. The study concentrates on the emergence of a new mode of thinking described as "Orientalism in Reverse," which came to dominate the political and intellectual panorama of pre- and post-revolutionary Iran. Drawing upon the works of Michel Foucault and Edward Said on how the "constitution of otherness" permeates any process of identity formation, I examine the two dominant problems

confronting Iranian intellectuals: identity per se, and

encounter with the West. I maintain that since the Iranian intellectuals' vision of their "self" was constrained by their perception of the "Western other," they did not and

indeed could not experiment the same types of ontological and epistemological ruptures that their Western counterparts

experienced in the aftermath of the Enlightenment. As a result, Iranian intellectuals in the last three decades have

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. increasingly turned toward nativism, traditionalism, and politicized Islam. This intellect trend provided the theoretical guidelines for the revolutionary movement that swept to power in 1979. In identifying the Iranian intellectuals' means and modes of cultural identification, I have followed the maxims

of methodological pluralism by drawing upon post structuralism and sociology of knowledge. The study has relied upon personal interviews, oral history files, and a variety of primary as well as secondary textual sources.

Ill

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Writing a dissertation usually begins with a combined optimism of will and intellect. Yet in the strenuous and lonesome process of completing it, the writer experiences a pessimism either of intellect or will. In this regard, I would like to extend my thanks to the following groups of people. First and foremost, the four members of my dissertation committee whose questions, criticisms, and

guidance I valued the most. Professors G. Matthew Bonham, Serif Mardin, Nicholas Onuf, and Ahmad Ashraf helped me at every step of the way to overcome my intellectual doubts and bewilderment. I profited enormously from the theoretical insights as well as the personal dignity of these teachers-

friends. Secondly, I would like to thank the distinguished

thinkers, cited in this study, who kindly gave of their time and shared with me their experiences and thoughts in many interviews. Without their help this study would not have been deserving of any merit. A third group of people to whom I have an intellectual debt have been my valuable friends and colleagues who each read different parts of this

study and made numerous suggestions for its improvement, both stylistically and qualitatively. In particular I would iv

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. like to thank Mehdi Aminrazavi, Vincent Gaetano, Peter Gran, Jules Hulton, Ali Mirsepasi, Tom Pounds, and Prodromos

Yannas. I am also grateful to Dean Louis W. Goodman and the School of International Service for providing a congenial atmosphere conducive to unobstructed intellectual pursuits. I am indebted to an American University Dissertation Fellowship which helped ease my financial difficulties when they were most pressing. Furthermore, a summer research award by the Graduate Student Council of the School of International Service enabled me to conduct my archival research at Harvard University. Finally, I would like to express gratefulness to my beloved fiance, Mondana, my dear sister Mahzad and my wonderful brother Mehran. I owe much of my optimism of will to their loving care, support, and encouragement. To them goes my gratitude and love.

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ABSTRACT ...... Ü ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... iv

INTRODUCTION ...... 1 Chapter I. OTHERNESS, ORIENTALISM, AND ORIENTALISM IN REVERSE ...... 18 II. SECULAR INTELLECTUALS AND THE OTHERNESS OF A RENTIER STATE ...... 70 III. SECULAR INTELLECTUALS AND THE OTHERNESS OF THE WEST ...... 130 IV. CLERGY AND THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A RELIGIOUS SUB-CULTURE ...... 195

V. THE DISCURSIVE REPERTOIRE OF LAY RELIGIOUS INTELLECTUALS ...... 239 VI. THE ENCOUNTER OF POST-REVOLUTIONARY THOUGHT WITH HEGEL, HEIDEGGER, AND POPPER ...... 284 CONCLUSION ...... 321

BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 330

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Figure 1. Fardid's Perception of the Ontological Circuits of Oriental and Occidental Philosophy ...... 143 2. Al-e Ahmad's Circular Theory of Intellectuals .... 152

V l l

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Table 1. Negative and Positive Propositions about Orient/ Orientals and Occident/Occidentals ...... 42 2. Third World Proponents of Nationalism ...... 60 3. Iranian Government's Revenues From Oil ...... 75 4. A Taxonomy of Shayegan's Philosophy ...... 175 5. Shariati's Taxonomy of the Occident/Orient Divide. 257

6. Synoptic Taxonomy of the Ideas of Davari and Soroush ...... 303 7. Traditional versus Dynamic fiqh ...... 314

vxii

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. INTRODUCTION

Moderately speaking, the Iranian Revolution of

February 1973 constitutes one of the most exciting occasions of the modern era. The brisk downfall of a mighty autocratic regime, use of religion as the primary agency of political mobilization, the unprecedented level of animosity displayed against the West, and the establishment of a theocracy in the latter decades of the twentieth-century presented serious questions over which policy makers and

social scientists had to ponder. In the decade that has since passed, two dominant schools of thought have emerged on the causes of the Iranian Revolution. The first views the revolution in terms of socioeconomic factors related to Iran's rapid and uneven

economic development. The second approach emphasizes

cultural and ideological factors, notably the rise of politicized Islam, Iranians' disenchantment with the West

and their search for a new cultural identity. Despite their enormous contributions in identifying the determinants of one of the twentieth century's most popular, turbulent, and

controversial revolutions, scholars following each approach

have oftentimes ignored one another. The purpose of this dissertation is to move, albeit

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2 modestly, toward a synthesis of the two approaches through a demonstration of the manner in which Iranian intellectuals

responded to the cultural, socioeconomic, and political transformation within Iran between 1960 and 1990. It will become clear that the time interval under consideration is of utmost importance for students of Iranian politics since it was an era marked by tremendous social upheaval and intellectual metamorphosis. Having undergone the considerable task of trying to investigate the theoretical orientation and social function of modern Iranian intellectuals, I have come to appreciate both schools of thought. Nonetheless, and despite my immense intellectual debt to the political economy approach, I consider myself closer to the cultural model. Its more penetrating and unsettled questions kept me perplexed, impressed, and

inspired.!

My theoretical investigation of contemporary Iranian

intellectual history has been confined within a cultural triangle: the impact of Western culture and civilization; Iran's Islamic and secular heritage; and the intellectuals'

estimation of the latter two. The importance of the first

‘For a theoretical treatment of these two different approaches to revolution see the following debate: William H. Sewell. Jr., "Ideologies and Social Revolutions: Reflections on the French Case," The Journal of Modern History 57, 1 (March 1985): 57-85; and Theda Skocpol, "Cultural Idioms and Political Ideologies in the Revolutionary Reconstruction of State Power: A Rejoinder to Sewell," Ibid: 86-96.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 3 lies in the fact that Western technology, economy, military, and politics have irrevocably impacted the day-to-day way of life and thinking in contemporary Iran. The second is significant since it constitutes Iranians' primary source of cultural and intellectual identity. The third is crucial

because in their capacity as creators and narrators of culture, intellectuals have played such a vital role in mediating the encounter between the former two. This cultural triangle has given rise to a string of problematical questions such as; (1) "What it the West?" (2) "How should it be confronted?" (3) "What comprises the Iranian identity?" (4) "What is the proper relationship among religion, science, and philosophy?" (5) "Is religion an anachronism for a developing society such as Iran?" (6) "Should modernity and secularism be viewed as universal principles or Western intrusions which are irreconcilable with traditional Iranian culture?"

Analyzing the methods of formulation as well as the means of response by Iranian intellectuals to these and

other similarly provocative questions constitutes the core of this dissertation. This task will be pursued through a critical examination of their process of identity-formation and discursive practices relative to the West. It will be

argued that a new mode of thinking, described as

"Orientalism in Reverse," has exercised a tenacious grip

over the course of intellectual deliberations in

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contemporary Iran. I contend that the theoretical framework of this new mode of thought can help us understand what is perhaps the most intractable question currently besieging the discipline of Middle Eastern Studies: "Why the reversion to politicized Islam?" In light of the revolution's outcome, a host of works

have appeared on the role and ideology of the Iranian clergy. However, relatively little has been done on the contributions made by non-clerical religious intellectuals. Still less attention has been devoted to analyzing the thought and action of the secularized intellectuals who have been treated mostly as marginal actors. An observer of

Middle Eastern social thought had once asked: In the contemporary Moslem-Arab societies, does the function of the intellectual recall that of the classic scholar, at once counsellor of the great people, honor of the city or of the village, and regulator, through the culture, through judicial consultâtice or through the education, of the social life?:

Perhaps the answer is negative. In the contemporary

Middle East, the intellectual does not enjoy the power, status, or popularity of the traditional notable, the

military officer, the clerical leader, or the nouveau riche bourgeois. Yet he remains important in his own right. The intellectuals have managed to break the inexorable monopoly

of the traditional elites, and have secured a role as

:Jean-Paul Charnay, "The Arab Intellectual Between Power and Culture," Diogenes 83 (Fall 1973): 40.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 5 cultural manufacturers. As a much politicized social group with a strong sense of political mission, the intellectuals have proved to be the only social group truly committed to the cultivation of alternatives. They reject the past, question the present, and espouse new visions of the future. Intellectuals are oftentimes inspired not so much by the realities of today, but by the uncharted possibilities of

tomorrow. They can be grouped into two grand clusters; the socially engaged visionaries and the instrumental- bureaucratic "professionals." The first group utilizes "critical discourse" to echo and instigate demands, question

and criticize social ills, and finally lead and represent the discontented masses. Members of the second group, on the other hand, are capable of becoming careerists or ideologues or, as Antonio Gramsci put it, "experts in legitimation." This study is concerned with the former group. It

attempts to throw some light on the current shortcoming in our state of knowledge on Iranian intellectuals by analyzing their role, ideas, and responses toward the West.

Intellectuals have been the most concerned, searching, reflective and attentive observers of Iranian cultural transformation. They have also been some of its most

vociferous participants. As active "culture-carriers,

^Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, Arab Rediscoverv of Europe; A Studv in Cultural Encounters (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), 9.

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their narration on Western culture and native identity has demonstrably affected the attitude as well as response of Iranian masses toward such issues as modernity, secularism, democracy, and humanism. Examining the theoretical content of intellectuals' thought is one way of reflecting on the

experience of recent generations of Iranians. However, before embarking upon any further discussion of Iranian social thought, a number of conceptual clarifications are in order. Throughout this dissertation I have used the term **rowshanfekrn," as the Persian equivalent of the French "intellectuels," the Russian "intelligentsia,"

and the English "intellectuals. This, however, can be somewhat misleading since in Persian "ro^shan/ekr" has a more generic connotation than its French, Russian, and English counterparts. The latter terms which were all

coined in nineteenth-century Europe had rather concrete

connotations. The French term "intellectuels" referred to those thinkers who were identified for their advocacy of

deism, scientific rationalism and ideology. The "intelligentsia" referred to that class of Tzarist Russians who had undergone European education, and who had vowed to

act as committed and revolutionary agents of cultural

^he Persian term "rowshanfekr" was coined in the early 1940s by the Iranian Academy of Literature to replace the Arabic sounding term "monaver al-Fekr," which itself was the equivalent for the French terms "les Eclaires," and "Libre Penseur."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 7 transformation.* In Iran, it was this Russian definition of the intellectuals as agents of progressive and radical change that was popularly circulated until the early 1960s. However, from that point on, with the extension of scientific and technical structures, the term underwent a

qualitative transformation as a class of educated and professional Iranians came of age. The category of "rowshanfekran" was hence used in a more broad sense to

refer to both the intellectuals and the intelligentsia or, in general, all those who in one way or another were associated with modern education and modern professional skills. Thus, groups such as writers, poets, literary critics, artists, teachers, students, professors,

researchers, translators, and journalists, along with administrators, managers and technocrats were all categorized as intellectuals. So to borrow a phrase from Richard Hofstadter, the term "intellectual" was no longer

the sole designation of one who "...examines, ponders,

wonders, theorizes and imagines."* In this study, however, it is indeed those with

Hofstadter's qualifications that I am predominantly

*For an excellent analysis of the Russian intelligentsia see; Isaiah Berlin, Russian Thinkers (New York: Viking Press, 1978). *Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (New York: Knopf, 1963.) Cited in James A. Bill, The Politics of Iran: Groups. Classes and Modernization (Columbus, OH: Merrill, 1972), 57.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 8 concerned with. Neither the professional-bureaucratic segment of the intelligentsia nor the veteran politicians figure prominently in my investigation.’ Instead it is the literati, the university professors, the philosophers, ideologues and thinkers that concerns me. These latter categories forced me to reconsider a second facet of the prevalent Western definition of an intellectual. Should the intellectual necessarily be an iconoclast, a heretic, a liberal, a revolutionary, marginalized and a secularist? Or can the designation also be bestowed upon a conservative conformist, a carrier of tradition, a partisan of the status quo, or even a guardian of faith? In short can theologians, lay preachers, mystics, and religious leaders also be

considered as intellectuals? Such prominent Western sociologists as Max Weber, Karl Mannheim, S.N. Eisenstadt, and Edward Shils have answered this question in the affirmative.® In the case of Iran in particular^ the Shi'i

ulama have acted as the sole representatives of the

’For an example of works treating these latter groups see: Gholam R. Afkhami, The Iranian Revolution: Thanatos on a National Scale (Washington, D.C.: Middle East institute, 1985). ®I am referring to Max Weber's Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, trans. by Talcott Parsons (New York: Scribner, 1976); Karl Mannheim's Essavs on Sociology and Social Psychology (New York: Oxford University Press, 1953); s. N. Eisenstadt's "Intellectuals and Tradition," Daedalus 101, 2 (Spring 1972): 1-19; and Edward Shils' "Intellectuals, Tradition, and the Traditions of Intellectuals: Some Preliminary Considerations," Ibid: 21- 34.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 9 traditional intelligentsia. As men of learning they have appeared in such diverse capacities as teachers, writers, translators, judges. Court consultants and ideological functionaries. In fact, much of the philosophical, literary and intellectual stock of Iran throughout the ages owes its

existence to the cumulative efforts of Shi'ite and Sufi scholars, mystics, poets and thinkers.* Hence, to deny their proper role in the maturation process of Iranian intellectual development leads to a distorted intellectual historiography. Besides these conceptual clarifications, any study of

Iranian intellectuals must also account for a number of historical and social peculiarities. A brief comparison with other Middle Eastern countries helps to demonstrate these distinctions. First and foremost, the fact that Iran

was never officially colonized by European powers led to a sustained period of infatuation among its intellectuals with

the West. Like their Arab counterparts, Persian enlightened

thinkers and travellers to Europe in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century were captivated by such magical words of the West as "constitution," "education," "equality," "government," "justice," "law," "liberty," "nation," and

*What makes these contributions so interesting is that they have been accomplished despite the fanaticism and orthodoxy prevalent among the greater Muslim community, and the predominant rigidity of theological students and preachers. The hedonistic poetry of early Persian mystics provides an example of how the propriety of puritanical teachings could be skillfully short-circuited.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 10 "nationalism." However, while European colonization of the Arab world in the nineteenth-century led to the rise of strong anti-Western movements in countries such as Egypt and Sudan, no such parallel movement materialized in Persia. Secondly, while the intellectuals in Pakistan, India and

North African states such as Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia not only became "bilingual but [also] linguistically bicultural,the Iranian intellectuals accomplished neither. Thirdly, Iranian intellectuals could never match the Ottoman’s and, later, Turks' keen awareness of Western philosophy. They became mainly acquainted with European schools of thought in the nineteenth-century through Ottoman translations. Likewise, in the twentieth-century they could neither exceed Turkey's secularization drive nor outdo the Turkish intellectuals' commitment to secularism.^ Contrary to the Chinese and Russian intelligentsia who

For a discussion of the anti-Western movement that swept Sudan between 1880 and 1898 see: L. Carl Brown, "The Sudanese Mahdiya," in Protest and Power in Black Africa. Robert I. Rothberg and Ali Mazrui, eds. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979): 145-168. "Wilfred C. Smith, "The Intellectuals in the Modern Development of the Islamic World," in Sydney N. Fisher, ed., Social Forces in the Middle East (New York: Greenwood Press, 1968), 201. "For three treatments of secularism and secularization in Turkey see; Serif Mardin, The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962); Niazi Berkes, The Development of Secularism in Turkey (Montreal: McGill University Press, 1964); and Nur Yalman, "Some Observations on Secularism in Islam: The Cultural Revolution in Turkey," Daedalus 102, 1 (Winter 1973): 139-68.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 11 came from more or less homogeneous class backgrounds, attended exclusive schools, and went to specific European countries, the Iranian intellectuals enjoyed a diverse class background and were products of widely disparate educational and cultural settings. Furthermore, unlike the Japanese intellectuals of the nineteenth-century and the Indian intellectuals of the twentieth-century, who critically assessed various facets of their societies' relationship with the West, the Iranian intelligentsia remained quite uncritical on the subject." Finally, the Iranian secular intellectuals were not able to follow the example of their

Russian counterparts who, soon after becoming exposed to European philosophies, began to elevate those very same ideologies to new pinnacles, such as in Marxism or anarchism.!'* This study in no way claims to explain all these

particularities, nor does it even begin to address many of

the issues raised. It is within the setting described above that its concern with the content of Iranian social thought is limited to three sets of questions: (1) How did modern Iranian intellectuals viewed the West; (2) What constituted

"See Carmen Blacker, The Japanese Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1964); and J.L. Mehta, India and the West: The Problem of Understanding (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1985).

"For a treatment of Russian intellectual thought see: Andrzej Walicki, A Historv of Russian Thought From the Enlightenment to Marxism, trans. Hilda Andrews-Rusiecka (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1979).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 12 their response; and (3) Were they justified in their depiction and reaction to the West? Before a critical probe of Iranian intellectuals' thought patterns, I need to clarify the underlying epistemological and methodological premises of this work.

In order to identify the intellectuals' means and modes of cultural identification, this study will follow the postulates of epistemological and methodological pluralism.

As a post-positivist, I have drawn discriminately from such schools of thought as sociology of knowledge, hermeneutics, and post-structuralism. The historical approach of the

first, the dialogical understanding of the second, and the textual apprehension of the third have all guided my methodological inquiry. Following a dialectical approach, this study has benefitted both from the theoretical insight of sociology of knowledge, which emphasizes the situation-

bound nature of knowledge, as well as post-structuralism's

interpretive/hermeneutic insights. Focusing primarily on

the texts and "discursive practices"** of Iranian intellectuals, I have subjected their literary, philosophical, and political texts to the historical

**Michel Foucault provides us with the following definition of a "discursive practice": "A body of anonymous, historical rules, always determined in the time and space that have defined a given period, and for a given social, economic, geographical, or linguistic area, the conditions of operation of the enunciative function." Michel Foucault, The Archaeoloov of Knowledge, trans. by A.M. Sheridan Smith (New York: Pantheon Books, 1972), 117.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 13 scrutiny of sociology of knowledge and the hermeneutical interpretation of post-structuralism. I have been greatly inspired by the theoretical contributions of the literature on the "constitution of otherness" in general, and the works of Michel Foucault and

Edward Said in particular. Following the latter two, I have treated the oral discourse as well as the books, articles and documents of the intellectuals under examination as discursive texts. These "objects" have been viewed as "texts" of an incipient popular discourse as well as an ideological-political movement that came to dominate the

panorama of Iranian political culture during the last few decades. My initial task has been to articulate the context in which this discourse was produced, the intellectual traditions that fed it, and the socioeconomic conditions that gave rise to it. The second task aims to explain the

progression of "Orientalism in Reverse" from a defensive

discourse to an aggressive alternative discourse. The multi-dimensional and elastic nature of the subject matter under investigation made me realize that I need to move beyond the disciplinary boundaries of present academic professions. Among social scientists, my training

as an international relations scholar has given me the

opportunity to study the theoretical developments taking

place in the other social sciences. True to the interdisciplinary nature of my field of study I have taken

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 14 the liberty to venture and draw upon the fields of literary criticism, sociology, economics, intellectual history, cultural studies, theology and philosophy. Lastly, a word about methodology and data sources. In tracing the development of Iranian intellectual history during the last three decades, I have drawn upon a variety of primary and secondary source materials. My primary sources consisted of: (1) Interviews I conducted with a number of secular and Islamic intellectuals over a two-year period; (2) Tapes and monographs compiled by the "Iranian Oral History Project" of Harvard University's Center for

Middle Eastern Studies; and (3) Tapes and monographs compiled by the "Oral History Project" of The Foundation for Iranian Studies in Bethesda, Maryland. Although some positivists may still object to the use of oral history as an appropriate methodology and data source, I believe this

approach can greatly enhance studies of ordinary masses as

well as intellectual elites.** Oral history allows social

scientists the added privilege of preserving the life as well as the temporary experiences of the actors and the observers.*’ It enables one to analyze the cultural.

**See David Dunaway and Wila Baum, Oral History: An Interdisciplinary Anthology (Nashville: American Association for State and Local History, 1984); and Anthony Seldon and Joanna Pappworth, Bv Word of Mouth: Elite Oral History (London: Methuen, 1983). *’Oral history has been used to study various racial and ethnic groups, immigrants, tribes, youth, women, unemployed, community activists, prisoners, civil rights, labor, and

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 15 emotional, and intellectual modes of behavior of common people as well as statesmen, businessmen and other leading personalities both immediately as well as retrospectively^ Furthermore, the open-ended nature of this new way of compiling data, if conducted properly, allots the

possibility for a dynamic and conducive intellectual

exchange. The application of this approach to an study of contemporary Iranian intellectual life-world can be justified on two grounds. First of all, in the absence of any serious tradition of writing autobiographies or

maintaining memoirs or diaries, oral history is the most

logical way of preserving leading individuals' experiences. Secondly, the physical dislocation, loss of documents, economic hardships, and political restrictions which have plagued the Iranian community of intellectuals in the aftermath of the revolution make oral history an attractive

source of first-hand data gathering. Nonetheless, in order to provide a comprehensive portrait of the contemporary

Iranian intellectual world, I have augmented the rich and perceptive reminiscences of individual intellectuals with a

wealth of textual sources. Toward that end, I have examined various books, essays, articles, monographs, and reviews

guerrilla movements, and the survivors of revolutions, wars, and the holocaust. See Patricia P. Havlice, Oral Historv: A Reference Guide and Annotated Biblioqraphv (Jefferson: NC: McFarland, 1985).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 16 that have appeared in the last thirty years both within and outside Iran. Many of these informations are being presented to the Western readers, in an analytical manner, for the first time. The oral accounts have further been corroborated through a procedure of cross-reference with

other participants as well as source materials. The central theoretical predilections of this study are defined in Chapter one, where Michel Foucault's analysis of "otherness," Edward Said's assessment of "Orientalism," and Sadik Jalal al-Azm's critique of "Orientalism in Reverse," are discussed. In the second chapter, utilizing a political economy approach, I demonstrate how the "rentier" nature of the Pahlavi regime brought about its crisis of

legitimacy which, in turn, was exploited by a secular intelligentsia committed to political activism. Chapter three deals with the second type of otherness confronting secular Iranian intellectuals, the otherness of the West.

The latter group's search for self-identity is deconstructed

through the literary, political and philosophical texts of four important Iranian intellectuals, namely Fakhr ad-din

Shadman, Ahmad Fardid, Jalal Al-e Ahmad, and Daryush Shayegan. In the fourth chapter, an account is presented on the changing nature of the clergy's philosophical and political discourse. Chapter five investigates the

discursive practices of a newly emerging class of religious intellectuals whose vision of cultivating an "Islamic

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 17 alternative" led to cries for "authenticity" and calls for "return to self." The final chapter of the dissertation undertakes a critical assessment of intellectual debates in post-revolutionary Iran, demonstrating the range of problematics and challenges facing the prevalent discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER I

OTHERNESS, ORIENTALISM, AND ORIENTALISM IN REVERSE

Martin Heidegger has identified an egocentrism which operates at the origin of Western poittical thinking. With the Cartesian "I think," an egoity appeared and became the established definition of humanity. The I provided an origin from which a certain but egocentric and dualistic universe was secured for Western experience.* It has been proclaimed that twentieth-century philosophy has undergone a "linguistic turn."’ This turn toward language has brought an unmistakable interest in the "Other," since embedded within language is the dichotomy between sameness and difference. Ludwig Wittgenstein's "language games," Jacques Derrida's "ethic of the ear," Jacques Lacan's "other," Jürgen Habermas's "communicative ethics," Hans Gadamer's "hermeneutics," Jean-Paul Sartre's

"Existentialism," Roland Barthes's "textuality," and Michel

Foucault's "archeology" have all undertaken a deconstruction

*Kenneth Liberman, "Decentring the Self: Two Perspectives from Philosophical Anthropology," in The Question of the Other, eds. Arleen B. Dallery and Charles E. Scott (Albany: The State University of New York Press, 1989), 127. ’Martin Jay, "Should Intellectual History Take a Linguistic Turn? Reflections on the Habermas-Gadamer Debate," in Modern European Intellectual Historv. eds. Dominick LaCapra and Steven L. Kaplan (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982), 87. 18

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 13 of the Cartesian "I", the "thinking ego" as the indispensable centerpiece of Western philosophy. These philosophers have not deserted the "I", but instead have called for a redefinition of it vis-a-vis the "Other." Derrida spoke of the need to decenter the self toward the

other; Sartre put forth the obligation to will the freedom of others, while Foucault taught us to abandon the blinders of "otherness" altogether. Thus, through language, the question of "Other" entered the limelight of modern

philosophy. Pre-modern thought has been of a binary nature, instituted upon the taxonomy of self/other. Perhaps the first practice of identifying an "other" occurred with Homo sapiens* recognition of their difference vis-a-vis animals, the Others, as radical non-selves.* The next act of differentiation took place with the development of myths, which, according to Mircea Eliade, maintained the absolute

"Otherness" of the divine while suggesting it to humans as

an exemplary model. But certainly the most enduring and socially powerful form of "Otherness" came about with the emergence of religious world views — in particular, the tradition of Semitic religions (Christianity, Islam, and

Judaism). All three religions share the same ontology by

*Michael J. Shapiro, The Politics of Representation; Writing Practices in Biography. Photographv. and Policv Analysis (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988), 102.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 20 dividing humanity into believer versus infidel, pious versus sinful, godly versus satanic, essentially, "us" versus "them." Albeit to different degrees, these categorical dualisms emanate from the unyielding beliefs of these religions in the idea of monotheism, which constitutes the

basis of their ontology. These religions all belong to a tradition that Michel Foucault identified as the "salvation

religions." He wrote of Christianity: "It's one of those religions which is supposed to lead the individual from one reality to another, from death to life, from time to eternity. In order to achieve that, Christianity imposed a set of conditions and rules of behavior for a certain

transformation of the self."* These "conditions" and "rules" were introduced against the background of a set of directive and commissive speech acts aimed at both the

disbelieving and the already converted.* In addition to being a redemptive religion, Foucault added, Christianity is also confessional. He referred to

early Christianity's ritual of exomologesis which, in addition to recognizing oneself as a sinner and penitent.

*Michel Foucault, "Technologies of the Self," in Technologies of the Self: A Seminar With Michel Foucault, eds. Luther H. Martin, Huck Gutman, and Patrick H. Hutton (Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1988), 40.

*For more on the three types of speech acts (assertive, directive, and commissive) see: Nicholas G. Onuf, World of Our Making: Rules and Rule in Social Theorv and International Relations (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1989): 78-95.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 21 involved fasting, rules about clothing, and prohibitions about sex, marriage and the priesthood.® The model of exomologesis was a "model of death, of torture, or of martyrdom." The sinner's disclosure of self is actualized by renunciation of one's own self, either through "killing"

himself or becoming fully obedient to a master.’ Foucault

argued, however, that from the fourth to the seventeenth century, a new technology for the disclosure of the self, exagoreusis, became predominant. The Greco-Roman idea of attending to the self was gradually replaced with Christianity's notion of self-renunciation. Reminiscent of the teacher/master verbalizing practice of the pagans,

exagoreusis called for renunciation of one's will and self by verbalizing his thought and permanently obeying a

master.* Foucault contended that in the modern era this "verbalizing practice" took a different form and was played

out in a new realm: the human sciences. He wrote:

From the eighteenth century to the present, the techniques of verbalization have been reinserted in a different context by the so-called human sciences in order to use them without renunciation of the self but to constitute, positively, a new self. To use these techniques without renouncing oneself constitutes a decisive break.®

®Michel Foucault, "Technologies of the Self": 41.

’ibid., 43-48.

*Ibid. ®Ibid., 49.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 22 Foucault maintained that the human sciences' construction of this new "self" has come about through the constitution of an "Other." In other words, self-knowledge develops through a knowledge of the "Other." He devoted a good part of his intellectual life to an examination of this

knowledge-accumulation process.*® Toward this end, he excavated the genealogy of various modern scientific disciplines, such as biology, economics, medicine, penology, and psychiatry. Foucault positioned his "archaeology of knowledge" at the convergence point of social history (how people act without thinking) and the history of ideas (how

people think without acting). His goal was not so much to foster a compromise but to open a space for dialogue through a demonstration of the insufficiencies of the two approaches. ** Foucault identified four technologies that human beings use to understand themselves; (1) technologies of

production; (2) technologies of sign system; (3)

*°Shortly before his death, Foucault summed up his long-held aspirations in the following way: "My objective for more than twenty-five years has been to sketch out a history of the different ways in our culture that humans develop knowledge about themselves." Ibid., 17-18. **He writes: "My field is the history of thought... Between social history and formal analyses of thought there is a path, a lane — maybe very narrow — which is the path of the historian of thought." Rux Martin, "Truth, Power, Self: An Interview With Michel Foucault," in Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault: 10.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 23 technologies of power; and (4) technologies of the self.*’ While Marx was concerned with the technology of production, Foucault preoccupied himself with the technologies of the self.** According to him, understanding the genealogy of knowledge is not possible without comprehending the ties

between power and knowledge. To demonstrate this point, Foucault examined the discursive practices of various scientific disciplines. Following the legacy of the Nietzschean tradition, Foucault concentrated on the "I," the "self-proclaimed agency," "the self-conscious individual," and "the subject of knowledge, action, and moral responsibility."** Foucault was concerned with how the "other" disappears into the singular "I," and

the collective "we." Thus, he began his intellectual odyssey into the margins of selfhood and of society. He studied the "madman," the "deviant," the "prisoner," the

"delinquent," the "murderer," the "hermaphrodite" — in

*’Michel Foucault, "Technologies of the Self": 18. "Foucault writes: "Technologies of the self permit individuals to effect by their own means or with the help of others a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts, conduct, and ways of being, so as to transform themselves in order to attain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality." Ibid. **Ladelle McWhorter, "Foucault's Move Beyond the Theoretical," in The Question of the Other: 198.

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short, our "Others."** Foucault charged that these "Others" have been created by discourses'^ harnessed to powerful

social forces and institutions. In other words, it is not objects that create discourses, but the reverse. Furthermore, through their linkage to the dominant power structures as well as in the name of scientific objectivity, the discourses of the human sciences have come to constitute

"regimes of truth."*’ These regimes of truth perform a "policing function" whose imperative is to: establish boundaries between regulated and unregulated domains of human activity, which creates a mentality that interprets such activity in terms of binary oppositions: sanity and insanity, health and sickness, legitimate and criminal behavior.

**See the following works of Foucault: Madness and Civilization: A Historv of Insanity in the Age of Reason (New York: Pantheon, 1965) ; The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception (New York: Vintage Books, 1975); Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1979); The Historv of Sexuality, vol. 1 (New York: Vintage Books, 1980). *®Formatively influenced by the works of Foucault, Michael J. Shapiro offers the following definition for "discourse*' : "A linguistic practice that puts into play sets of rules and procedures for the formation of objects, speakers, and thematics... The concept of discourse involves concrete, temporarily, and spatially located instances of language practice as well as signalling a concern more with the constitutive role of statements than with their referential function." Michael J. Shapiro, "Strategic Discourse/Discursive Strategy: The Representation of 'Security Policy' in the Video Age," Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Atlanta, 1989: 6-8. *’Donna U. Gregory, "Forward," in International/ Intertextual Relations, eds. James Der Derian and Michael J. Shapiro (Lexington, MA.: Lexington Books, 1989): xiv.

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lawful and illicit love." Foucault was intent on proving the arbitrariness of these categorizations. In Madness and Civilization, he untangled psychiatric discourse, demonstrating how perception of the insane changed from one of eccentric behavior in the Middle Ages, to embarrassing behavior in the sixteenth century, and finally to intolerable behavior in the eighteenth century." He performed this very same deconstruction on the discursive practices of a variety of other disciplines. Through a critical analysis of their assumptions, discourses, and actions, Foucault brought a historical indictment against such academic disciplines as

medicine, pedagogy, penology, and demography. Foucault's "genealogy" centered around the problematic of power-knowledge, and the triangle of power, right, and truth. He contended that "the exercise of power itself creates and causes to emerge new objects of knowledge and accumulates new bodies of information...Conversely,

knowledge constantly induces effects of power."’® According to Foucault, the manifold relations of power in any society

"...cannot be established, consolidated nor implemented

"Patrick H. Hutton, "Foucault, Freud, and the Technologies of the Self," in Technologies of the Self; A Seminar with Michel Foucault; 126. "Foucault, Madness and Civilization: 3-64.

’®Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977. ed. Colin Gordon (New York: Pantheon Books, 1977): 51-52.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 26 without the production, accumulation, circulation and functioning of a discourse."’* Furthermore, he believed that "...there can be no possible exercise of power without a certain economy of discourses of truth which operates through and on the basis of this association."” The

association was thus centered on a triangle composed of rules of right, mechanisms of power, and the effects of truth. Foucault first examined the dynamics of this causal triangle in the development of the classical "human sciences,"” and then proceeded to an examination of such disciplines as political economy, biology, psychiatry,

medicine, and penology. According to him, by inventing or reactivating a set of rules, these disciplines came to constitute a system of control in the production of discourses. Discourses thus became "assets" for which

different social forces compete in a discursive economy. Foucault's stance vis-a-vis the tradition of

continental philosophy is extremely important. By

addressing the social-historical and social-ontological problematic of otherness, Foucault indirectly had come to

criticize Hegel's four stages of human history, which he

’*Ibid., 93.

”lbid. ”See Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeologv of the Human Sciences (New York: Vintage Books, 1973) .

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 27 perceived to be too reductionist and Eurocentric. Furthermore, like most other students of post-Hegelian thought, Foucault abandoned Hegel's dialectic of master and

bondsman in favor of a study of the "other." By questioning whom discourse serves, Foucault supplemented Marx's question of whose interest the geometry of power supports. While Marx looked at the means and modes of production, Foucault's critical sequel interrogates the means and modes of representation. Both thinkers, however, were preoccupied with the process of alienation, whereby the human subject leaves his authentic state of being in order to become an

"other." Foucault's work also called into question the central tenets of phenomenology, which holds the sameness of self and the other as a basic prerequisite of mutual

interpersonal understanding, communication, and relations.**

For Foucault, otherness is not just a question of

difference, but also one of hierarchy, since the "other" is not one with whom we identify, but instead one whom we perceive to be either superior or inferior to us. Foucault

also parted ways with structuralists, who are more concerned with delineating the stable structures and continuities of

**For two critical examinations of the phenomenological exposition of otherness, see: Z.D. Gurevitch, "The Other Side of Dialogue: On Making the Other Strange and the Experience of Otherness," American Journal of Socioloov 93, 5 (March 1988): 1179-1199; and Adrian Diethelm, "Phenomenology Deconstructed," Working Papers in Sex. Science and Culture. 3 (August 1977): 69-78.

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history than with showing its irrationalities and discontinuities. He wrote: "My aim is most decidedly not to use the categories of cultural totalities (whether world views, ideal types, the particular spirit of an age) in order to impose on history, despite itself, the forms of

structural analysis."” Martin Heidegger once suggested that the modern age was not only the age of the master narrative, but also the age of representation.” Foucault's criticism of the master narrative of Western man, as well as his deconstruction of its ensuing forms of representation, constitutes the bulk of his intellectual contribution. Hence, one can summarize Foucault's accomplishments in three tiers: (1) Western civilization does not constitute a well-defined and homogeneous entity; (2) knowledge and power are intertwined; and (3) by committing violence (hindering, misconstructing,

precluding) toward an "other," "we" are in fact damaging our own sense of self-identity. Foucault's ground-breaking work on otherness inspired

numerous scholars and intellectuals to apply his genealogical methodology to different subject matters,

disciplines, geographical entities, as well as historical

“Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge: 15.

“Quoted in Graig Owens, "The Discourse of Others: Feminists and Postmodernism," in The Anti-Aesthetic: Essavs on Postmodern Culture, ed. Hal Foster (Port Townsend, WA: Bay Press, 1983): 66.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 29 settings. Two areas that proved receptive to this line of inquiry were feminism and racism. The feminist literature on otherness has demonstrated how the gender-coded, bifurcated modern society functions. In so doing, it has informed us of the mechanisms through which the man is

perceived as the absolute self and the woman as the inferior other: of how the "wife" develops to be the persistent, naturalized, and the internal other of the "husband," while "she" is all along the "other of phallocentric discourse."” Similar works on the history of racism have also demonstrated how ethnic Indians become the "strangers" of European immigrants to America, black slaves the "inferiors"

of the white masters, and Jews the "subversive enemies" of fascism and Nazism.” However, perhaps the most challenging types of deconstructive work have emerged in such fields as history and anthropology which, among other things, share a

common subject matter ("otherness"); are both concerned with the text and context of actions rooted in time and place;

”For some feminist works on the problematic of "otherness" see: Drucilla Cornell, "Feminism, Negativity, Intersubjectivity," Praxis International 5, 4 (January 1986): 484-504; Mary L. Felstiner, "Seeing the Second Sex Through the Second Wave," Feminist Studies 6, 2 (Summer 1980): 247-276; and Genevieve Llyod, The Man of Reason: "Male" and "Female" in Western Philosophy (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984).

“For a thought-provoking discussion of racism see the set of articles published in two special issues of Critical Inquiry 12, 1 (Autumn 1985); and 13, 1 (Autumn 1986) under the titles of "Race, Writing, and Difference," and "More on Race."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 30 are concerned with the acts of translation, understanding, and explanation; and report results in a literary form.” The development of secularism, along with the appearance of a "colonial" discourse in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, reinforced the dichotomous mindset

of the Western man. Such dichotomies as European/non- European and Civilization/Barbarism easily replaced the Christendom/Muslim dyad prevalent in the Middle Ages. The development in the nineteenth century of anthropology as an intellectual endeavor came against such a background. The expansion of European colonialism, the growth of an almost unbending faith in science, the combined condescension and universalization inherent in global, all [-] encompassing theories of biological and social evolution, and the successful domination of much of the world's political economy by nineteenth century Euro-American capitalism made the emergence of academic anthropology not only possible but highly likely.*® At the core of anthropology from the very beginning

was a paradigm defined by James Clifford as a "salvage

paradigm," a geopolitical, historical paradigm that has

organized Western practices of "art- and culture- collecting."** The "salvage" paradigm represents the white

“Bernard S. Cohn, "History and Anthropology; The State of Play," Comparative Studies in Society and History 22, 2 (April 1980); 198-199. “Virginia R. Dominguez, "Of Other Peoples: Beyond the 'Salvage' Paradigm," in Discussions in Contemporary Culture, ed. Hal Foster (Seattle: Bay Press, 1987): 133. **James Clifford, "Of Other Peoples: Beyond the 'Salvage' Paradigm," in Discussions in Contemporary Culture. 121.

Reproduced with permission of the copyrightowner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 31 man's burden of attempting to subjugate the "savage," "heathen," "beast," or "barbarian," while desiring at the same time to rescue his "authenticity," "fossils," and "tribal culture." This relationship obviously is not one of parity, since the non-Westerners are always regarded as dispensable marginals incapable of realizing the importance of preserving the well-being of their own objects. Hence, it is "our" job to "salvage," "rescue," "save," and "preserve" their artifacts. As Clifford and Dominguez both point out, it is not a coincidence that connoisseurships, art collection, the rise of public museums, the scramble for

ethnographic artifacts, and the emergence and popularity of world fairs all occurred simultaneously with the development of anthropology in the nineteenth century. Thus, the West came to define the standards of authenticity while anthropology worked to justify its right of entitlement.

The former failed to realize that, like difference,

authenticity is "produced not salvaged,"” while anthropology decided to ignore the fact that the "Others" were in a significant way an artificial creation of its own

discursive practices.” In The Conquest of America, the Franco-Bulgarian

”Trinh T. Minh-Ha, "Of Other People," in Discussions in Contemporary Culture. 140. ”See Jonathan Friedman, "Beyond Otherness: The Spectacularization of Anthropology," Telos 71 (Spring 1987) 165.

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writer and critic Tzvetan Todorov demonstrated how the history of cultural confrontations can be de-mystified and re-written if we were to take cognizance of the presence of the "Other." Re-examining the "discovery" paradigm of European historiography in light of the Spanish conquest of

Central America in the sixteenth-century, Todorov argues

that this paradigm is a falsification of history. Like the "salvage" paradigm of anthropology, the "discovery" paradigm of intercultural confrontation reifies the people and cultures that it studies, but fails to treat them as subjects of history. Todorov suggests that the problematic

of alterity can be placed upon at least three levels: (1) the axiological level involving a value judgment (i.e. the

other is good or bad); (2) the praxeological level involving a rapprochement or distancing in relation to the other (embracing the other's values or identifying the other with yourself); and (3) the epistemic level involving knowledge or ignorance of the other's identity.** Todorov is most

interested in the second axis of assimilation and

identification. He maintains that ever since the time of the conquest. Western civilization has employed this axis in order to assimilate the other into its own domain, and indeed has in great part succeeded.** Todorov refers to the

“Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America, trans. by Richard Howard (New York: Harper 6 Row Publishers, 1984): 185. 35 Ibid., 247-248,

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 33 science of ethnology, this "child of colonialism," as one of the processes through which the assimilation of the other became possible. As he shows in the case of the Spanish conquistadors, the epiphany of the other can also be imaginatively constituted, whereby instead of uncovering an

objective other we discover our very own subjective cognition. Hence, Columbus' "discovery" of the Americas in 1492 was not so much the beginning of the modern era, but a re-discovery of the European self vis-a-vis a newly found other in the wonderlands of Mexico and the Caribbean. Colonial ethnology produced its own etymology, which

in turn, had a heavy impact on the geographical discourse. Regions of the world were designated as either based on their spatial proximity or their cultural amenability toward Western Europe. According to the yardsticks of the British or French politicians and military officers, the whole of Asia was divided into Near, Middle, and Far Easts, and the

African continent into North and South. Similarly, the term

"Latin America" first emerged and spread in the second half of the nineteenth-century.” Michael J. Shapiro has recently reminded us once again of how the discipline of geography continues to develop in the shadow of the military to this very day. Taking the case of the territory defined as "Southeast Asia," Shapiro points out that this term only

“Robert Fernandez Retmar, "Our America and the West," Social Text 15 (Fall 1986): 1.

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recently acquired its now-stable linguistic/geopolitical identity. He maintains that this expression did not exist prior to 1942; it was only then coined by the U.S. Pacific Command and map-makers for a public interested in following the developing allied military movements.” According to Shapiro, the "geographical 'knowledge' we invoke in our naming helps, in Foucault's terms, to put into circulation the tactics and strategies involved in the 'demarcations' and 'control of territories'."*® The appearance of terms such as "civilization" in the middle of the eighteenth century, and the "West" in the mid-nineteenth century necessitated the positing of "Barbarians" and the

"Orientals" as the antithetical "Others." Hence, in response to the question "What is in a name?" one can answer, "Otherness." Just like boundaries, the names on a map constitute not a neutral designation but an arena of contested claims and rights. The question is not one of

right versus wrong, but one of cultural intersubjectivity;

of how the "other" is produced, circulated, and consumed

within our social imagination. An example of this contested terrain is found in the works of Jose Marti, one of Latin America's greatest nineteenth-century intellectuals, who

“Michael J. Shapiro, "The Constitution of the Central American Other," in The Politics of Representation; 93-94. “Ibid., 93.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 35 spoke of "Our America" instead of "Latin America."*® Marti was attempting to write the poetry, history and the general story of his "own" America, instead of one composed and narrated by the European travelers, historians, and anthropologists. Thus, his attempts were motivated by a desire to reformulate the terms of discourse in order to take possession of these "assets" within the economy of linguistic practices.

Two other examples of how otherness is embedded within naming practices are "Islam" versus the "West," and "First World" versus the "Third World." In the first dichotomy, one entity is designated based on its primordial religion (Islam) while the other is defined in terms of geography. In the second set of binary opposites, the First and Second Worlds are delineated in terms of specific modes of production (capitalism or socialism), while the Third World is designated in terms of an external experience of domination. The two naming practices help to sustain the

sense of otherness between the secular and the religious, and the modern and the traditional.

*®Retamar, "Our America and the West": 1.

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Orientalism

Contact between cultures always makes for drama: an ontological, communal drama of human differences or an existential, intellectual drama in the life of an individual. Superficial contact creates a feeling of strangeness; more profound encounters risk bringing on the dissolution of the self, the shattering of its coherence, the end of certitude, and a traumatic challenge to one's values.*® One of the first and most promising attempts to apply systematically Foucault's archaeological method to a new subject matter came with the publication of Edward W. Said's Orientalism.** Like Foucault, Said was interested in the machinery of representation, of how an "Other" comes to be constituted. Said's subject matter was the "Orient," an

exotic spatial and cultural configuration, which had succeeded for centuries in captivating the attention as well

as fomenting fears and passions among Europeans. Said's "Orientals" resemble Foucault's insane, perverts, and criminals in a number of ways. All are subjects of prevalent institutional discourses and narratives who are identified,

analyzed, and controlled but never allowed to speak.*’ All share a condition of otherness arising from their perceived

difference with respect to what is accepted as "normal,"

*®Hichem Djait, Europe and Islam: Cultures and Modernity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985) : 51. **Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage Books, 1979) . *’Said opens his book with a quotation from Marx: "They cannot represent themselves; they must be represented."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 37 "true,” and "right." Said's book is an exercise in textual criticism. Through a meticulous examination of scholarly writings, diplomatic archives, travel memoirs, and literary volumes, he comes to demonstrate how the Orient was first appropriated "textually" by Europeans in the nineteenth century. According to Said, all societies acquire their identities through a juxtaposition to another: an alien, a foreigner, or an enemy. A schematic glance at the spectrum of political cultures around the world substantiates Said's claim that the dichotomizing technique of differentiation between "us" and "them" is an important component of any organized system of political thought. Politics both as a discipline and a vocation classifies people on the basis of supporter or opponent, companion or rival, and most importantly, friend or enemy.

Said contends that this appropriation was made

possible through a discourse of difference that he designates as "Orientalism." He defines "Orientalism" as

"an enormously systematic discipline by which European culture was able to manage — and even produce — the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post- Enlightenment period."* According to Said, Orientalism as

*Said, Orientalism: 3, Said, however, is inconsistent with this definition throughout the book. His polemical style leads him to define Orientalism as a "corporate

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 38 a body of knowledge and system of representation succeeded in portraying the "Orient" as Europe's silent "civilizational other." The line which was drawn somewhere between present-day Greece and Turkey to separate Orient and Occident was not so much a fact of nature but rather an invention of European "imaginative geography."* Said

writes ; We must take seriously Vico's great observation that men make their own history, that what they can know is what they have made, and extend it to geography; as both geographical and cultural entities — to say nothing of historical entities — such locales, regions, geographical sectors as "Orient" and "Occident" are man-made. Therefore as much as the West itself, the Orient is an idea that has a history and a tradition of thought, imagery, and vocabulary that have given it reality and presence in and for the West.* Since the self is invariably linked with the other, it was in opposition to this designated entity that Europe was able to create and maintain its own identity. Among the countries of the Orient, China represented the ultimate

exotic other, due to its geographical remoteness and

historical isolation. India, long the crown jewel of the British colonial acquisitions in the sub-continent, was the next candidate for otherness, becoming more important with

institution" (3); "form of paranoia" (72); "political doctrine" (240); "mental reality" (44) ; "discourse" (3); "discursive formation" (23); "an exercise of cultural strength" (40), etc.

*Edward Said, "Orientalism Reconsidered," Race and Class 27, 2 (Autumn 1985): 2. 45 Said, Orientalism: 4-5.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 39 the rise of the Romanticist movement in the nineteenth century.* The only remaining candidate qualified to serve Europe's need of a quintessential "other" was the Muslim world. The Islamic East, or Mashreq, was regarded as close

to, yet different from, the totality of Western civilization. As a Semitic religion, Islam shared many of Christianity's theological axioms, yet its geographical proximity, confrontational outlook which led to the conquest of European lands in the Middle Ages, along with its

demonstrated political unity under the Ottoman Empire, established it as Europe's great cultural and political

adversary. Until the eighteenth-century Islam was viewed as a perversion of Christianity, and the Muslim world as the province of the Antichrist. With the coming of the secular philosophy of the Enlightenment, the Islamic world came to

be perceived as the embodiment of all that was recently left

behind in Europe; an all-encompassing religion, political despotism, cultural stagnation, scientific ignorance,

superstition, etc. Hence, the Islamic Orient became Europe's collective nightmare, a world prone to stereotypes and exotic

fantasies. For Western man the "Orientals," who include the

*For two works treating the otherness of China and India see: Zhang Longxi, "The Myth of the Other: China in the Eyes of the West," Critical Incmirv 15, 1 (Autumn 1988): 108-131; and Gauri Viswanathan, "Currying Favor: The Politics of British Educational and Cultural Policy in India, 1813-1854," Social Text 19/20 (Fall 1988): 85-104.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 40 "Muslims," "Arabs," "Turks," and "Persians," were only occupying a "discursive space." They served as Rousseau's ideal type of "noble savage," and as Montesquieu's fictitious travelers to Paris in Lettres Persanes. The former viewed them nostalgically as the representatives of a bygone age in harmony with nature, while the latter used

them as a symbolic mouthpiece for his criticism of European life at the time. In both cases they served as the metaphorical reflections of the Occidental self upon itself. Thus as Said has rightfully argued, "...the relation between Orientalists and Orient was essentially hermeneutical: standing before a distant, barely- intelligible civilization or cultural monument, the Orientalist scholar reduced the obscurity by translating, sympathetically portraying, inwardly grasping the hard to reach object."* The Orient and Orientals could only serve

in the capacity of "communities of interpretation,"* always

represented yet never representing. The Orient was written about but never able to "write back." The Orientalist was always present while the Orient was routinely absent. The

Orient and the Orientals served as real and imaginary "texts" and "subjects" for European authors. The world of Western writing and Oriental silence made it possible to represent and label a variety of things "Oriental." Such

*Said, Orientalism: 222. *Said, "Orientalism Reconsidered": 4,

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 41 terms as Oriental "corruption," "cruelty," "despotism," "essence," "mentality," "mysticism," "sensuality," "spirit," and "splendor" soon entered the everyday discourse of European observers (see Table 1). The Orient thus came to epitomize not just a surrogate idea but an "ontological

other" which was discovered, confined, salvaged, and "civilized." "It can best be described as the contrast of opposites: the Orient is what the Occident is not. Once again let's cite the differences: technology, religion, individualism, and so on," said one critic of this distorted

ontology.* This paradigm of difference was maintained through the discourse of Orientalism which was rooted in the rationalism, secularism, and universalisa of the eighteenth century as well as the romanticism, positivism, and colonialism of the nineteenth century. Deeply grounded in the political culture of their time. Orientalist scholars

came to rely on such diverse disciplines as biology, anthropology, philology, and lexicography to justify the paradigmatic dominance of the Occident. Academic Orientalism soon became a school of interpretation and a

*Albert Memmi, "The Orient: Myth and Reality," Dissent 28, 3 (Summer 1981): 369.

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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 43 source of knowledge about the Orient. The accumulated lineage of this cultural tradition facilitated Western man's self-appointed mission of transforming the world into his own image. Responding to Foucault's knowledge/power maxim. Said discloses the conscious as well as the unconscious collaboration, between Orientalists and the colonialist

powers, whereby the former apprehended the Orient intellectually while the later appropriated it physically.*® Thus, since the eighteenth century positive knowledge expedited the process of power and capital accumulation. What made this cooperation possible, according to Said, was the common racist, imperialistic, and ethnocentric

beliefs of the academic Orientalists and the colonialist politicians. The religiously-inspired racial prejudices of

the Middle Ages were the historical antecedent for the biological and geographical racisms of the post-Renaissance

era. The passage from the feudal system to a capitalist

mode of production, with the subsequent requirements of

capital accumulation, directed Western powers to dispatch their troops to the lands of the "-primitives.” Perhaps the

most influential factor of all was the ethnocentric and

“said refers to Napoleon's invasion of Egypt in 1789 as an example of how the two trends converged. Furthermore, he demonstrates how, during the heyday of colonialist expansion in the beginning of the nineteenth-century, "Asia Societies" were formed in France (1822), England (1823), and United States (1842). Academic chairs in oriental studies were established at every major European university.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 44

Eurocentric culture of modernity.The universalist nature of the European idea of progress, which viewed man in a permanent thrust forward, could not look favorably upon the non-synchronous experience of the Orient. The land of antiquity and metaphysics could only be abandoned if the cherished goal of progress were to be attained. Despite

their "Oriental" pedigree, Europeans appropriated Hellenism and Christianity as the constitutive elements of their own particular heritage. It was from the position of this borrowed identity that they paternalistically took it upon themselves to represent and judge the Orient as the depository of the archaic past and eternal stagnation.“

Said notes that "Oriental history — for Hegel, for Marx, later for Burkhardt, Nietzsche, Spengler and other major philosophers of history — was useful in portraying a region of great age, and what had to be left behind."*

*In his consequential book, Marshall Berman has interpreted the four major features of modernity; (1) that modernity is a uniquely European phenomenon; (2) that it transformed the pre-moderns' traditional polarity of an illusory versus a real world; (3) that by unveiling religious and political illusions, the bourgeois revolutions "uncovered and exposed new options and hopes"; (4) that the bourgeoisie not only brought forward a free economic market but also provided for a freedom "to shop around and seek the best deals in ideas, associations, laws and social policies, as well as in things." See Marshall Berman, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air (New York: Penguin Books, 1988): 13-36, 105-114. “Samir Amin, Eurocentrism (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1939): 100-101. Amin provides a critique of Europe's counterfeit as well as authentic genealogies. *Said, "Orientalism Reconsidered": 5.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 45 While sharing Foucault's general line of reasoning.

Said differs from him in many ways. Both men are learned critics of representation who are more concerned with deconstruction of the prevalent ways of thinking than with presenting an alternative. Their aim is to resurrect the

forgotten presence of the subaltern and marginal others. However, while Foucault attempts to particularize European culture within its own self-defined boundaries. Said ventures into the more contested terrain of questioning Western claims to truth. Second, Foucault and Said differ in how they view the relationship between individual texts and authors and collective formations and discourses. In Foucault's encyclopedic macro-analysis of the genealogy of various institutions, individual texts and writers do not count much, while in Said's micro-analysis they are of primary interest. On this difference. Said writes: "Yet unlike Michel Foucault, to whose work I am greatly indebted,

I do believe in the determining imprint of individual writers upon the otherwise anonymous collective body of

texts constituting a discursive formation like Orientalism."* The third discrepancy between the two thinkers manifests itself in their attitudes toward power. Foucault is more concerned with the technologies and manners

of realization of power, while Said is preoccupied with

*Said, Orientalism: 23. For more on this point see Edward Said's The World, the Text and the Critic (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 46

opposition to it. Again, Said formulates the differences between himself and Foucault in the following way; Many of the people who admire and have learned from Foucault, including myself, have commented on the undifferentiated power he seemed to ascribe to modern society. With this profoundly pessimistic view went also a singular lack of interest in the force of effective resistance to it, in choosing particular sites of intensity, choices which, we see from the evidence on all sides, always exist and are often successful in impeding, if not actually stopping, the progress of tyrannical power.* Said's interest in mounting an attack on the prevalent structures of power instead of a mere delineation of it,

leads to the fourth difference; political activism. While Foucault remained a critic of humanism throughout. Said is a passionate defender of it. Spatially speaking, one can say that while Foucault's normative considerations stay in the background, Said's valuative beliefs are present at the very forefront of his writings. Whether deploring Orientalists or defending the plight of his Palestinian people, Said's

normative predilections can be easily detected. Such post

positivist epistemological schools of thought as Critical theory, hermeneutics, and post-structuralism have indicated,

however, that this is not an act to be deplored.* The only drawback to Said's seminal work is the excessive polemical

*Edward W. Said, "Foucault and the Imagination of Power," in Foucault: A Critical Reader, ed. David Couzens Hoy (New York: Basil Blackwell, 1987): 151.

*For a defense of this view see Seyla Benhabib, Critique. Norm, and Utopia (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 47 rhetoric he sporadically employs throughout his text. Writing around the same time as Edward Said were two

European critics of Orientalism, Maxime Rodinson and Brian S. Turner. Rodinson, a French sociologist trained as an Orientalist, has been the most successful in undermining his own discipline by calling into question some of its dominant stereotypes.” He differs from Said in a number of ways.

Firstly, he disagrees with Said's assertion about the malevolent intentionality of studying different societies. For him, the desire to study cultures and societies that differ from our own is only a general human tendency shared by virtually all societies. Secondly, tracing the lineage

of Orientalism, Rodinson contends that the word Orientalist appeared in English around 1779 and in French in 1799.* In contrast to Said, however, he maintains that the eighteenth century's universalist vision placed Orient and Occident side by side. The fraternal and understanding eyes of Goethe, Rousseau, Voltaire, and the French Revolutionaries

who believed all men are born equal perceived the Orientals as foreign but equal. Yet this was also an age of

exoticism, of conceiving the other. The translation around 1717 of the novel Arabian Nights, for example, made a

”See in particular: Islam and Capitalism (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981); and Marxism and the Muslim World (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1981). *Maxime Rodinson, Europe and the Mvstiaue of Islam, trans. by Roger Veinus (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1980): 57.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 48 "monumental contribution to the growing mystique of the

Orient. Rodinson is closer to Said in his overall evaluation

of Orientalism. He writes: The concept of Orientalism itself sprang from pragmatic necessities that forced themselves on European scholars devoted to the study of other cultures. This situation was reinforced by European dominance over other societies, and the result was a greatly distorted vision of things.*® Finally, Rodinson contends that Said too often makes the same mistake that he himself and other communist

intellectuals of the 1930s and 1940s committed, that of assuming "...all foes of the powerful were pure heros, all their ideas the unalloyed truth, and all their deeds paragons of virtuous action."*' In other words, for Rodinson the Orientals, like the proletariat, are not the

sole embodiments of goodness and purity that Said tries to portray. Rodinson attributes this shortcoming on the part of Said to his nationalistic tendencies and limited scope of

inquiry. Brian S. Turner, a British-educated Marxist

sociologist, attacks the problematic of Orientalism at its

core epistemological foundations. He contents that

“ibid., 44. For an analysis of Orientalist art as portrayed in nineteenth-century French paintings see: Linda Nochlin, "The Imaginary Orient," Art in America (May 1983): 118-129, 186-191. “Rodinson, Europe and the Mvstiaue of Islam: 117.

*'lbid., xiii.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 49 Orientalism is based on an idealist epistemology that is essentialist, empiricist and historicist.® Turner defines Orientalism as "...a discourse which represents the exotic, erotic, strange Orient as a comprehensible, intelligible phenomenon within a network of categories, tables and concepts by which the Orient is simultaneously defined and controlled."* For him. Orientalism is a discourse bent on manufacturing difference, a self-validating and closed discourse which emphasizes otherness in order to account for the "uniqueness of the West."* He maintains that for the Orientalists, Oriental history is only a series of missing features and absences: the missing of the middle class, independent cities, political rights, legal reliabilities, personal property, individualism, revolutions, anti authoritarianism, an autonomous bourgeois class, bourgeois culture, secularism, capitalism, modernity, etc.* For

example. Turner asserts that the doctrine of Western

uniqueness encounters a number of difficulties in trying to

“Bryan S, Turner, Marx and the End of Orientalism (Boston: George Allen & Unwin, 1979): 7.

*Bryan S. Turner, "Orientalism and the Problem of Civil Society in Islam," in Orientalism. Islam and Islamists eds. Asaf Hussain, Robert Olson, and Jamil Qureshi (Brattleboro, VT: Amana Books, 1984): 24. *Ibid., 35-36.

*See Turner's Weber and Islam (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978) ; Capitalism & Class in the Middle East (New Jersey: Heinemann Educational Books and Humanities Press, 1984) ; and Marx and the End of Orientalism.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 50 explain the historical flourishing of technology and science in such patrimonial and bureaucratic political systems as China and the Islamic Middle East.** According to Turner,

this mode of perception stigmatizes the Orient as a caricature of the West, a mirror image, an entity antithetical to Occidental vicissitudes. Turner's analysis of Orientalism differs from Said's in two important ways. Firstly, Turner refutes Said's depiction of Orientalism as a homogeneous discourse about

the Orient. By bringing in the factor of social class ideology. Turner contends that Western attitudes toward

Islam, for example, have not been consistently negative. According to Turner, while the European bourgeoisie has perceived Islam as an obstacle to the process of modernization, the European aristocracy has generally viewed

Islam favorably for its opposition to industrial

development.” Secondly, Turner disagrees with Said's full

abandonment of Marxism as an alternative to Orientalism. While acknowledging classical Marxism's heavy dosage of Orientalism, Turner believes nevertheless that neo-Marxism is still the only perspective capable of putting an end to

**See Bryan S. Turner, "State, Science and Economy in Traditional Societies: Some Problems in Weberian Sociology of Science," British Journal of Sociology 38, 1 (March 1987): 1-23. ”See Bryan S. Turner, "Une Interpretation des Representations Occidentales de l'Islam," Social Compass 31, 1 (1984): 91-104.

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it. He writes: The criticism of Orientalism in its various forms requires something more than the valid but indecisive notion that at its worst Orientalist scholarship was a rather thin disguise for attitudes of moral or racial superiority and thereby a justification for colonialism. What is needed is something other than the objection that some Orientalists were less than neutral and objective, or that they retired from the real world of Middle East politics to the ivory towers of philology, poetry and aesthetics. The end of Orientalism requires a fundamental attack on the theoretical and epistemological roots of Orientalist scholarship which creates that long tradition of Oriental Despotism, mosaic societies and the "Muslim City". Modern Marxism is fully equipped to do this work of destruction.*

Orientalism in Reverse France, you whom we have loved so much, what have you done?...Conquer Algiers, sack China, betray and bomb Mexico... And England, what is this nation of powdered wigs and rapacious lords doing in India? Down with what is called European civilization. Europe can’t even civilize itself and it would civilize us. Francisco Bilbao

We no longer believe in Europe. We no longer have faith in its political system or in its philosophies. Worms have eaten into its social structure as they have into...its very soul. Europe for us backward, ignorant, impoverished people is a corpse. Adonis A century separates the above quotations. The first

belongs to a Mexican author writing in 1864 amidst Europe's ferocious colonial conquests. The second is that of a

leading contemporary Arab poet writing in the 1960s, that

68Turner,, Marx and the End of Orientalism: 85.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 52 turbulent decade of de-colonization, war, and resistance. Despite their similar outcries, however, the two authors differ in one important manner. While the first expresses the colonized self's state of shock and disillusionment caused by the colonizing other, the latter represents a

conscious decision on the part of that self to abandon the other. This metamorphosis from fascination to disillusionment, and finally to abandonment of the West was much more than a semantic change. In what follows, I shall argue that it lies at the very center of the current historical consciousness of Third World intellectuals in general and Middle Eastern intellectuals in particular. Toward the end of his book Orientalism. Edward Said raised the following question: "How does one represent other cultures? What is another culture? Is the notion of a distinct culture (or race, or religion, or civilization) a useful one, or does it always get involved either in self-

congratulation (when one discusses one's own) or hostility

and aggression (when one discusses the other')?"®* This question is, obviously, of paramount theoretical and

political significance for the scholars of international and intercultural relations. Furthermore, epistemologists are

also concerned with this issue, since it consequently poses these questions: (1) Can representation and imagery as acts

of othering ever be undistorted?; (2) Can such acquired

69Said, Orientalism: 325.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 53 knowledge thus be viewed as objective? Said's post structuralism compels him to answer this question with an unequivocal no. The real issue is whether indeed there can be a true representation of anything, or whether any and all representations, because they are representations, are embedded first in the language and then in the culture, institutions, and political ambience of the representor. If the latter alternative is the correct one (as I believe it is), then we must be prepared to accept the fact that a representation is eo ipso implicated, intertwined, embedded, interwoven with a great many other things besides the "truth," which is itself a representation.™ The following questions immediately come to mind: (1) Is Said's own representation of Orientalism true and

accurate?; and (2) Can the "Orientals" representation of their own "others," the "Occidentals," be any more accurate than Occidental writings on the Orient? Said was not initially concerned with the latter question. For him there

was no such equivalent to Orientalism as "Occidentalism,"

since the Orientals neither talked about themselves or the

West, nor did they have the institutions to do so if they

had so desired. This, however, was an erroneous proposition. In the post-colonial milieu the Orientals were talking more than ever about themselves as well as the West. The colonized masses, the nationalist leaders, the

liberation movements, the bilingual intelligentsia, the

migrants, the travelers, and the Western-educated students

70Ibid., 272.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 54 were all talking and writing about themselves and the Western world from the vantage point of difference. While there were few institutions for a systematic study of the West, numerous organizations devoted to advocating the causes of the Orientals, the Muslims, the Africans, and the Arabs were formed.”” The Bandung Conference, the non- aligned movement, the Arab League, Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Organization of Islamic States, and Organization of African States were all formed during this period. Late in Orientalism and in his follow-up articles,

however. Said becomes quite alarmed at the prospect of a reverse otherness. In the concluding paragraph of his book. Said warns his readers: "I hope to have shown my reader that the answer to Orientalism is not Occidentalism. No former 'Oriental' will be comforted by the thought that having been

an Oriental himself he is likely— too likely— to study new

'Orientals'— or 'Occidentals'— of his own making."^ In a

subsequent reconsideration of his early ideas. Said becomes even more critical:

’*The absence of Oriental institutions devoted to study of the West can be attributed, among other things, to the following determinants: (1) the political vulnerabilities of certain ruling classes who could be perceived as subservient to the West; (2) the rejectionist political ideology of radical states toward the West; and (3) the favorable cultural ambience prevalent among many Third World elites about traveling or studying in the West, and the relative ease through which this could be accomplished.

72Ibid., 328.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 55 You do not respond...to the tyrannical conjuncture of colonial power with scholarly Orientalism simply by proposing an alliance between nativist sentiment buttressed by some variety of native ideology to combat them. This, for example, has been the trap into which many Third World and anti-imperialist activists fell in supporting the Iranian and Palestinian struggles.”” In a critical review of Said's book, the contemporary Syrian philosopher Sadik Jalal al-'Azm implicated the latter on these same grounds. al-'Azm iterated two of the points made earlier by Maxime Rodinson. The first concerns the universal tendency shared by all cultures to create self/other dichotomies, based on the fact that the fundamental premise of otherness is grounded in an

imaginative exteriorization. The second is an indictment of Edward Said for not following his own advice to Oriental intellectuals about refraining from readily applying the available "structures, styles and ontological biases of Orientalism upon themselves and upon others."’"* Jalal al- 'Azm calls this phenomenon "Orientalism in Reverse," while

others have labeled it "Occidentalism."’’^

^Said, "Orientalism Reconsidered": 12. Interestingly enough, Michel Foucault was one of the first European thinkers who publicly came out in support of the Iranian Revolution of 1979. ’"*Sadik Jalal al-'Azm, "Orientalism and Orientalism in Reverse," Khamsin 8 (1981): 19.

”For a usage of the latter term see Cheryl Benard and Zalmay Khalilzad, The Government of God: Iran's Islamic Republic. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984), chapter four. I prefer the term "Orientalism in Reverse" over "Occidentalism" for two reasons: (l) I shall argue that instead of abandoning the ontological, methodological, and

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 56

Orientalism in Reverse is an attempt on the part of Oriental, and in particular Middle Eastern, intellectuals and political elites to articulate a counter-knowledge, a counter-discourse to Europe's Oriental narrative. However, far from rendering a post-mortem on Orientalism, it has come to share much of its ontological and epistemological axioms. First and foremost, it uncritically embraces the letter's truism of a fundamental ontological difference separating the natures, peoples, and cultures of the Orient and the Occident. Orient and Occident are depicted as essentialistic geographical, historical as well as cultural entities symmetrical to one another. Each is supposed to possess its ovm distinct and easily identifiable history,

imagery, tradition of thought, mode of discourse, ethics, as well as culture. Implicit in this abstractness which construes Orient and Occident as the irrevocable "others" of

one another is an assumption about the homogeneous compositions of the so called "East" and "West." They talk

and think about each other's inhabitants and territories as

if they are all real, conscious, and undifferentiated totalities and terrains. The Occident plays the same role of alter ego (for the proponents of Orientalism in Reverse)

epistemological doctrines of Orientalism proper, the term is an inverted utilization of these same apparatuses; and (2) that its point of departure is primarily introverted (concerned with understanding its "own" Orient) and only secondarily extroverted (concerned with understanding "the other's" Occident.)

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that the Orient has traditionally performed for the Orientalists. Stanley Diamond has argued that Western culture could only conceive of itself through reference to the invented primitive.’* It is relative to the native, the barbarian, the underdeveloped, and the non-Europeans that the Western identity, civilization, and heroism is defined. The same logic seem to persist in the case of Orientalism in Reverse, since the Oriental "we" is always constructed relative to the Homo Occidental is. In other words, the "other" always functions for both sides as a hypothetical

viewer, or what Derrida has referred to as a "culture of

reference."” Like Orientalism, Orientalism in Reverse is a historical phenomenon. While the former emerged as a companion to eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and twentieth-century Western "will to power," the latter is a phenomenon only of the post-World War II period. It is rooted in the twentieth-century tradition of anti-colonial and anti

imperialist struggles, an outcome of the post-colonial world, a reaction to the colonialist strategy of mimicry.

’*See Stanley Diamond, In Search of the Primitive; A Critique of Civilization (New Brunswick: Transaction Books, 1981). ”See Jacques Derrida, Margins of Philosophv. trans. by Alan Bass (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 58 that "authorized version of otherness."’* Psychologists and political scientists agree that at times of crisis the quest for "identity" - whether at individual or collective levels - becomes a self-conscious problematic. This "crisis" emerged in the aftermath of World War II when the old colonial empires were replaced by a new hegemonic geometry of power.” The previously bare colonial subjugation of much of the world at the hands of European and American colonialisms gave way to a more subtle form of imperialism. The former "colonies" became new "nation states," or what Benedict Anderson has more aptly phrased new "imagined communities."*® With the onset of political de-colonization in much of Asia and Africa in the 1950s and 1960s, nationalism became the primary ideological formation as well as the mobilizing political force of this era.**

’*Homi Bhabha, "Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse," in Politics and Ideology, eds. James Donald and Stuart Hall (Milton Keynes, PA: Open University Press, 1986): 201.

”This crisis of identity was common to all non-Western countries and perhaps most severe for the Middle Eastern states. The dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, military defeats and occupations at the hands of foreign powers, discovery of oil and greater integration into the world capitalist system all contributed to this quest for identity. “Benedict Anderson, Imagined communities (London: Verso, 1989). Anderson charges that a "nation" is "an imagined political community -and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign": 15.

**See Elie Kedourie, ed. Nationalism in Asia and Africa (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1970).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 59 "Third World" nationalist thinkers, artists, leaders, and movements came to dominate the terms of discourse, narrative, imagery, and rhetoric, as well as the aspirations, of millions of their own people (see Table 2). Nationalism usually promotes fear and hatred of the Others. The calls for political independence, cultural authenticity, and knowledge indigenization were all rooted in a preoccupation - at once real and imaginary - with the "other." Its reality was a direct outcome of the apprehensible colonial vicissitudes of the not-so-distant past; while its imaginariness emanated from the practice of readily applying the mental frameworks and categorical dualisms of the former masters upon themselves. In response to their previous condition of "subalternity, they embarked on a practice of othering the self.* Orientalism in Reverse, the author of this dissertation contends, is a

prime example of this "othering of the self." In order to

“Following Gramsci, Fredric Jameson has come to define "subalternity" as "the feelings of mental inferiority and habits of subservience and obedience which necessarily and structurally develop in situations of domination." See Fredric Jameson, "Third-World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism," Social Text 15 (Fall 1986): 76. *See Homi K. Bhabha, "Remembering Fanon: Self, Psyche, and the Colonial Condition," in Remaking Historv. eds. Barbara Kruger and Phil Mariani (Seattle: Bay Press, 1989): 137.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 60 ”1I II I I1 il ? ■g ,1 ô ^ l l è i •S I

I !I iiii g 1 -g

i l 3 s,<2Iï i s !I E ! I II Ig ! i i l i l " # l| g I g f l IO4 g-gog 1 ê II a s d l i lï i 3: o 11 ■S3 » si I •3 ^ -g ü _ II ri ^ ^ ^ m kil g h î i i l I l! j i “i i ll< Z #

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 61 represent the "Orient" it necessarily has to indulge in its further "Orientalization." The prerequisite for delineating the Orient was to reinforce particularity, worship difference and emphasize its otherness from the paragon. The essentializing categories of Orient and Occident allowed

for "imaginative geography" to operate in reverse. The Orient is envisioned as an intimate and well-defined totality, while the "Occident" and "Westerners" denote the absolute others. The "West" can thus be viewed symbolically, semantically, or substantively as "the other" or more narrowly as "the enemy."

In all cases, however. Orientalism in Reverse borrows its iconoclasm toward the West from its very subject since the West also serves as its culture of reference. Thus, even in his newly acquired capacity as the speaker, author, and actor, the Oriental continues to be over-determined by

the Occidental listener, text, and audience. To borrow

Gramsci's terminology, the beleaguered Oriental comes to

wage his "war of position" within the territory of the contestant. Threatened by the superior arsenal of the adversary in this cultural war, the marginalized intellectual of the Orient borrows nationalism, the

ideological visor of the enemy. Reminiscent of Marx's idea

on how the proletariat was to commandeer the means of

production to combat the bourgeoisie's hold over power, the non-Western world comes to appropriate another nineteenth-

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century Western doctrine (i.e., nationalism) to challenge the letter's imperialism. The Hegelian master/bondsman dichotomy has proved more enduring than previously imagined. Of all the post-World War II thinkers who wrote on behalf of Third World intellectuals, Frantz Fanon was perhaps the most original. In many ways he can be credited with having inaugurated the counter-discourse designated here as "Orientalism in Reverse." Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth changed the terms of discourse such that for the first time the West, and not the native, was defined as the other. As Suha Sabbagh has put it, this constituted "... a

resolution to the colonial problem on the level of the t e x t . Fanon's work differs from Said in an important way. "While Said addresses the impact of Western discourse on Western behavior. Fanon discusses the consequence for the victim of internalizing the same discourse."” Fanon's work

therefore goes one critical step further than Said's.

Through his poetic style. Fanon not only incriminates the

colonizers, but also criticizes the colonized for having internalized the others' depiction of them as "inferiors." For Fanon this greatest moment of colonization leads, to an

eradication of indigenous intellectual traditions. What

”Suha Sabbagh, "Going Against The West From Within; The Emergence Of The West As An Other in Frantz Fanon's Work," Ph.D. diss.. The University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1982, p. 3. 8SIbid., 14-15.

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ensues is a psychological condition in which the colonized could only imitate, yet never identify with or away from, the dominating "they." Fanon, like Aime Cesaire and the Negritude Movement, called for the abandonment of this internalized inferiority complex. According to Fanon, liberation could not be attained until this subservient consciousness was first relinquished. Putting an end to this condition of liminality requires iconoclasm and a counter-narrative (in addition to political resistance) to redefine the boundaries of the colonized self and the colonialist other. Fanon believed political

liberation could not be secured through Western benevolence since independence must be obtained and not be granted. Correspondingly, "the wretched of the earth" could not alter their condition of intellectual dependency if they were not to abandon entirely Western definitions, descriptions, and

vocabularies. The first concern led Fanon, a revolutionary

from Martinique, to participate in the Algerian Revolution; the second led to the writing of Black Skin. White Masks,

where the narcissism, emulative behavior, and servile social consciousness of the natives came under a relentless critique.” In both cases. Fanon tried to resurrect the

historical attendance of the "native I" by reverberating his marginalized voice, thus elevating him from their state of

”See Frantz Fanon, Black Skin. White Masks (London: Paladin, 1970).

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introvert quietism to an extrovert outspokenness. Despite its surreptitious retainment of much of the theoretical infrastructure of Orientalism, "Orientalism in Reverse" does not constitute an exact antithesis of the former discourse. Like Orientalism, "Orientalism in

Reverse" is premised upon exteriority, yet it is more concerned with understanding its own domestic self than with investigating the exotic other. As a post-colonial discourse, the dialogue of "Orientalism in Reverse" is concerned primarily with its own constituents and only secondarily with its Occidental adversaries. Secondly,

"Orientalism in Reverse" is, as its name suggests, more reactive than active. It attempts to bring its constituents out of their sense of inferiority to the West (a product of years of colonialist subjugation) through the praxis of "writing back" at it. The means toward regaining the Orient

is first to reclaim it textually by acquiring the right of

narrative. Thus, "Orientalism in Reverse" represents a response to Orientalism and colonialism both at the level of

text as well as political consciousness. In this manner. Orientalism in Reverse is not just the manifesto of Middle Eastern intellectuals' resistance, but also the very discourse for which their struggle is waged. Thirdly,

"Orientalism in Reverse" differs from Orientalism in terms of its knowledge/power configuration. "Orientalism in

Reverse" does not match Orientalism's grounding in the two

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pillars of academic and institutional support, nor does it enjoy the letter's universalisa, prestige, or voluminous investigations. It is more dispersed, elusive, disarticulated, and fragmented than Orientalism. "Orientalism in Reverse" does not follow Orientalism's heavy

reliance on such "sciences" as biology and anthropology. Instead, it bases its claims to truth on such normative fields as theology, mythology, mysticism, ethics, and poetry. al-'Azm points out that one area where the proponents of the two discourses share a common interest is in analysis of language, texts, philology, and related subjects. This combination of textual, metaphysical, as well as deep-rooted social, political, and economic grievances against the West, local elites, and the status quo has provided "Orientalism in Reverse" with powerful rhetorical instrumentalities capable of mass mobilization.

Like Orientalism, "Orientalism in Reverse" is a discourse of

power. Yet instead of articulating the views of the

victors, it has come to represent the aspirations as well as frustrations of the disenfranchised.

In its Middle Eastern context, "Orientalism in Reverse" has presented itself as an alternative to modernity. Its adherents have turned mainly toward Islam, which they view as a sanctuary from the chaotic age of

modernity, with its irreverence, pluralism, doubt, fragmentation, ethical decay, and alienation. Like its

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monotheistic counterparts (Christianity and Judaism), Islam is premised upon a dualistic outlook. Along with the other two religions, it shares the Platonic tradition of designating two separate and distinct worlds. While the lineage of the Judeo-Christian's metaphor of "God's kingdom on earth" can be traced back to Plato's idea of "philosopher kings," Islamic philosophy begins its thoughtful ontological quest with Avicenna (Ibn Sina), the eleventh-century Persian physician, philosopher, and mystic. Whereas Plato divided the universe into the material and the metaphysical worlds, Avicenna's esoteric philosophy spoke of the world of light and the world of shadows. In his Mantia al-Mushriaivin (The Logic of the Orientals) and the three visionary recitals, Avicenna speaks symbolically of the Orient representing the world of light, ideas, and purity, while the Occident symbolized the world of shadows and matter.*’ According to this "Oriental philosophy," which is based upon rationalism

as well as illumination:

The soul of man is caught as a prisoner in the darkness of matter and must free itself in order to return to the world of lights from which the soul of man originally descended. But in order to accomplish this difficult feat and be delivered from his "Occidental" exile he must find a Guide who will orient him in the cosmos and lead him to his ultimate salvation.**

*’See Henry Corbin, Avicenna and the Visionary Recital (Irving, TX: Spring Publications, 1980). **S.H. Nasr, Three Muslim Sages (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964): 44.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 67 Avicenna attempted to transcend Aristotle's philosophy, which viewed logic as the first principle and regarded the reality of things as beings-in-themselves. For Avicenna, the existence of every object emanates from the existence of God, and reason is viewed only as a ground for transcending itself. Avicenna's ontological doctrines, so implanted with the otherness of the divine, were transmitted through the illuminist and rationalist schools of Islamic philosophy and left a significant mark upon Islamic philosophy.” Of the two major sects within Islam, Shi'ism can be viewed as the more appropriate inheritor of Avicenna's metaphysical otherness. Its minority status, claims of historical persecution, and language of martyrdom all had a determining impact upon the subjective attitudes of its community. In addition, the futuristic nature of its language (promising eternal salvation, heaven, and immortal

happiness for those who choose to confront the "unjust others" - rulers, rival sects, infidels) helped to enhance

this dualistic mind-set. The predominant discourses of Shi'ism are all based on an allegorical internal/external geography which fortifies a radical mental boundary separating the "viciously aggressive them" from the "peace loving us." This dichotomous rendering of the individual

”This tradition was carried forward via such intellectual figures as Nasser Khosrow, Khawjah Nasir al-din al-Tusi, Suhrawardi, Mir Damad, and Mulla Sadra.

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and collective domains leads to advocacy of the need for absolute unity as the only effective way to rebuff the "other's treacherous plots." Hence, the internal/external figurative speech contributes to the formation of a

"garrison-state mentality" among the umma. Given this set of characteristics and the way it constructs and immortalizes subjects, relations, and ideas, the Shi'ite discourse has gained possession of a strong value-impetus within its universe. Like Judaism, it accentuates the "historic-victim discourse" in which the victim is the object of the rhetorical trope.* This ethical discourse has managed to form subjective mind-sets

which are always fascinated by an "other;" i.e. an earthly leader or one transcending time and space (the Mahdi), or the "perfect utopia" of early Islam. As Foucault's genealogy of power has demonstrated, however, discourses are terrains in which power and authority are given to some and

withheld from others. Embedded within Shi'ism's historic- victim discourse is a call for resistance to the unjust incursions of the other(s). In Iran, the ideas in

"Orientalism in Reverse" easily appealed to the Shi'ite majority already accustomed to a dualistic Weltanschauung, whereby the injustices of the present political and economic

*G. Matthew Bonham and Michael J. Shapiro, "The Manipulation of Concepts in Reporting International Conflicts," Unpublished paper delivered at the Sixth Annual Scientific Meeting of the International Society of Political Psychology, Oxford University, July 1983: 14-17.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 69 systems easily invoked the syntax, slogans, and imagery of the past. Nativism garbed in religious discourse could be used to advocate a turn, inward and back, toward the simple, the authentic, the provincial, and the sacred, as if the past were the panacea for all the wrongdoings of history and Islam the sole prerogative of Iranians. In the following chapters I shall demonstrate how, in this context; (1) the two discourses became inextricably bound; and (2) how the combined intellectual presence and emotional intensity of "Orientalism in Reverse" and Shi'ism obstructed or neutralized the development of most other alternative

discursive practices within the collective consciousness of the Iranian populace.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER II

SECULAR INTELLECTUALS AND THE OTHERNESS OF A RENTIER STATE

An intellectual as satisfied with the world as with himself, or at least, with his ideas and ideals, would simply not be an intellectual.^ The application of concepts such as "secularization," "secularism," and "secular" to studies of the Middle East has often been more problematic than enlightening. The first problem arises when the three concepts are used interchangeably. In this study the following distinctions are made: ’’Secularization” refers to a social process, independent of an individual's control, whereby a "...transformation of persons, offices, properties, institutions, or matters of an ecclesiastical or spiritual

character [are changed] to a lay, or worldly, position."

’’Secularism” is a doctrine, spirit, or consciousness

advocating the temporal (as opposed to the sacred) foundation of "...individual ideas, attitudes, beliefs, or interests." ’’Secular” denotes individuals or states of society that are normally capable of maintaining a degree of

‘Crane Brinton, The Anatomv of Revolution (New York; Vintage Books, 1965), 42. 70

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 71 differentiation and flexibility in their value systems.’ The second difficulty arises from the different historical and cultural experiences between the Middle East and Western Europe, where these concepts first emerged. Middle Eastern nation-states did not experience firsthand

the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Industrial Revolution, or the Enlightenment. There was no Lutheran movement to question the foundations of Islam as the primordial religion from inside, or a Voltaire to subject the sacred imagery of that religion to a masterful mockery from outside. In societal terms, there was not a genuine bourgeoisie class capable of revolutionizing the means and relations of production. Finally, the three major axioms of the Enlightenment - rationalism, secularism, and individualism - only reached the Middle East in a derivative, unauthentic form. As a result, the separation of the sacred from the

temporal, of civil society from the state, which occurred in the West at least a century ago, never quite materialized in

Middle Eastern societies.* In the case of Iran, for instance, only sixteen years before Luther was to post the famous 95 Theses on the door of the Wittenberg Cathedral,

the Safavid dynasty had come to power (1501) proclaiming

’Definitions are taken from Niyazi Berkes, The Development of Secularism in Turkey. 3-8.

*For a discussion of these issues see: Bassam Tibi, The Crisis of Modern Islam: A Preindustrial Culture in the Scientific-Technoloaical Aae. trans. by Judith Von Sivers (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1988).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 72 Shi'ism to be the new state religion. A result has been the pervasive durability and domination of religious rule in Iran. Logically, then, this study uses concepts relating to "secularism" in their broader sense rather than with their more narrow, historical connotations. The "secular" Iranian intellectuals of the 1960s and 1970s confronted a dual sense of otherness with respect to the state and the West, respectively. Dissent and nativism were the end results of their theoretical endeavors. In this chapter I shall present a theoretical analysis of their otherness vis-a-vis the state, while in the next chapter I

will deal with their otherness toward the "West." Drawing methodologically upon the literatures of political economy and sociology of knowledge, I contend that the structural weaknesses of the state, the real and imaginary presence of the West, and the ever-increasing gap between the modern and

the traditional sectors of Iranian society helped give rise

to, as well as legitimize, the counter-discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse" in the 1960s and 1970s.

The Formation of a Neooatriarchal Rentier State

In the aftermath of World War II, Third World societies in general, and Middle Eastern countries in

particular, confronted the essential dilemma of

socioeconomic change. In a region characterized by the rapid transformation of its economic infrastructures and the

instability of political institutions, the search for

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 73 appropriate models of development has been a constant preoccupation. From 1964 onward, under the rule of Mohammad Reza Shah, Iran embarked on a fast-paced modernization process, one that was only halted by the advent of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Mohammad Reza Shah's was viewed throughout, by most Iranian and Western observers, as a modernizing, secular, and stable regime. Yet, at its hour of destiny, it collapsed swiftly at the hands of a political adversary. Its demise once again exposed the fragile nature of stability and of the claims to legitimacy emblematic of most Middle-Eastern ruling classes.

The outbreak of World War II had put an end to the autocratic reign (1925-1941) of Reza Shah. The reign of his

son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1941-1979) was characterized by a return to autocracy after an initial period - two decades, in fact - of power consolidation. In the early 1960s, the Shah inaugurated an agrarian reform program which, in spite of its many shortcomings, supplemented the state's policy of

import-substituted industrialization by providing it with the requisite manpower. The massive infusion of new wealth

generated from the export of oil enabled this undertaking. The state no longer had to rely on agricultural surplus for capital accumulation. The end result of this process was the transformation of the Iranian economy from one based on

agriculture and commerce to a one-product economy based on oil.

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The state's increasing reliance on petro-dollar revenues made Iran a textbook example of a ’’rentier state,” a state that derives a substantial portion of its revenue on a regular basis from payments by foreign concerns in the form of rent.* In Iran, government revenue from oil increased from $555 million in 1963-64 to over $20 billion in 1975-76.* In other words, oil revenue as percentage of total government revenue jumped from 11 percent in 1948 to 41 percent in I960,* and up to 84.3 percent in 1974-75.’ By this time, oil revenue comprised 45 percent of Iran's GDP, and 89.4 percent of its foreign export receipts.* Thanks to

accumulating oil revenue, Iran's GNP grew at the annual rate of 8 percent in 1962-1970, 14 percent in 1972-73, and 30 percent in 1973-74.* Between 1972 and 1978 Iran's GNP grew

*For the literature on "Rentier States" see Hossein Mahdavi, "The Patterns and Problems of Economic Development in Rentier States; The Case of Iran," in Studies in the Economic Historv of the Middle East, ed. M.A. Cook (London; Oxford University Press, 1970), 428-467; Petter Nore and Terisa Turner, Oil and Class Struggle (London: Zed Press, 1980); and Hazem Beblawi and Giacomo Luciani, eds.. The Rentier State: The Political Economv of Public Finance in the Arab Countries (London: Croom Helm, 1987). *Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 427. *Hossein Mahdavi, "The Patterns and Problems of Economic Development in Rentier States: The Case of Iran": 430. ’Jahangir Amuzegar, Iran: An Economic Profile (Washington, D.C.: Middle East Institute, 1977), 63.

*Ibid. ’Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 428.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 75 from $17.3 billion to an estimated $54.6 billion, giving it one of the highest GNP growth rates in the Third World. However, from 1954 to 1975 the total percentage of direct taxes levied by government on salaries, real estate, private and state corporations only rose from 5 percent to 10

percent.“

Table 3.— IRANIAN GOVERNMENT'S REVENUES FROM OIL (in Billions of Dollars)

Fiscal Year Revenues

1963-4 .5 1968-9 .9 1970-1 1.2 1973-4 5.0 1975-6 20.0 Source: Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 427.

The "rentier state" is in itself a sub-system of a "rentier economy," an economy "...substantially supported by expenditures [of] the state, while the state itself is supported from rent accruing from abroad. Sudden

economic gains in a traditional society such as Iran had

both advantages and drawbacks. First, they enabled the

*Misagh Parsa, Social Origins of the Iranian Revolution (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1989), 64. "Afsaneh Najmabadi, "Depoliticisation of a Rentier State: The Case of Pahlavi Iran," in The Rentier State: The Political Economv of Public Finance in the Arab Countries, eds. Hazem Belbawi and Giacomo Luciani, 215. ‘’Beblawi and Luciani, "Introduction," The Rentier State. 11.

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quick launching of public works projects, but without the taxation, drastic deficits, or inflation which usually plague developing countries. Since oil revenue increased at a faster rate than GNP, the public sector expanded rapidly. The embryonic Iranian state of the early 1900s was now transformed into a form of etatisme. The government became the dominant actor in the economy. As Theda Skocpol has put it:

The state's main relationships to Iranian society were mediated through its expenditures - on the military, on development projects, on modern construction, on consumption subsidies, and the like. Suspended above its own people, the Iranian state bought them off, rearranged their lives, and repressed any dissidents among them. The autonomy of the state from a taxation base, and its desire to disentangle itself from its civilian constituency gradually eroded any linkage between the state and civil society. The Shah who viewed himself as the "Great Benefactor" did not rule through, or in alliance with, any independent social class." Instead, by intervening in all significant decision

making policies and demanding absolute loyalty, the Shah was stripping the state of its corporatist disposition. Hence, oil revenues helped to establish a patron-client relationship and a neopatriarchaV* state. The elitist.

"Theda Skocpol, "Rentier State and Shi'a Islam in the Iranian Revolution," Theorv and Societv 11, 3 (May 1982): 269.

‘*Hisham Sharabi has defined "Neopatriarchal" as "... an entropie social formation characterized by its transitory nature and by the specific kinds of underdevelopment and non-modernity visible in its economy and class structure as well as its political, social, and cultural organization." Hisham Sharabi, Neooatriarchv: A Theorv of Distorted Change in Arab Societv (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), 4.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 77 imperial nature of the regime precluded the state from becoming an effective intermediary between the Court and the citizenry. Thus, by default the state contributed to the further alienation of the latter from the former. In this "Neopatriarchal Rentier State" (or what another Iranian

scholar has called a "Petrolic Despotism"") monological speech dominated all levels of socio-political discourse. The subjection of the Iranian economy since the mid-1950s to the expenditure shocks of rapidly increasing oil revenue resulted in severe economic discrepancies, social dislocation, and political tensions. First, economic development tended to be confined to certain enclaves within the rent parameters. This condition led to major geographical disparities and produced a process of uneven development. Second, the repercussions of oil expenditures were not uniform in all sectors of the economy. While the service and industrial sectors were developing immensely,

agriculture was declining. This was reflected in the

declining share of the agricultural sector in the total GDP from 28 percent in 1962 to 9.3 percent in 1977." In fact.

"Homa Katouzian, The Political Economv of Modern Iran (New York: New York University Press, 1981), 213-255. Pesaran, "The System of Dependent Capitalism in Pre- and Post-Revolutionary Iran," International Journal of Middle East Studies 14, 4 (November 1982): 505.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 78 while the "exoteric state"*’ closely linked the economy to the rhythms of the international capitalist system, few links were cultivated between the traditional sectors and the new superstructures of foreign trade of goods and services. Third, the concentration of vast external rents in a few hands created inequities in income. In 1973, the

wealthiest 10 percent of the urban households captured 38 percent of spending, while the poorest 30 percent accounted for only 7 percent." As a result, class disparity between

the rich minority who were benefitting from the oil boom, and the poor majority who were still suffering great

deprivation, was increasing at an alarming rate. Fourth, because of the concentration in the 1970s of wealth and development projects (i.e., construction) in metropolitan areas, Iran witnessed a massive migration from the countryside to the urban municipalities. By the early

1970s half of the country's inhabitants were living in these centers. The former landless peasants became seasonal

laborers and construction workers. Unable to meet the high rents in Tehran and other major cities, they created shanty towns on the outskirts of the major metropolitan centers, and joined the ranks of the urban poor. Their material

*’By that I mean "a state predominantly based on revenue accruing directly from abroad as against an 'esoteric state' which is predominantly based on domestic revenue and taxation." See Beblawi and Luciani, "Introduction," 13. "Robert Looney, A Development Strateov for Iran Through the 1980's (New York: Prager, 1977), 47.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 79 condition as rural uprooted or evicted peasants, along with their religious convictions and cultural alienation in the cosmopolitan surroundings of urban cities, proved too

volatile to restrain. As the course of future events demonstrated, these groups came to play an instrumental role

in the overthrow of the Shah's regime." Fifth, the windfall profits generated from the export of oil and natural gas were not saved or used efficiently. The availability of revenues fostered an increase in expenditure. Huge sums were lavished on the latest military

technology. In the 1970s nearly one-third of the total budget was regularly allocated for military expenditures. "The annual military budget increased from $293 million in 1963 to $1.8 billion in 1973, and after the quadrupling of oil prices, to $7.3 billion in 1977."’° The luxury goods imported by the government and the elites only added to the

burden. The result was inflation and import dependency. By 1974-75, imports were increasing at an annual rate of 77

percent, while non-oil exports were actually falling by 8

"For two studies of the living conditions as well as the political psychology of the urban poor before the revolution see; Farhad Kazemi, Urban Poor and Revolution in Iran (New York: New York University Press, 1980); and Ali Banuazizi, "Alounak Neshinan-e Khiaban Professor Brown," [Hut Dwellers of Professor Brown Street], Alefba (Paris) 3 (Summer 1983): 53-65. 20'Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 435.

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Legitimation Crisis of The Pahlavi Regime In his book Arab Politics. Michael Hudson wrote; The central problem of government in the Arab world today is that of political legitimacy. The shortage of this indispensable political resource largely accounts for the volatile nature of Arab politics and the autocratic, unstable character of all the present Arab governments.” Hudson's observation certainly describes Iran, where political legitimacy has been a rare phenomenon. Why? Max Weber defined "legitimacy" as any transformation of authority which is generally accepted and obeyed without frequent resort to coercion. Based on a number of similar premises, Jürgen Habermas supplemented Weber's sociological analysis with an economic/philosophical inquiry into the legitimation crisis confronting advanced Western industrial

states.” Despite the apparent infelicity of applying

Habermas' theory to an analysis of a non-Western, semi- traditional society such as Iran, I postulate that

concerning the problem of legitimation, there are striking similarities between Western industrial states and the

’‘Charles Issawi, "The Iranian Economy 1925-1975: Fifty Years of Economic Development," in Iran Under The Pahlavis. ed. George Lenczowski (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1978), 166. ”Michael Hudson, Arab Politics; The Search for Leaitimacv (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977), 2. ”See Jürgen Habermas, Legitimation Crisis (Boston: Beacon Press, 1975).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 81 rentier states of the Middle East. I draw upon the letter's theoretical model to illustrate the legitimation crisis that beset the Shah's regime in the 1960s and 1970s.” Anthony Giddens has summarized Habermas' theory of the

legitimation crisis: Contemporary capitalist societies are still subject to economic crisis, but conflicts on the purely economic level are less important than those which occur in other institutions. Because economic life is today in considerable degree administered by government, in conjunction with the larger corporations, economic crises rapidly tend to become political ones. In Habermas's view, these are more threatening to the system than are economic problems, because the technocratic character of modern politics cannot generate deep and abiding loyalty to the political order. Politics having become a largely pragmatic affair, the mass of the population feels no real commitment to the political system, and readily becomes alienated from it if that system fails to maintain its narrow brief— i.e., to guide sustained economic growth. In such circumstances, which Habermas believes to be becoming more and more widespread, the political system faces what he terms "crisis of legitimation."... Rather than economic contradiction, the tendency to legitimation crisis is for Habermas the most deep-lying contradiction of modern capitalism...this emerging contradiction tends to spawn new social movements...which attempt to inject back into political life the values it has lost— to do, for example, with the relations between human beings and the natural world, and

”l find this appropriate in light of my epistemological agreement with Habermas' assertion that any sociological study must account for the interplay between the means and modes of socioeconomic activity, as well as the means and modes of cultural identification. In other words, cultural discourse must be situated within the domain of social practices and relationships, and vice versa.

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human individuals with one another.” Drawing upon Habermas's model, I contend that Iran under the Shah came to experience a similar legitimacy crisis. Since in rentier economies the state is the dominant economic actor (administering the economic life of the country), and all strata rely on state directives and allocations for services, employment and privileges, economic crises tend rapidly to translate into political crises. In Iran, the historical weakness of the indigenous bourgeoisie forced the "state" to fulfill yet another function, as the agent of capital accumulation and

industrialization.” This duty, however, only added to the burden of the "state" since it had to play a dual role. First, the state was the prime agent responsible for capital accumulation and allocation as well as economic development. Secondly, the state is the hegemonic machinery of the

Iranian ruling class. As one observer put it by the end of

the Shah's rule, "the state had become the largest wealth holder, industrialist, and banker in the country."” The

peculiarity of Iran's industrialization strategy, according

“Anthony Giddens, "Jürgen Habermas," in The Return of Grand Theorv in the Human Sciences, ed. Quentin Skinner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 136.

”See Ahmad Ashraf, "Historical Obstacles to the Development of a Bourgeoisie in Iran," in Studies in the Economic History of the Middle East, ed. M.A. Cook, 308-332 ”Misagh Parsa, Social Origins of the Iranian Revolution. 63.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 83 to a Marxian analysis, was that primitive accumulation and

capital accumulation were occurring simultaneously. This historical coincidence had three important repercussions on the economic, cultural, and political levels: (1) simultaneous growth of the social forces of capitalism

(bourgeoisie and modern petty bourgeoisie) and their more traditional counterparts (commercial bourgeoisie and traditional petty bourgeoisie); (2) preservation and expansion of traditional ideological and cultural structures and values (religion, patriarchal relations) parallel to the development of modern capitalism; and (3) preservation and domination of traditional and archaic political structures

(monarchical despotism, the nonexistence of democratic institutions) at the time of implementation of the supposedly "new" strategy of industrialization. Hence, the Shah's regime combined the universal vulnerabilities of a rentier state with the peculiar weaknesses of the Iranian

domestic bourgeoisie.

There was yet another handicap. Since the Shah's

regime was reinstalled to power through a CIA-supported coup in 1952, it had very little political legitimacy to begin with.” The only way the regime could have compensated for its dire lack of political legitimacy was by providing for

the welfare of its citizenry (particularly for the emerging

”For a first-hand account of the coup see Kermit Roosevelt, Countercoup: The Struggle For the Control of Iran (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1979).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 84 new middle class). The government vaunted its goals of "...leading Iran to the gates of great civilization," of making Iran "...the West Germany of Asia," and becoming "...the fifth greatest military power in the world." While economic windfall and land reform had lent token legitimacy

to the regime, subsequent events proved these to be inadequate stock in the unstable market of Iranian politics. One observer of rentier states foretold the Shah's predicament accurately in 1970; A government that can expand its services without resorting to heavy taxation acquires an independence from the people seldom found in other countries. However, not having developed an effective administrative machinery for the purposes of taxation, the governments of Rentier States may suffer from inefficiency in any field of activity that requires extensive organizational inputs. In political terms, the power of the government to bribe pressure groups or to coerce dissidents may be greater than otherwise. By the same token, this power is highly vulnerable since the stoppage of external rents can seriously damage the government finances.”

By the mid 1970s this possibility had become an actual

reality. As a result of the dramatic rise in oil prices in 1973, the government doubled its expenditures, lifted all foreign exchange controls, and implemented selective liberalization of foreign trade. These policies added to the existing disparities and injustices of the Shah's hasty

”Hossein Mahdavi, "The Patterns and Problems of Economic Development in Rentier States: The Case of Iran," 467.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 85 industrialization program.* By the mid 1970s the state's cumulative expenditures caught up with its financial resources. In addition, by 1975-77 world demand for Iranian oil contracted. The result was the abrupt termination of many industrial projects, which in turn precipitated massive

unemployment. Combined with the corruption and conspicuous consumption of Iranian high society, the preexisting sense of deprivation among urbanites became magnified. Suddenly, the people realized that "today" was not the "tomorrow" the state had promised them "yesterday." Fast economic growth had fostered an even faster growth in expectations. The

rentier economy had produced a "rentier mentality" in which the sacred neoclassical work-reward theorem (which was supposed to generate a strong work ethic) was inapplicable. The public viewed reward and windfall gains as being based on situational or opportunistic factors and state favoritism

rather than a consequence of systematic hard work.

Furthermore, since the state had failed to levy any strong system of direct taxation on its citizens (due to its structural/ideological deficiencies), the public was accustomed to viewing the state not as an institution it had to pay for, but rather as one it should rely on.** The

Iranian masses did not have a "welfare consciousness" since

*°See Thomas Walton, "Economic Development and Revolutionary Upheavals in Iran," Cambridge Journal of Economics 4, 3 (September 1980): 271-292. **Beblawi and Luciani, "Introduction," 2

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they did not perceive welfare benefits "...as rights, but as gracious handouts from the Shah."*’ Najmabadi identifies two important differences between European welfare states and the Iranian rentier state: 1) The European welfare state was subsidized from taxes paid by citizens, not from external revenues accruing to the state. 2) It was the struggles of working-class organizations in Europe that led in large part to the establishment of welfare measures after World War II, and not the initiative of a head of the state who charitably disposed of state revenues and was not under any pressure to spend on welfare at all.** Therefore, in the mid 1970s the state, which until

that time had not found itself accountable to the public for the expenditure of oil revenue, confronted a citizenry which was quick to realize that their ideals of a better life far exceeded reality. A crisis of expectation on the part of the people had suddenly materialized.

Intellectuals and the State

The Shah is holding the oil in his hand like a glass of wine drinking to the health of the West.**

The state also failed on the ideological front. In an

*’Afsaneh Najmabadi, "Depoliticisation of a Rentier State; The Case of Pahlavi Iran," 223.

"ibid. "Reza Baraheni, God's Shadow: Prison Poems (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1976), 33.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 87 "...age of nationalism, neutralism, and republicanism"^ the regime accorded centrality to a royal ideology whose principal features were Persian chauvinism, loyalty to the person of the Shah, depoliticization of the citizenry, and the glorification of pre-Islamic Iranian history. This exclusionary ideology, imposed from above, failed to fulfill either the ideological needs of the traditional masses, or the recently expanded middle class. Due to its lofty nature, the royal ideology was fundamentally incapable of creating an ideological sense of political participation among the people or to subdue its political opponents. Throughout its rule, the Pahlavi regime remained a

dictatorship not predicated on real consensus. Inevitably, then, it relied increasingly on violence as the key to its security amidst the rise of semi-organized counter-groups, which were largely couched in Islamic discursive practices. By the mid 1970s the profound dubiety of state legitimacy

took expression in military-economic implications. The

regime was stripped of whatever economic legitimacy it had previously accumulated. The crisis of economic legitimacy

soon spilled over into the political sphere. An acute crisis of the state manifested itself when political and

physical terror failed to spread fear as its ideological

effect. While the Shah and his lieutenants embarked on rapid

35'Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 426.

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modernization of the socio-economic infrastructure of the country, there was no attempt to modernize the political system. Uneven economic development and the widening gulf between these two primary domains proved instrumental in the eventual downfall of the anachronistic monarchical regime. Following Samuel Huntington's model of a "mass party,the Shah founded his Rastakhiz (Resurgence) party in 1975 and encouraged all Iranians to join. At a time when all the legal channels of participation were closed to the opposition - who were subjected to harassment, imprisonment, and torture - this call only proved to be a cruel joke.^’ The Shah's formula for political stability was based on two

main pillars: ruthless suppression of the opposition and

encouragement of "civil and familial/vocational privatism. The regime used the former to encourage the

“See Samuel Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968).

^Daryush Homayoun (b. 1928), a leading pro-Shah intellectual who served in such capacities as journalist, founder of Avandeaan daily newspaper. General Secretary of the Rastakhiz Party, and finally Minister of Information (1977-78), provides an account of the artificial nature of the party. See Daryush Homayoun, in an interview recorded by John Mojdehi, November 21, 1982, Washington, D.C., tape no. 3, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University. “Habermas defines these terms in the following way: "Civil privatism denotes an interest in the steering and maintenance performance of the administrative system but little participation in the legitimizing process..." Complementing this depoliticized public realm is a "familial-vocational privatism" which consists in a "family orientation with developed interests in consumption and leisure on the one hand, and in a career orientation

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 89 latter. It failed to realize that even among the nouveaux riches, rapid modernization would foster a sense of deprivation in terms of political participation, rational decision-making, and national independence. And, more importantly for the lower classes, such questions as wealth

distribution, conspicuous consumption, and moral decadence would prove to generate strong anti-state emotions. Hence, the rentier nature of Iran's economy caused the gradual erosion of the bonds linking the state and civil society. The state viewed itself as independent from civil society, and failed to exercise any ideological hegemony over its constituents. The people, on the other hand, having been accustomed to a "rentier mentality", did not develop a "welfare consciousness." Not having to pay for the state, they nevertheless came to rely on it. Against the backdrop of these conditions, the crisis of legitimacy quickly engulfed the precarious state when it floundered on its many overambitious promises to different segments of the

population. Political repression failed to stop the

disenchanted masses once they realized it was possible to alter the status quo.

The opposition of secular Iranian intellectuals to the state, on the other hand, was largely due to political factors. Having come mainly from the ranks of the new

suitable to status competition on the other." See Jürgen Habermas, Legitimation Crisis. 75.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 90 middle class, they had somewhat benefitted from the Shah's economic programs. Yet the neopatriarchal and pro-Western nature of the regime left much to be desired. These intellectuals could not easily forgive the Shah for ousting former Premier Mossadeq. Their first experimentation after

the Second World War with a democratic and nationalist government had been abruptly terminated. In addition to this bitter historical memory, the state's conservative, pro-Western attitudes in foreign policy, notorious repressive apparatuses (SAVAK), prohibition of political dissent, censorship, and internal corruption all contributed to the alienation of the intelligentsia from the state.“ The Shah's state and the Iranian intelligentsia each

posed a problem for the other. The state relied heavily on technocrats and bureaucrats to manage its rapidly expanding industrial machinery. At the same time the apparatus' demand for an increasing voice in government matters was a

“Daryush Ashuri (b. 1938), a contemporary Iranian social thinker, points out that in countries such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, Mexico and other rentier states where wealth was accumulated through oil rather than through labor (as it was done in Japan, Korea, and the Soviet Union) a structure of economic and political discipline never took shape. In Iran, where political satire is a primary way of expressing opinions, government employees jokingly referred to their salaries as their "sahm-e naft" (share of oil). The idleness of the state as well as the arbitrariness of the existing income and merit system are implicit. This rentier mentality allowed for the routine of accepting bribes, kickbacks, favoritism, and corruption to develop as prevalent methods of conducting business. Daryush Ashuri, interview by author, 29 May 1989, New York, tape recording, Columbia University, New York.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 91 source of worry for the state. Viewing himself as the leader of the campaign to modernize Iran, the Shah could not do away with the army of intelligentsia who were supposed to spearhead this movement. Yet, as the embodiment of the neopatriarchal power configuration, he could not delegate authority to the intelligentsia whom, based on the experience of Mossadeq, he could not trust. Thus the

dilemma confronting the state was how to utilize the technical skills of the intelligentsia while avoiding any concessions. In order to compensate for its deficit of legitimacy, the state tried to "buy off" the intelligentsia with monetary incentives and employment.'”’ On the other hand, the intelligentsia, lacking many

options in a still relatively undeveloped private sector, had to rely on the state as their primary source of employment. Consequently, the intelligentsia were absorbed into such state institutions as Plan and Budget

Organization, The National Iranian Oil Company, Central

Bank, Iranian National Radio and Television, and various universities. Despite their dependence on the state for their economic livelihood, these intellectuals did not

perceive themselves as a part of it. Quite to the contrary, having observed the corruption, inefficiency, waste, and mismanagement of the Iranian bureaucracy - in addition to

^For an insightful account of this relationship see James Bill, The Politics of Iran: Groups. Classes and Modernization.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 92 the repressive nature of the political infrastructure - they became further alienated from the regime. As one intellectual put it, having been employed as hired subordinates, "...intellectuals developed a sense of guilt ... about their cooperation with the state, so much so that

opposition to the state became a value in itself."^* Daryush Homayoun describes the intellectual-state

relationship; Iranian intellectuals had a legiti mate dilemma vis-a-vis the state. They could not compromise with the regime, the regime did not have much to offer them. It is true that it provided educational facilities for them, send them abroad, provided employment for them (so much so that) many staunch opponents of the regime were receiving aid from various state and private organizations such as Radio and Television, Center for Intellectual Development of Children, institutions affiliated with the Queen and various princesses, office of the Prime Minister,... Yet they could not see themselves as belonging to the regime which was providing these services for them because of the regime's defects... That regime was used to give people bread and gifts but not to take them into account/" The close affiliation of the Pahlavi regime with the

West, while fruitful in economic terms, proved to be a political liability. The Shah's generally obsequious demeanor toward the West (particularly toward the United States, as a way of reciprocating for his reinstatement to power) became an undiscussed national embarrassment. The

^Daryush Ashuri, interview by the author, 29 May 1989. ^See Daryush Homayoun, in an interview recorded by John Mojdehi, November 21, 1982, Washington, D.C., tape no. 2, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 93 presence of American advisers, technicians, managers, and military personnel reached unjustifiable proportions. In light of the strong tradition of opposition to foreign domination embedded within Iranian political culture, along with the still-lingering memory of the 1953 coup, this identification became a handicap in the eyes of the Iranian intellectuals. Again, Homayoun critically reflects: Intellectuals did not like Iran's dependence on the U.S. Furthermore, America and the Americans also went too far. It was really not necessary to have fifty thousand Americans serving the Iranian army, or turn large districts of Tehran into American ghettos/" The ruling elites were not only too closely associated with the West, they also came to view their own society through the eyes of the West. The programs and solutions promoted by Western-educated economists, political scientists, and engineers were too often tailor-made to the

needs and conditions of the advanced industrial states. Economically, they pursued a capital-intensive modernizatir^

plan while possessing a massive reserve army of unemployed laborers. One insider within the Pahlavi regime described Amir Abbas Hovayda, a French-educated intellectual who was Iran's Prime Minister for thirteen years:

Hoyevda was a thoughtful thinker, but not an Iranian thinker. He had studied in the West for too long and as a result his intellectual and philosophical dimensions were indeed shaped by French and English languages and the Western environment... Even though he was very interested

*Ibid.

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in Iranian culture and was a nationalist, he would even read our philosophy through the books of Henry Corbin [a French Orientalist and philosopher] instead of in Farsi.* Crane Brinton has identified the "intellectuals' transfer of allegiance" as one symptom of a pre revolutionary condition.* Two events, one in the beginning of the 1950s and the other in the early years of the 1960s, proved instrumental in this process of intellectual

desertion. These events were the overthrow of Mossadeq in 1953, and the June 1963 uprising in Qom. Following the 1953 coup, all political parties were outlawed. In the absence of its charismatic leader, the National Front gradually sank into anonymity. The Third Force of Khalil Maleki, which had brought together some of Iran's leading intellectuals and literati, strived one more time to stage a comeback when it reorganized itself under the name of Jameh-ye Socialistha-ye Nehzat-e Meli Iran [The Socialist League of Iran's National Movement] in the early 1960s. This organization, however,

did not last long and was reduced to a mere memory once many of its cadres abandoned the realm of organized political activity in pursuit of more individualistically-oriented, and often apolitical, endeavors. The Tudeh Party suffered

the most casualties in terms of execution and imprisonment

*The Reminiscences of S. H. Nasr, 1982-83, 118, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies.

*Crane Brinton, The Anatomv of Revolution. 39-49.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 95 of its members. Many of its leading cadres fled to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe to seek political asylum. In short, it ceased to operate as an effective political party. Furthermore, the bloody suppression of the June 1963 uprising led by Ayatollah Khomeini reinforced the conclusion

of Iran's more radical intellectuals that it was no longer possible to challenge the regime through legal and peaceful means. Thus they went underground, turning to armed struggle as their only viable means of resistance. The more moderate elements, however, pursued their agenda not through guns but through literature, poetry, and the arts. In what

follows, I shall illustrate the activities, goals, and impact of these two tendencies, each representing one way of dealing with the otherness of the state.

The Militants In the 1960s, Iran's political culture underwent a

radical turn. The defeated, disillusioned radical youths and rank-and-file cadres of the National Front and the Tudeh

Party could not console themselves with the glory days of the past. They replaced the old leadership's intellectual

pessimism with a rejuvenated optimism of will. Conservative realism was no solution for these romantic visionaries.

Failing to follow the example of National Front leaders' retirement from political activism, or the mild criticisms expressed by the Tudeh Party's leaders in exile, they turned

toward radical political action. This radicalism mainly

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manifested itself in armed struggle waged by underground guerrilla organizations, among which two main groups were formed: Sazaman-e Cherikha-ye Fadayee Khalq-e Iran (The Organization of Iranian People's Fedayee Guerrillas), and Sazaman-e Mujahedxn-e Khalq-e Iran (The Organization of

Iranian People's Freedom Fighters) The Fedayeen organization was officially formed in March 1971. However, its roots can be traced to the mid 1960s, when two independent underground groups (later to merge), began operations. The first group, formed in 1963,

was led by Bizhan Jazani; the second, formed in 1967, was headed by Masoud Ahmadzadeh and Amir-Parviz Pouyan.* Having maintained much of the theoretical infrastructure of the Tudeh Party, Jazani's group emphasized political organization. Ahmadzadeh and Pouyan, on the other hand, were influenced by the ideas of such revolutionary thinkers

as Regis Debray, Che Guevara, Mao Zedong, and Carlos

Marighella. Modeling themselves after these

revolutionaries, they advocated guerrilla warfare as the only medium available to shatter the all-powerful image of

the state. Thus the first group's more seasoned tradition

“Hereafter, the two organizations will respectively be refereed to as the "Fedayeen" and the "Mujahedin." As a group of religious intellectuals, however, the Mujahedin will be treated in chapter 5. *Jazani was a former member of the Tudeh Party while Ahmadzadeh and Pouyan were both former members of the National Front.

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of political reflection was complemented by the letter's sense of idealistic activism. Yet, sharing a common belief in the idea of "revolutionary agency," both groups promoted a voluntaristic and populist strategy for change. After some deliberation, they approved Ahmadzadeh-Pouyan's theory of armed struggle on the assumption that heroism and self- sacrifice was the only way to awaken a "retired nation."* This decision was in tune both with the winds of radicalism sweeping the region in the aftermath of Nasserism, the 1967 Arab-Israel War, the rise of the PLO, the Algerian war of liberation, and Qadafi's rise to power in Libya, and with the general state of revolutionary intellectuals' isolation

from the masses. On February 8, 1971, thirteen Fedayeen guerrillas, trying their new approach of rural guerrilla warfare, attacked a gendarmerie post in Siahkal in the northern Gilan province. The regime responded with a disproportionate show of force, sending a much larger army to smash the

guerrillas. Two of the Fedayeen were killed in combat, and those captured were summarily executed (or died under torture). While the Siahkal attack was a total military

failure for the Fedayeen avant-guards, it proved to be an

“The two major theoretical texts promoting this view respectively were: Amir-Parviz Pouyan, Zarorat-e Mobareze Mosalahan-e Va Rad-e Theori-e Baaa [The Necessity of Armed Struggle and the Rejection of the Theory of Survival]; and Masoud Ahmadzadeh, Mobareze Mosalahan-e Ham Strateai Ham Tactic [Armed Struggle: Both a Strategy and a Tactic].

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 98 astonishing propaganda victory. A mere four months after the Siahkal event, Ahmadzadeh summed up the Fedayeen's goal: The goal of the armed struggle in the beginning was not to inflict a military blow on the enemy but rather a political blow. The aim is to show the path of struggle both to the revolutionaries and to the masses, make them aware of their power, show that the enemy is vulnerable, that the possibility of struggle exists, to expose the enemy and awaken the masses.*

Siahkal thus became a watershed event in contemporary Iranian history. It signified, first, the vulnerability of the state and, second the inauguration of a new revolutionary approach to political struggle. The Fedayeen, however, generated the greatest

enthusiasm not among the rural peasantry whom they had originally aimed to mobilize, but among the urban college students. The Iranian peasantry could not have been further away from what Fanon in The Wretched of the Earth referred to as "...the revolutionary proletariat of our time." On

the contrary, from their lack of any particular ideology or

language of protest, the Iranian peasantry came more to resemble Eric Hobsbawm's "pre-political people.Judging from the examples of peasant rebellions in Russia, Mexico, China and numerous other Third World countries, Eric Wolf

‘“Masoud Ahmadzadeh, Mobareze Mosalahan-e Ham Strateai Ham Tactic. 4th ed., (The Middle East Branch of Sazemanhay-e Jebhey-e Meli Gharej Az Keshvar, 1974), 6-7. “Bee Eric Hobsbawm, Primitive Rebels: Studies in Archaic Forms of Social Movement in the 19th and 20th Centuries (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1959).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 99 designated the twentieth-century as the era of peasant wars." Yet, as two longtime observers of Iranian politics have pointed out, what is significant in the case of Iran is not the frequency but the conspicuous absence of a tradition of revolutionary peasant movements.” The Iranian

peasantry, who had participated neither in the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1909 nor in the oil nationalization movement or other political events of 1941- 1953, were not stimulated by this guerrilla operation either. The place where the Fedayeen's heroism had the

greatest bearing was in the urban areas in general, and the university campuses in particular.” This was not surprising, given that the guerrillas themselves had come mainly from the ranks of the new professional middle class, and had acquired their academic and political education in

"Eric Wolf, Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Centurv (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1973). ”See Farhad Kazemi and Ervand Abrahamian, "The Non revolutionary Peasantry of Modern Iran," Iranian Studies 11, (1978): 259-304. "After the Siahkal raid the Fedayeen carried out much of their attacks in the urban areas targeting military posts, banks, and power plants. For their assessment of these activities see: Parahev-e Az Tairobiat-e Jana Cherikev-e Shahri Par Iran [Some Experiences From Urban Guerrilla Warfare in Iran] (Organization of Iranian Peoples Fedayeen Guerrillas, nd.)

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the universities.” In studying the history of the Fedayeen organization, one finds a positive correlation between the location of institutions of higher learning and the places were the Fedayeen branches were most active. A former high- level cadre of the organization ranked the provinces where the Fedayeen were most organized before 1976 in the following manner: Tehran and its suburbs, Gilan, Mazandaran, Azarbaijan, Khorasan, and Isfahan.” Tehran was the logical front-runner since a disproportionate number of universities were clustered there. Gilan, Mazandaran, and Azarbaijan, located in the north or northwestern regions shared such characteristics as geographical proximity to the Soviet Union, historical links with the Russian revolutionaries, and a more progressive and secular political culture. Khorasan and Isfahan, respectively in the northeast and the central parts of the country, however, represented the more traditional and religious provinces. Yet even there, the

infusion of oil wealth, the establishment of heavy

industries (e.g., the Isfahan Iron Steel Plant formed in

”a survey of 172 Fedayeen guerrillas who lost their lives between 1971 and 1977 revealed the following occupational breakdown: College students (73) ; high school students (1); teachers (17); engineers (19); office workers (7); doctors (3); intellectuals (4); other professionals (11); housewives (8); conscripts (5); workers (12); not known (12). See Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 481.

”See Alireza Mahfoozi, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, April 7, 1984, Paris, tape no. 1, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

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1965 with Soviet cooperation) and the new technocratic elites needed to run these businesses, plus the rapidly expanding centers of higher education, all made the appeal of the Fedayeen's message more powerful. Tehran, Tabriz (capital of Azarbaijan), and Mashhad (capital of Khorasan) are three examples of places where a good number of Fedayeen leaders became acquainted with one another on university campuses. At the University of Tehran, the following five students came together: Bizhan Jazani (born in Tehran in 1937, he was considered the foremost theoretician of the organization until his execution in 1975), Abbas Sourki (native of Mazandaran,

executed with Jazani in 1975), Ali-Akbar Safa'i-Farahani (native of Gilan and leader of the Siahkal raid), Muhammad Ashtiyani (born in Tehran in 1934), and Hamid Ashraf (born in Tehran in 1946, he later became the leader of the

organization and was killed in combat in 1 9 7 6 ) Behrouz

Dehgani, Ashraf Dehgani, Alireza Nabdel, Kazem Saadati, along with such literary figures as Samad Behrangi, and Gholam-Hossein Sa'edi (who were working closely with the organization), all came from the city of Tabriz. In Mashhad such figures as Masoud Ahmadzadeh, Amir-Parviz Pouyan, Hamid

Tavakoli, Said Aryan, and Bahman Azhang formed yet a

“Their academic training were respectively in the following disciplines: Jazani (political science), Sourki (political science), Safa'i Farahani (engineering), Ashtiyani (law), and Ashraf (engineering). Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions. 483-484.

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different clique.” As the above brief biographical sketches demonstrate, the universities served as the prime recruitment center for the Fedayeen organization. Sporting clubs for mountain climbing or wrestling, or even the broader literary clubs were secretly patroned by Fedayeen sympathizers attempting to enlist new members. This

practice was by no means limited to the Fedayeen. The Islamic Mujahedin as well as such smaller armed Marxist groups and circles as the Luristan group (led by Dr. Azami), the Palestine group, Khosrow Goleoorkhi's group,” Mustafa Sho'aian's group,” and the Tofan group all followed a similar procedure. This turn toward the universities resulted from numerous factors. First, the 1953 coup, by putting an end to organized legal political opposition, inadvertently

”The academic disciplines of these guerrillas was as follows: Ahmadzadeh (mathematics); Pouyan (literature); Tavakoli (History), Aryan (English); and Azhang (English). The first two were respectively students at Aryamehr Industrial University and National University in Tehran while the latter three were students at the University of Mashhad. “Golesorkhi, was a Marxist journalist and poet whose courageous defense of his beliefs (along with his fellow comrade Karamat Daneshian) in a televised trial in 1974 captivated thousands of viewers. Their execution following the trial became another rallying point for the militant intellectuals.

”Sho'aian (b. 1936) was a welding engineer, a teacher, and an independent Marxist thinker who in a series of debates with Hamid Momeni, the leading theoretician of the Fedayeen, criticized the organization's Leninist-Stalinist doctrines. He was killed in a gun-battle with the security police in 1975.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 103 transferred the locus of opposition from factories and work sites to such places as high schools, universities, and even mosques.” This development was only natural, since the regime could outlaw political parties and threaten striking workers with termination of employment, but could not storm

the mosques, outlaw prayers, or close the universities indefinitely, since the state itself depended upon university graduates to staff its own bureaucratic machinery." A classic case of what Samuel Huntington has called the "king's dilemma" was thus at hand. A second factor had to do with demographic changes occurring in

Iranian society at the time. In the thirty-year period after 1946, Iran's population rose from sixteen million to thirty-four million.” In addition, thanks to the drastic reductions in the infant mortality rate brought by improving medical techniques, Iran's population was becoming younger—

so much so that by 1976 two thirds of the Iranian population

was under the age of thirty, and the median age was close to

“Ali Ashtiani, "Tadavom va Goseightegi Dar Mobarezat-e Tabaqay-e Karkar," [Continuity and Discontinuity in The Struggles of the Working Class] Kankash 4 (Winter 1989); 50. "This is not to say that the regime did not carry on these activities. Quite to the contrary, in more than one occasion it attacked the mosques and closed the universities. Yet each time it was under the pressure of public opinion to reopen these centers.

"Julian Bharier, "A Note On the Population of Iran, 1900-1966," in The Population of Iran; A Selection of Readings, ed. Jamshid Momeni (Honolulu: East West Population Institute, 1977), 59. Cited in Mehrdad Arman, "Role of the Youth in the Iranian Revolution," Kankash 5 (Fall 1989): 92.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 104 21.4.” Finally, this population was also becoming urbanized. According to one study, between 1956 and 1976,

the average rate of growth of the urban population was increasing at an annual rate of 4.9 percent, while that of the rural population was increasing at a mere rate of 1.6 percent.” The expansion of the population, along with its compositional transformation, precipitated a large increase in the number of young men and women entering the universities. Despite the sharp increase in the number of students in institutions of higher learning (from 9,996 in 1953-54 to 67,268 in 1970),” the universities were still unable to accommodate the rapidly growing pool of college- bound high school graduates. According to one report, between 1963 and 1969, the number of people who took the university entrance examination rose from 13,600 to 60,000, while the number of those annually accepted only expanded from 2000 to 8000.” In other words, in the 1960s a small

13 to 14 percent of young Iranians could even dream of entering college.

”Shakhezhay-e Eitemaivah Iran 1357; Barrasev-e Moahadamati [Social Indicators of Iran in 1978: A Preliminary Investigation] (Tehran: Plan and Budget Organization, 1978), 32. Cited in Mehrdad Arman, "Role of the Youth in the Iranian Revolution": 93.

”Mehdi Bozorgmehr, "Demographic Components of Political Instability: The Case of Iran" (Master's Thesis, San Diego State University, 1982), 40. ”james Bill, The Politics of Iran. 58.

“Ibid., 90.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 105 Faced with such a dim prospect, the Iranian upper and middle classes started to send their sons and daughters abroad in the hope of providing them with the newly- cherished commodity of higher education. A report by Iran's Ministry of Science and Higher Education in 1970 revealed

that one out of every four Iranian college students was studying abroad.” While this trend lessened the pressure on the regime to accommodate all prospective students, at the end it proved to be a liability. In light of the greater freedom found in Western democracies, these students were now able freely to voice their often-critical political

opinions. One organization instrumental in politicizing a great number of newly-arriving Iranian students was the Confederation of Iranian Students (hereafter, the Confederation). The Confederation was initially formed by National Front, Third Force, and Tudeh activists who left

Iran immediately before or after the Mossadeq episode. The first Iranian Student Association was formed in Vienna in

1957. Similar associations were gradually formed in France,

”0f these, forty-one percent were in the United States, twenty-eight percent in West Germany, twelve percent in Great Britain, eight percent in France, and six percent in Turkey. See Government of Iran, Amar-i Danishiuvan-i Irani [Statistics Concerning Iranian University Students] (Tehran: Ministry of Science and Higher Education 1970), 74-75. Cited in James Bill, The Politics of Iran. 58.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 106 Switzerland, Germany, and the U.S.” The Confederation activists used the same tactics of working the athletic and

cultural clubs that were used by the guerrillas in recruiting students back home. Spread throughout many countries, the Confederation did an apt job during the 1960s and 1970s of coordinating Iranian student opposition outside Iran to the Shah's regime. Influenced by the success of revolutionary movements in Egypt, Cuba, Algeria, China, and Vietnam, the Confederation established contacts with progressive and revolutionary organizations both within and outside Iran. They were often warmly received by the revolutionary leadership of Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Libya, and the Palestine Liberation Organization.” Once armed resistance was underway inside Iran in 1971, the

Confederation provided it with monetary and logistical

”Mehdi Khanbaba-Tehrani, a founder of the Confederation, identifies the following people as some of the leading activists of the organization: Kourosh Lashaie, Hasan Masali, Bahman Niroumand, Mahmoud Rasekh, Ali Shirazi, Majid Zarbakhsh in Germany; Bijan Hekmat, Ali Shakeri, Firouz Tofige in Switzerland; Mehrdad Bahar, Hamid Enayat, Homayoun Katouzian, Mohsen Rezvani, and Zhila Seyyasi in England; Manouchehr Hezarkhani, Hossein Malek, Homa Nateq, Nasser Pakdaman, and Amir Pichdad in France; Faraj Ardalan, Ahmad Ashraf, Ali Barzegar, Ali-Mohammad Fatemi, Sadeq Ghotbzadeh, Hasan Lebaschi, Mohammad Nakhshab, Khosrow Shakeri, and Majid Tehranian in the United States. See Mehdi Khanbaba-Tehrani, Neaahev-e Az Daroun Be Jonbesh chap- e Iran: Kofteaou Ba Mehdi Khanbaba Tehrani [An Insider Look Into the Left Movement in Iran: Interview With Mehdi Khanbaba-Tehrani], ed. Hamid Shokat, vol. 2 (Saarbrucken, West Germany: Baztab Verlag, 1989), 311-313. ”Khosrow Shakeri, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, July 27, 1983, Cambridge, Massachusetts, tape nos. 1 & 2, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 107 support. It facilitated contact between guerrilla organizations inside Iran and those in the region, and went as far as sending its own members to the PLO camps to be trained in the techniques of armed struggle. Furthermore, it printed many of the books outlawed in Iran,™ published a variety of newspapers, translated books and articles, smuggled people into and out of Iran, held rallies and conferences to mobilize Western public opinion against the regime, advocated the plight of Iranian political prisoners, and broadcasted radio messages to Iran. The Confederation thus transformed many would-be students to full-time revolutionaries working to overthrow the regime from abroad. Inside Iran, the situation was no better for the regime. The government and university administrations requested obedience from an increasingly restless student body. In line with its policy of promoting civil privatism,

the state proscribed student participation in any type of

political activity. Nonetheless, as one of the most cognizant strata within the Iranian society, the student body could not stay secluded from the impact of the

’‘‘Th e Confederation published a list of 209 books, identified by the SAVAK as "harmful," which were banned before 1971. Most of these books were by leftist authors and translators along with some written by such Muslim intellectuals as Khomeini, Khamanei and Rafsanjani. See Fereydoun Tonokaboni, Pah Dastan Va Nevestehav-e Diaar As Ferevdoun Tonokaboni Va Zamimeh fMaaalati Dar Barav-e Sansor Dar Iran Va List-e Ketabhav-e Mozere) [Ten Stories and Other Writings of Fereydoun Tonokaboni Plus An Appendix on Censorship And The List of Harmful Books] (Berkeley: Confederation of Iranian Students, 1977), 2d ed., 199-208.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 108 occurrences around them. Within the university, they requested freedom of expression and assembly, a greater role for students in decision making, and evacuation of police guards from the campuses. In the society at large, they demanded that the government address some of the social ills besetting Iranian society.^ Often ignored or given false promises, the students would subsequently turn more radical. They boycotted classes, held rallies, staged sit-ins, and organized hunger strikes. Convinced that these actions were insufficient, they started to take more drastic actions. In May 1962, they went to Javadiyeh, a poor section of Tehran

damaged by a flood, to build a bridge. In 1968, they took an active part in commemoration services for Gholam-Reza Takhti, an admired Olympic gold medalist wrestler who they suspected was killed on the orders of Shah's brother out of a matter of personal jealousy. In March 1970, they joined

in a popular outcry against increasing bus fares. In May 1970, they attacked a number of American-owned institutions

and centers.™ Thus for the students the 1960s ended the

™In a 1966 survey of Tehran and National University students attitudes toward the most important task confronting the government, forty-six percent mentioned elimination of inequality and injustice followed by thirty percent who called for raising the general level of education and increasing educational opportunities. See James Bill, The Politics of Iran. 89.

™Some of the other causes for which the university students demonstrated were: in support of teachers rights (April 1961), against the CENTO Conference (June 1961), solidarity with the Algerian resistance (November 1961), against American technicians (December 1961), against Israel

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 109 same way it had begun, with a wave of unswerving protests. These protests were almost exclusively secular in nature and often dominated by the leftist forces who have traditionally concentrated much of their energy in the cultural/ educational realm. The emergence of underground guerrilla organizations strengthened this trend, but also lent legitimacy to anti-government Muslim student groups active in the universities.™ The government's response to student discontent was a mixture of intimidation and diversionary appeasement. Following its regular practice of buying-off opponents, the government would offer scholarships, living allowances, jobs, and other incentives to the students as unofficial bribes. When these attempts failed, the government would resort to the age-old practice of using threats and sanctions. The students were threatened with such prospects as failing grades, loss of scholarships or dormitory rooms,

or even expulsion. The more militant students had to face

SAVAK interrogations, tortures, and imprisonment. Judging from the continuation of demonstrations in the universities, it seems that these government tactics were not successful. After all, it is much harder to induce a young, single,

unemployed, and idealistic generation than an aging, married, economically pressed generation of aspiring

(June 1967), commemoration of Siahkal martyrs (March 1971). ™I will deal more with this issue in Chapter 5.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Furtherreproduction prohibited without permission. 110 bourgeoisie and mid-level bureaucratic class with the promise of monetary rewards and the threat of lose

privileges. The government's university predicament was not limited to the students; the faculty were also a cause for concern. In an environment of political repression, the

socially-minded faculty were prohibited from speaking on certain subjects. Faced with student informers, inquisitions by the administration, SAVAK, politically- dictated high-level appointments, administrative corruption, expulsion or imprisonment of their students, as well as a

host of other difficulties, a good number of the faculty

body also harbored strong grievances against the government. This problem was most acute in the case of young returnee professors who were uncorrupted, professionally minded, and/or politically inclined. The case of Nasser Pakdaman, a professor of economics

at the University of Tehran and founder of the Organization

of University Professors (1978), is illustrative of this

group. Born in 1933 to a middle class family in Tehran, Pakdaman graduated first in his class of 1954 from the University of Tehran's School of Law and Political Science. In 1955 he went to France, where he earned his doctorate in

Economics. Despite receiving a government scholarship, Pakdaman took part in the formation of the Confederation and

later on initiated the "League of Iranian Socialists in

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Europe" with a group of like-minded intellectuals. In 1967, he returned to Iran to face such harassment as the confiscation of books sent to him from abroad, as well as direct and indirect SAVAK inquisitions, interferences, and warnings. Pakdaman compares the plight of a university professor in Iran at the time to a man imprisoned inside a steam pipe, living in a place for which he was not made but was condemned. The imprisoned man develops a language of symbolism, indulges in self-censorship, becomes negative- minded and isolated.™ Pakdaman's case is representative of a great many young professors with impeccable academic credentials who returned to Iran only to experience the impediments to true intellectual pursuits caused by an authoritarian political machinery.™ The self-sacrificing militants, the non-conformist students, and the dissident faculty all counterbalanced

their isolation from the ordinary masses with a populist approach to political struggle. They attempted to reflect the demands of "the masses" while not necessarily succumbing

™See Nasser Pakdaman, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, May 26, 1984, Paris, tape nos. 1, 2, 3, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

™Other examples include Pakdaman*s former wife, Homa Nateq (a leading historian), Hamid Enayat (professor and Chair of University of Tehran's School of Law and Political Science), Ahmad Ashraf (a leading sociologist), Reza Barahani (a well-known literary critic), Ali Shariati (a foremost Islamic theoretician) , Manouchehr Hezarkhani (a prominent translator of literary and political theory texts), and Simin Daneshvar (Iran's first and preeminent woman novelist.)

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 112 to the letter's world-view. Toward that end, they resorted to an imitation of the language and demeanor of the masses as a way of building ties between themselves and the latter. This, however, was a futile attempt from the very beginning; the underground, full-time, and perilous life of a

guerrilla, and the elite, urban nature of a university student or professor in a country with an illiteracy rate of close to sixty percent, were too much of an impediment for such a fanciful solidarity ever to materialize. At best, "the masses" could only remain bystanders, admirers of the guerrillas' heroic acts, or courteous listeners of lectures

by the university students on the malevolent nature of Iran's socioeconomic system. Hence, the relationship

between the guerrillas and the students became a symbiosis in which the former recruited members from the latter, while the latter became the most enthusiastic supporters and promoters of the former.

The Literati The heros and heroines of Middle Eastern literature, like those in certain writings of the Orientalists, reach for a wholeness and identity through action, but they almost always fail. The representative hero...like modern man in Camus's definition, feels himself a stranger in "a universe suddenly emptied of illusion and light. Besides underground safe houses and university

’*Mona N. Mikhail, "Middle Eastern Literature and the Conditions of Modernity; An Introduction," World Literature Today 60, 2 (Spring 1986): 199.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 113 campuses, a third arena where the secular intelligentsia's otherness to the state manifested itself was in the pages of literary and artistic journals. Having closed the doors to any meaningful social or political activity, the regime viewed literature, arts, and sports as arenas where much of the attention and energies of the youth activists could be redirected without endangering its own existence. Once again, however, the regime had inadvertently provided an arena in which, in the guise of short stories and poems, dissension could be voiced in a form that lost no effectiveness from its subtlety. The socially-minded

members of the literati community used the open forums of literary journals to voice some of the same grievances raised earlier by the guerrillas and the students. Devoid of the means used by the former groups, they utilized the only weapon in their possession — the pen. For them, literature became an instrument of change and a political

medium to underscore censorship, corruption, repression,

despotism, and the plight of the disenfranchised. This new conception of literature led to a division in the ranks of the literary community between the engagé literati and the literary neutrals. The engaged artists, poets, translators, and writers were advocating adabiyat-e mote^ahhed (committed literature), one which would operate

as the mouthpiece of the poor and the underprivileged. The

literary neutrals, on the other hand, wanted to pursue

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 114 "... in letters a beauty or an understanding quite outside politics."” The regime's patronage of the literary neutrals only exacerbated the already-developing rift

between the two competing groups. The engagé literati described the neutrals as government puppets, alienated from the masses, superficial, absurdists, escapists, nihilist,

decadent, imported, artificial, illegitimate, lifeless, and unethical. They perceived their own art as attentive, loyal, dutiful, ethical, and authentic. The engagé literati's use of literature as a means of contesting the regime and inculcating popular political consciousness led some to an adaptation of socialist realism

via intellectuals such as Bertolt Brecht, Anton Chekov, Nikolai Chernyshevsky, Maxime Gorky, Pablo Neruda, Romain Rollan, and Ivan Turgenev. Like the writers themselves, the Iranian proponents of these engagé writers and social poets

came almost exclusively from the ranks of the left. Such

novelists, poets, and translators as Bozorg Alavi (b. 1904),

Reza Baraheni (b. 1935), M.E. Beh'azin (b. 1915), Samad Behrangi, Ali-Ashraf Darvishian, Mahmoud Dowlatabadi (b. 1940), Khosrow Golesorkhi (1941-1974), Siyavash Kasra'i, Esmail Kho'i (b. 1938), Ahmad Mahmoud, Bahram Sadiqi, Gholam-Hossein Sa'edi (1936-1985), Said Soltanpur (d. 1981),

and Fereydoun Tonokaboni are emissaries of this particular

school of thought. A second group of engagé literati

77Crane, Brinton. The Anatomv of Revolution. 44.

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consisted of those writers who believed in partisan

literature but were not adherents of socialist realism. This group consisted mainly of disillusioned Marxists as well as liberal members of the Iranian literary community. Among its leading figures were Jalal Al-e Ahmad (1923-1969), Mehdi Akhavan-Saless (1928-1990), Sadeq Chubak (b. 1916),

Simin Daneshvar (b. 1921), Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967), Ebrahim Golestan (b. 1922), and Ahmad Shamlu (b. 1925). These writers, poets, and filmmakers were influenced by Western artists and thinkers such as Albert Camus, Ernest Hemingway, Henry James, Bertrand Russell, Jean-Paul Sartre and others. Bozorg Alavi, the dean of Iran's socialist realism, summarized his commitment to partisan literature by saying "I know I cannot write about flowers and

nightingales."’* Shamlu, a protege of Mima Yushij (1895- 1960) and Iran's preeminent poet since the 1960s, spoke of "poetry as mankind's weapon" and demonstrated his

cosmopolitanism by proclaiming:

I, an Iranian poet, first learned about poetry from the Spaniard Lorca, the Frenchman Eluard, the German Rilke, the Russian Mayakovsky... and the American Langston Lughes; and only later, with this education, I turned to the poets of my mother tongue to see and to know, say, the grandeur of Hafiz from

’*Cited in Rivanne Sandler, "Literary Developments in Iran in the 1960s and the 1970s Prior to the 1978 Revolution," World Literature Today 60, 2 (Spring 1986): 249.

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a fresh perspective.” The group of literary neutrals also consisted of two major tendencies. The modernist wing was led by figures such as Ahmad-Reza Ahmadi, Mahshid Amir-Shahi, Nader Ebrahimi (b. 1936), Hushang Golshiri (b. 1937), Shahrokh Meskoob, Nader Naderpur (b. 1929), Abbas Pahlavan, Yadollah Roya'i, Sohrab Sepehri (1928-1980), Goli Taraghi (b. 1939), and Fereydoun Tavallali (1919-1985) .*° This group of literary writers was inspired by the works of Edgar Alan Poe, Samuel Becket, William Faulkner, Eugene Ionesco, James

Joyce, Franz Kafka, and John Steinbeck. The traditionalist wing of literary neutrals, consisting mainly of aging Persian classicists, was represented by men such as

Badiolzaman Forouzanfar (1899-1970), Jalalodin Homa'i (d. 1980), Parviz Natel-Khanlary (1913-1990), Said Nafici (1895-

”Cited in Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, "A Well Amid the Waste; An Introduction to the Poetry of Ahmad Shamlu," World Literature Todav 51, 2 (Spring 1977): 202-203.

*°A word of caution is due here about the employment of categorization such as "engagé," "literary neutrals," "socialist realist," "modernist," and "traditionalist." Considering the fact that many of the literary and artistic figures mentioned here had only recently come of age and/or were experimenting with new styles of prose and poetry, classification as designed here may at times be misrepresenting. For example, some engagé intellectuals were often experimenting with modernist styles, while the themes explored by the literary neutrals were not always devoid of a subtle political message (either in favor or against the regime.) Thus, the engagé versus literary neutrals is only meant to differentiate in the broadest sense those who had made a premeditated and conscious decision as to whether their artistic products were to serve a particular cause, ideology, or class, from those more concerned with the purely aesthetic nature of their work.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 117 1966), Zabihollah Safa (b. 1911), Shojaoddin Shafa, Rezazadeh Shafag, Lotfali Soratgar (1900-1969), and Mujtaba

Minovi (1903-1977). While the modernist wing of the literary neutrals remained more or less apolitical, the traditionalist wing

became very much involved with the officially sanctioned culture of the time. As leading authorities of Persian language and literature, they designed and supervised the academic curriculum of literature departments throughout Iranian universities. At a time when in non-establishment intellectual circles the new poetry movement was flexing its

muscles, students of literature at Iranian universities were only trained in the time-honored texts of the past. For example, in 1967 the Master's program in the literature and language of Iran at the University of Tehran consisted of reading such classics as "Shahnamah of Ferdawsi (d. 1025),

Divan of Unsuri (d. 1040-1050), Khusraw Shirin of Nizami al-

Din Ganjavi (d. about 576-599), Mathnavi of Jalal al-Din Rumi (d. 1273), Bustan of Sa'di (d. 1291), Divan of Hafiz (d. 1389), Tarikh-i Bayhaqi (995-1086), Kalilah-u-Dimnah of Ibn Huqaffa (d. 760), Jahan-Gushay-i-Juwayni (d. 1282),..."” More importantly, however, the traditionalists also dominated such government-supported foundations as

**Theda Brodsky, "The Teaching of Literature in Iran," Literature East & West 11, 2 (June 1967); 178.

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Anjoman^e GhalanF, Bonyad-e Farhan-e Iran (Iran's Cultural Foundation)” , Shouray-e Aley-e Farhang (High Council on Culture)” , Daftar-e Oliahazrat (Office of the Queen)”, Bonyad-e Farah (The Queen's Foundation)” , Farabi Institute, and others. In the politically charged milieu of the time, those intellectuals and artists active in the literary field decided to politicize literature as a way of countering both the aloofness of the modernists as well as the conformist posture of the traditionalists. These engagé literati

”This was the Iranian branch of the International PEN Society, and was led by such figures as Mohammad Hejazi, Ali Dashti, Parviz Khanlari, and Ebrahim Sahba. ”Under the honorary presidency of the Queen and the vice-presidency of Princess Ashraf (Shah's twin sister), this foundation was run by Khanlari with the assistance of Ali-Akbar Saidi-Sirjani. The foundation published numerous books on the literature and history of Iran.

”The presidency of this council belonged to Mr. Pahlboud, Minister of Culture and Arts, while Jamshid Behnam (b. 1930) and Zabihollah Safa respectively served as the council's secretary generals. This council was to control various cultural activities around the country (i.e. television programs.) However, due to turf wars with the Ministry of Culture and Arts, it was not too successful. ”This office was responsible for maintaining Iran's museums as well as sponsoring a host of other cultural events. “Formed a few years before the revolution, this foundation was to serve as an umbrella organization for a number of intellectual organizations. Overseen by the Queen herself, this foundation was directed by Abdol-Majid Madjidi. Two of the major institutions under its supervision were Anjonman-e Shahansahi-e Falsaf-e (Royal Society of Philosophy) formed in 1974, and Markaz-e Iraney-e Motalaey-e Farhangha (The Iranian Center for the Study of Civilizations) formed in 1976.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 119 criticized the modernist doctrine of "art for the sake of art" as well as the traditionalists' subdued sense of literary aestheticism. Against the first group they advocated "committed art and literature," and against the second group, a strategy of anti-establishment political activism. The combined impact of this twin struggle was the development of a formidable adversarial counter-culture. This counter-culture is best represented in the works and life of Samad Behrangi (1936-1968), a young writer and social critic from the city of Tabriz. After earning a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Tabriz, Behrangi went on to became a primary school teacher. As a leftist and an arch-antagonist of escapist literature, Behrangi set for himself the task of reclaiming an ignored domain of literary endeavor: children's literature. He was heavily influenced by a literary-political triangle: the Russian literary tradition of socialist realism, the guerilla warfare of Latin American revolutionaries, and the

cultural revolution that was occurring in China at the time. Behrangi picked the field of children's literature, which

was unpolluted, uncontested, and symbolically oriented. His most famous work. The Little Black Fish” depicts the account of an adventurous, self-sacrificing young fish who leaves his little stream to explore the larger world of a

*’Samad Behrangi, The Little Black Fish and Other Modern Persian Short Stories, trans. Mary and Eric Hoogland (Washington, D.C.: The Three Continents Press, 1976).

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sea. On his way, he encounters all sorts of savage acts committed against fishes by larger creatures such as the crab, the pelican, and the sharks. It becomes his responsibility to fight these injustices. Finally, while attempting to free a comrade, the little black fish dies at

the hands of a larger reptile. The story produced a living legacy of a courageous nobody who took on the powers that

be. Ironically enough, Behrangi's accidental drowning in a river a few years later conjured up the same, images as his fictitious little black fish.” The significance of Behrangi's stories stems not so much from their aesthetic nature (they followed straight-forward plots and employed a

simple language) but rather lies in the folk style and rich

symbolism with which they were narrated.” Behrangi represented the best of what can be regarded as populist and partisan literature. Though some disagree with the merit of

his actions, Behrangi is to be credited with having turned

”The opposition insubstantially accused the government of causing Behrangi's death, hence transforming him into both a martyr and a best selling writer.

^Besides his children's stories, Behrangi wrote a number of critical monographs on the dismal state of education both in his native Azerbaijan as well as in the rest of Iran. Labeling much of these policies as Amerikazadeh (struck by the United States), Behrangi brought an indictment against the government policy makers sitting in Tehran for promoting programs totally out of touch with the needs of rural Iran. See his Kandokave Par Masael-e Tarbevatev-e Iran [Inquiry Into Educational Issues in Iran], (Reprinted by the Iranian Student Association in the U.S. Supporters of Organization of Iranian People's Fedayeen Guerrillas, nd.)

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 121 the committed teacher into an anti-establishment activist and propagandist.* Behrangi set an example for many young and idealistic conscripts who went into the Sepah-e Danesh (Literacy Corp)” hoping to improve the living conditions of the peasantry. His close affiliation with the Fedayeen in Tabriz, and in particular with his close friend, confidant, and colleague, Behrouz Dehgani (who was later tortured to death by SAVAK for being a leading member of the Fedayeen), helped to popularize his works as well as strengthen the bond between the underground activists and the legally functioning literati.

Gholam-Hossein Sa'edi, a psychiatrist and Iran's foremost playwright, characterized the decade of the 1960s

*Behrangi helped to popularize a term centered around a fictitious character by the name "Mr. Choke-Bakhtiar." Representing the typical middle-class government employee, Behrangi made a mockery of this character for his apolitical, submissive, and selfish behavior. His unrelenting satirical criticism of "Mr. Choke-Bakhtiar" was a symbolic indictment of the value systems governing the new Iranian middle class.

^Formed in the mid 1960s, The Literacy Corp was an imitation of the American Peace Corp and was designed to fight illiteracy in the villages. It was made up of recent high school graduates who instead of serving in the regular army would be send to the countryside. They were entrusted with such responsibilities as educating both the rural children and adults as well as helping with such welfare enterprises as building roads, public baths, infirmaries, and a host of other sanitary projects. Thus, for the young anti-establishment Iranian intellectuals who historically have been urban based and without access to such mass media means as radio and television, becoming a teacher or serving in the Literacy Corp became a suitable vehicle for reaching out to the peasantry.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 122 as the era when Iranian literature and literati blossomed.” Echoing Sa'edi's sentiments, Mohammad-Ali Sepanlou, a leading literary critic, summarized the accomplishments of

this era in the following manner: (1) the consolidation of Persian New Poetry; (2) drastic improvements in the quantity as well as quality of novels and literary criticisms; (3) the advent of a serious filmmaking industry; (4) profound improvements in the composition and distribution of children's literature; (5) publication of numerous short stories and poems; (6) publication of a variety of original research on Iranian history, philosophy, and literature; and

(7) the appearance of Iran's most important plays by such talented dramatists as Bahram Beyzayi, Akbar Rad'i, Ali Nassirian, Mohsen Yalfani, and Sa'edi himself.” The plays were often adapted by equally talented New Wave film directors such as Khosrow Haritash, Masoud Kimiya'i, Daryush Mehrju'i, Amir Naderi, Sohrab Shahid-Saless, and Nasser

Taqva'i. Considering the great popular potential of film,

this joint venture between the writers and the directors proved most beneficial to both parties. Writers' works were now reaching an unprecedented number of people, while the

”Gholam-Hossein Sa'edi, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, June 7, 1984, Paris, tape no. 4, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University. ”Mohammad-Ali Sepanlou, Nevisandeoan-e Pishrow-e Iran [Iran's Leading Writers] (Tehran: Negah Publishing, 1987), 1 1.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 123 caliber of film scripts was drastically improving.” Similarly, great strides were being made in painting, translation, and publishing. The number of publishing houses, for example, which until 1941 was no more than 23, had now gone up to 283 (127 in Tehran, and 56 in the

provinces.)” While benefiting from these strides, however, the engagé literati had ample cause for discontent. Despite the infusion of oil wealth, these artists and poets, like the rest of the dissident intellectuals, viewed themselves as politically defeated. In the aftermath of the coup, many poets affiliated with the National Front or the left translated this defeat into poetry. Akhavan-Sales's "Zemestan" (Winter) epitomized the literary community's dejected mood. Yet at the same time, they represented a new experimentation with style, and a new semiology. Implicit within these and other masterpieces of the new poetry genre was an allegorical style fully supported by the fertile

mythological symbolism of Persian language and literature. Fredric Jameson, the American Marxist literary critic.

”For a detailed examination of this relationship see: Hamid Nafici, "Iranian Writers, the Iranian Cinema, and the Case of Dash Akol," Iranian Studies 18, 2-4 (Spring-Autumn 1985): 231-251. ”Mehri Parrirokh, Rahnamav-e Nasheran-e Iran [Directory of Iran's Publishing Houses], (Tehran: Center for Scientific Documentation, 1989). cited in F.A. Faryar, "Shomar-e Nasheran-e Ma," [The Number of Our Publishers] Nashr-e Danesh 9, 3 (March-April 1989): 54.

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has asserted: Third-world texts, even those which are seemingly private and invested with a properly libidinal dynamic— necessarily project a political dimension in the form of national allegory: the story of the private individual destiny is always an allegory of the embattled situation of the public third-world culture and society.” Despite his unjustified generalization about the nature of third-world literature as a whole, Jameson's point about the allegorical nature of many of these texts is well taken. Much of this can be attributed to political censorship and strangulation, as well as to the illiteracy of a general public in need of mythical-symbolic characters to whom they could relate. Studying the fiction, poetry, and other works of many Iranian literati in the 1960s and 1970s, one is struck by the amount of symbolism, allegory, metaphors, and allusions used to avoid the institution of censorship.” One Iranian literary critic summarizes the censorship/symbolism mechanism:

A life of concealment develops progressively in the misty atmosphere where all channels of communication are rigidly held in control. Ingenious forms of protection and secrecy are devised as substitute for ordinary privileges of privacy.

“Fredric Jameson, "Third-World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism," Social Text 15 (Fall 1986): 69.

”Tw o principal censorship agencies were SAVAK and the Ministry of Culture and Art's Composition Bureau. The magnitude of censorship could be gauged based on the frequency by which such literary periodicals as Ferdowsi. Jahan-e Now. Neain. Omid-e Iran. Seoid-va-Sevah. and Tofia were censored or closed. At the same time, however, such periodicals as Sokhan and Yaahma. representing the literary establishment, were left free to operate.

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Walls surround houses. Veils cover women. Religious taqiyeh [deliberate dissimulation] protects faith. Ta'arof [ritualistic modes of discourse] disguise real thoughts and emotions. Houses become compartmentalized with their daruni [inner] and biruni [outer] areas. Feelings become disjointed in zaheri [external] and bateni [internal] spheres. Abstractions imprison concreteness. Slogans suffocate dialogues. Overworked generalities replace the specific.”

The most recurring themes and symbols in the literature of this era deals with subjects such as corruption, darkness, fear, hypocrisy, loneliness, nothingness, solitude, and walls. In class terms, the terms expressed the haughtiness of the upper class, superficiality of the middle class, hopelessness of village life, and

alienation of the urban poor. It was in such an atmosphere that Kanun-e Nevisandegan-e Iran (The Writers Association of Iran) was founded in April 1968. The Association was formed in response to a "Congress of Iranian Writers and Poets" that the government was planning to organize in February 1968.” Faced with the objection of the engagé writers, the

regime abandoned the idea of the congress. Celebrating

their small victory, the writers decided to form a writers'

association to represent their cause and to take on the regime collectively. Discussions among members of the

”Farzaneh Milani, "Power, Prudence, and Print: Censorship and Simin Danashvar," Iranian Studies 18, 2-4 (Spring-Autumn 1985): 327.

”For a full account of the Association's history see Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, "Protest and Perish: A History of the Writers' Association of Iran," Iranian Studies 18, 2-4 (Spring-Autumn 1985): 189-229.

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Association centered around such themes as the meaning of freedom, the social stance of the writer, and the necessity of a committed literature. However, due to the untimely death of Al-e Ahmad (the major force behind the Association) as well as internal factionalism and disagreements among its members, the Association failed to hold together after March 1970. Despite this brief period of activity, the Writers Association served to sharpen criticism voiced against the

government. Almost a year later, the rise of armed struggle waged by the Fedayeen threw its shadow over Iranian intellectual

and literary communities. The Siahkal episode helped implant a whole new set of themes into the literature of this era. Renunciation, resistance, revolution, sacrifice, prison, and heroism entered the depository of subjects from which artists, poets, and writers could draw. Guns,

forests, and roses dominated the symbolism of the new

spirit.The populist themes championed by the guerrillas soon spilled over into the literary community as more and

more poets and writers rushed to support the new activist visionaries.To counter the guerrilla attack, however.

‘“Guns and forest denoted the means and the place, respectively, where armed resistance was first inaugurated; the red rose symbolized blood, and the memory of Khosrow Goleshorkhi, whose last name precisely meant the red rose.

““Examples of this group include: Maftoon Amini, Reza Barahani, Esmail Kho'i, Nemat Mirzazadeh, Mohammad-Ali Sepanlu, Ahmad Shamlou, Said Soltanpur, and Gholam-Hossein Sa’edi.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 127 the regime responded to this literary campaign of "sabotage" with an equally heavy hand. The period between 1971 and 1975 witnessed the peak of censorship, horror, and intellectual suffocation when many engagé literati were imprisoned, blacklisted, or denied permission to write or

publish. Faced with various factors such as the stalemate reached with the urban guerrillas. President Jimmy Carter's arrival at the White House in January 1976 and the launching of his human rights campaign, and the greater success of Iranian student organizations abroad in exerting public

pressure against the regime for its treatment of political prisoners, the regime relaxed some of its rules of engagement. The Iranian writers and poets took advantage of this gesture by once again reviving the Writers' Association.'” Their first plan of action was to organize

‘“These included Mahmoud Beh'azin, Manouchehr Hezarkhani, Jafar Koush-Abadi, Nemat Mirzazadeh, Nasser Rahmani-Nejad, Mohammad-Ali Sepanlou, Said Soltanpour, and Fereydoun Tonokaboni. Beh'azin provides a first-hand account of his imprisonment by the security forces in his sarcastically entitled book: Mehman-e In Aaavan [Guest of These Gentlemen] (Tehran, Nil Publishing, 1970). ‘“Karimi-Hakkak charges that "according to official statistics, the number of volumes published and marketed annually in Iran dropped from over 4,000 in 1969 to about 700 in 1976." See Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, "Protest and Perish: A History of the Writers' Association of Iran": 204. ‘”Eslam Kazemiyyeh (b. 1931), a founding member of The Writers' Association, recalls that in 1976 after Franco's death and the return of the Spanish monarch to power many Iranian intellectuals were following the developments in Spain quite regularly. The Spanish King had declared

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 128 ten nights of public poetry reading by well-known writers and poets. These readings were held in the Irano-German Cultural society (also known as the Goethe Institute) in Tehran in October 1977. For the first time, close to sixty prominent poets and writers recited their poetry and other

works to highly enthusiastic crowd composed mainly of urban and university-educated youths. Emerging from years of censorship, the speakers used the occasion effectively to voice their opposition to the regime from different ideological positions. Some, such as Soltanpour, openly revealed their secular-leftist predispositions, while others such as Shams Al-e Ahmad, Eslam Kazemiyyeh, Jafar Koush- Abadi, and Siyavash Kasra'i invoked more religious terminology and metaphors. The poetry reading nights also served as an indication of the extent to which government and the opposition were able to restrain themselves in a

charged atmosphere. These ten nights are crucial in modern Iranian

intellectual history. First, they provided closer relations between the artists and their audiences; second, they helped raise the political consciousness of the young university

and high school students; third, the writers attending these

democracy, and had promised both the royalist and the communists that they could return to Spain. Hence, for the Iranian intellectuals and literati, Spain represented an experimentation with democracy in a previously repressive regime. The Reminiscences of Eslam Kazemiyyeh, 1983-84, p. 6, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 129 events were able to maintain a sense of political pluralism among themselves irrespective of their contrasting ideological convictions; and finally, the poetry nights made it possible for the opposition to experiment with a more

peaceful mode of resistance to the regime. Due to these factors, the poetry reading nights are considered a prelude to the waves of protest that would engulf Iranian cities only a few months later. The militants and the literati had contributed their share in undermining the Rentier State.

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SECULAR INTELLECTUALS AND THE OTHERNESS OF THE WEST

Analogous to their sense of otherness vis-a-vis the state, the secular Iranian intellectuals of the 1960s and 1970s faced a second type of otherness vis-a-vis the West. While the first othering act was more immediate, concrete, dangerous, and well-defined, the second was more distant,

abstract, safe, and ambiguous. The adversary was not an

armed, repressive limited entity called the state, but a more remote and undefined totality designated as the "West" or the "Occident.These two types of otherness vis-a-vis the state and the West became inextricably bound as secular intellectuals came to perceive the Iranian regime as an

extension of a larger entity called the "West."

‘Throughout this study the two dichotomies of East/West and Orient/Occident will be used interchangeably in order to remain loyal to the literal translations and the tone of the works cited. The East/West dichotomy refers not to the present political division of the world but instead to a geographical division of the globe. The "East" or the "Orient" encompasses all of the Middle and Near East, Asia, Far East, and North Africa, while the "West" or the "Occident" refers mainly to Western Europe and North America. As we shall see later, however, the term "West" was misused by a number of Iranian intellectuals. While it represents a geographical entity for some, others hold a more symbolic or mystical view of it, regarding it as a way of life or a set of ontological doctrines.

130

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 131 In this chapter, I shall illustrate how the discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse" took shape through this second perception of otherness. Two discussions that came to the forefront of Iranian intellectual life in the 1960s and the 1970s made the most significant contributions to this social

construction of the West as an other. The first discussion, which began soon after the end of World War II, was rekindled in 1962 with the publication of a polemical monograph by Jalal Al-e Ahmad entitled Gharbzadeai. This

work gave birth to a discourse of the same name.’ The incipient discourse of gharbzadegx (Westoxication), which was to dominate the intellectual panorama of Iran from that point on was the Iranian offshoot of the discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse." The second debate began with a series of scholarly works in the late 1960s and early 1970s critical of Western

Orientalism, Western Iranology, and Western Orientalists.

As with its predecessor, at the core of this discussion lay two interrelated issues confronting modern Iranian intellectuals: self-identity, and encounters with Western civilization.*

’Throughout this chapter, in order to differentiate the two concepts, I have used the upper case Gharbzadeai to refer to the title of Al-e Ahmad's monograph, while using the lower case gharbzadegi to refer to the broader discourse under investigation. *I shall treat this second debate rather briefly, since much of the criticisms voiced by the Iranian intellectuals

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 132 Tracing the epistemological, historical, and political genesis of gharbzadegi, this counter-discourse, which aspired to articulate an alternative to the political and philosophical paradigms of the West, led many secular Iranian intellectuals to turn toward nativism, traditionalism, and even Islamicism. Toward substantiating this assertion, I concentrate on the works of four leading post-World War II Iranian intellectuals: Fakhr ad-Din Shadman, Ahmad Fardid, Jalal Al-e Ahmad, and Daryush Shayegan. The selection of these intellectuals was not based on their popularity, but rather by the following criteria: (1) they articulated some of the most

philosophically-consequential ideas on the discourse of

gharbzadegi; (2) they represent different views and political affiliations; and (3) they exemplify the predominate response of Iranian intellectuals during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s to the problem of encounter with the

West. Fakhr ad-din Shadman was one of the earliest Iranian

statesmen and thinkers to detect the rise of an intellectual enigma with respect to the West. Ahmad Fardid is a

philosopher who has had considerable influence on many Iranian intellectuals for the last three decades. Jalal Al- e Ahmad was Iran's most eminent anti-establishment intellectual and social critic of the 1950s and 1960s.

against Orientalism were similar to those raised by Edward Said in Orientalism; these were addressed in chapter 1.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 133 Daryush Shayegan, a former university professor as well as Director of the Iranian Center for the Study of Civilizations, presented one of the more philosophically- refined expositions of the Orient/Occident among those articulated in Iran in the 1960s and 1970s. It is to an examination of their individual thoughts that we now turn.

Fakhr ad-Din Shadman; The Forgotten Pioneer The trajectory of the gharbzadegi metadiscourse in the post-World War II era was guided considerably by Seyyed Fakhr ad-Din Shadman.* He is regarded as the man standing in the center of the labyrinth that lies between two

generations holding different views regarding the West. Shadman provides the missing link between the earlier

*Fakhr ad-Din Shadman (b. 1907) was born into a religious family in Tehran. He was a product of both the old and the new educational systems. Shadman spent his primary education under the tutelage of two religious teachers. After attending a number of modern secondary schools, including Darolfonun (considered the best school in Iran), he went on to Darolmoalemin (Teachers' College) where he earned a law degree. As an employee of the Ministry of Justice, Shadman was send to Europe where he earned first a doctorate in Law from University of Paris (1935), and then a doctorate in Political Science and Economics from the University of London (1939). After spending fourteen years in Europe, Shadman returned to Iran and held a variety of posts, including Minister of Economics and Agriculture (1948), Minister of National Economics, and then Minister of Justice (1953-54). Furthermore, Shadman was responsible for envisioning and founding the Abadan Technical College, which since its inception has provided Iran with the corp of professional manpower needed to operate its oil industry. Finally, Shadman was also a professor of History at University of Tehran from 1950 until close to the time of his death in 1967. See his biography, published in Rahnema- ve Ketab 5, 1 (March 1962): 95-100.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 134 staunch supporters of the West and its later arch-critics. In his most important work, Taskhir-e Tamaddon-e Faranai [Conquest of European Civilization]*, written in 1947, Shadman criticizes the beliefs of his compatriots, who faced the political and ideological permeation of the West. By

depicting two fictitious characters, one representing traditional clerics, the other a Western-educated intellectual infatuated with the West, Shadman was able to indict both groups. He criticized the former for their ignorance of the West, his opposition to the accomplishments of the modern age, and his nostalgia for the tranquility of a bygone era. However, Shadman saved his most severe

criticism for the members of the second group. Borrowing from the French, he labeled these individuals with the pejorative term "fokoli,” meaning one wearing a tie, or a "dude."* Writing in the volatile milieu of the 1940s,

Shadman maintained that before Iran was taken over by Western civilization and made into a powerless captive, it

should have attempted to appropriate that civilization

willingly and thoughtfully. According to him, the only means available to the Iranian people to accomplish this

*The essay was published as part of the following book: Aravesh va Pevrayesh Zaban [Beautification and Polishing of Language] (Tehran: Iran Publishing, 1947).

*Some other terms that were used by the clergy as well as the common people to describe these Western-educated intellectuals were ”Mostafrang,” [one who has gone to the West], "Motejaded” [modernist], "gherti" [effete], and "kafar" [unbeliever].

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 135 task was the rich Persian language. His enmity toward the "fokolis** emanated from their

advocation of total surrender to the "farangi" [Western] ways of life, including a change of language.’ The "fokoli" subjects of Shadman*s criticism fell into three groups: (1) the encyclopedists and translators working with "Farhangestan" (The Iranian Academy of Literature);® (2) students and intellectuals recently returned from abroad;

and (3) advocates of the new style of Persian poetry. His criticism of the first group concerned their flirtation with

the idea, originating in next-door Turkey, of conversion to Latin letters, as well as their coining of terms. The second group was castigated for deserting their ethnic roots and customs in order to become superficially westernized.

Finally, the third group was reprimanded for abandoning the

’shadman maintains that for Iranians, the terms "farang" and ”farangi” are not clearly defined. Instead, they are terms whose definitions depend on the extent of the speaker's knowledge and opinion. For some, "farang" only refers to Europe, while for others it can imply Europe, Australia, as well as the three Americas. Shadman himself, however, used the term to designate all countries which have a full or a majority Christian population, are descendants of a European race, speak one of the European languages, and have reached the highest stages of civilization. See Fakhr ad-Din Shadman, Teraoedev-e Farang [Tragedy of the West] (Tehran: Tahouri Publications, 1967): 167. *Founded in 1935 by Reza Shah, the academy was to revise the Persian language and purify it from foreign (primarily Arabic) influence. The Academy was given the mandate to create new terms to combat Arabic contamination of Persian. However, the Allies' occupation of Iran in 1941 put an end to the Academy's short existence.

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rhythmic and intricate classical poetry of Persia for a non- conventional, enigmatic poetry imitative of Western styles. Shadman spelled out some of the characteristics of a "fokoli" in the following way: -An unmanly Iranian who never complains of the difficulty inherent in learning the strenuous vocabularies of German and French, or the often-unregulated pronunciation of English, yet refrains from learning his mother tongue and views this ignorance as a sort of accomplishment. -An ignorant or an ill-intentioned Iranian who thinks that if the Persian alphabet is replaced by a Latin one, all Iranians will suddenly be able to read and write Persian. -An unaware Iranian who does not understand that the Western missionaries' castigation of Islam as the root cause of Iran's misfortune stems from their malevolence, egocentrism, and prejudice emanating from their Christian belief in belittling the religions of others. -A well-dressed cleric who has learned a few Persian and Arabic words and read thirty or forty books drafted by the unlearned yet prolific writers of Egypt and Syria, and with enormous difficulty has incompletely memorized a few hundred Western scientific and philosophical terms translated from Arabic. -An "exceptional" mentor who views himself as Iranian, teaches Iranian students in the universities, and receives his salary from the wealth of the Iranian masses, yet who does not have the determination of a Western countryside teacher to learn his mother tongue. Nonetheless, he is audacious enough to invent words, and wants meticulously to teach subjects to his poor students through a strange language he himself has designed. -An indecent and narrow-minded Iranian who thinks Western civilization amounts merely to dancing cheek to cheek, gambling, and going to smoke-filled pubs, yet is oblivious to the fact that the foundation of Western civilization is actually based on reading, deliberation, and argumentation.* Shadman viewed Russia and Japan as two countries that were able deliberately to appropriate Western civilization

*Shadman, Tashkir-e Tamaddon-e Faranai: 13-18.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 137 and succeeded in that task while countries such as Algeria, which were "taken over" at the time by the Western civilization, became destitute.*® He concluded that in the face of the Western intrusions to Iranian culture, Iran was going to experience a fate similar to Algeria's unless it

absorbed Western civilization confidently and reflectively. In a metaphorical language in tune with the military spirit

of the 1940s, he wrote: We can compare Western civilization to an army made up of one hundred million soldiers. Every valuable book that we bring to Iran, every accurate translation that we give to our countrymen, and every blueprint of a factory, a building, a machine... that we gather in Iran is as if we have captured one soldier of this huge army and made him into our own servant.** Shadman believed that the superiority of the West resided in its scientific outlook and not necessarily in the force of its moral convictions. Hence he contended that

while Iran needed to send students to the West to acquire the letter's technical know-how and translate scientific

textbooks, it did not necessarily have to embrace the letter's ethical standards or ways of thinking. Shadman

viewed the Second World War as the last chapter of Europe's glorious history and its material-spiritual independence.

*®Ibid., 30.

**Ibid., 75. Other military metaphors used by Shadman that reflect the militaristic discourse of the era include terms such as "weapon," "capture," "escape route," "surrender," "resistance," "Western cultural invasion," "collaborating with the enemy," and "fifth column."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 138 In a poetic essay on the fate of Europe he wrote; Oh Europe, what meanings are embedded within your name! Europe as the incarnation of ancient Greece and its wisdom, ancient Rome and its magnificence, France and its intellectual stocks, Italy and its innovative art, Switzerland and its government. Hearing the name Europe, one is reminded of Greek philosophy, British poetry, German music... Europe equals the accumulating and self- correcting science from Aristotle to Planck, splendid poetry from Homer to Hugo, and rationalist philosophy from Plato to Russell. Its discoveries and inventions are beyond measurement... The vast Americas is one of its discoveries and powerful electricity its other accomplishment. The telescope is one of its inventions and an airplane traveling faster than the speed of sound its other. Shadman viewed democracy as Europe's most significant

discovery, and regarded the mechanisms designed for guaranteeing its protection to be Europe's greatest invention. Nonetheless, as a conscientious Third World intellectual familiar with the agonies of colonialism, Shadman remained an objector to European hypocrisy. He saw Europe's greatest vice in its denial of freedom to the non-

Europeans at the same time that it was continuously boasting

about the virtues of freedom and democracy." Shadman also reprimanded his own compatriots for constantly looking up to the deceptive West while remaining totally ignorant of the geography, history, science, literature, and arts of such Eastern countries as India, Russia, and China. Furthermore, Shadman criticized the Western-oriented political and

"shadman, Teraaedev-e Farana: 112.

"ibid., 113.

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intellectual elites of Iran for their total neglect of the religious seminaries, which he regarded as the forerunners of Iran's oldest universities. He reminded his colleagues of the scholastic merits of such theological centers as Qom, Isfahan, Ghazvin, Mashhad, Shiraz, Kashan, and Yazd from which many lyricists, physicians, astronomers, teachers, translators, and scientists had emerged. He concluded by saying that the gap between the universities and the religious centers should be bridged.* once again making a

mockery of the "fokolis" as some of the products of this new educational system, he sarcastically declared: since becoming a fokoli does not require much [intellectual] capital, whoever reads a few chapters of an economics book by Charles Gide or [Alfred] Marshall becomes an economic expert; whoever tightens up the screws on his aunt's sewing machine becomes an engineer; whoever writes the account of his cousin's wedding in poor Persian becomes a creative writer; whoever writes or talks about politics, party, Metternich, Lord Curzon, and Bolsheviks and Mensheviks becomes an expert on politics. So much so, that compared to our overall population we have more economists than the United States, and more political experts and commentators than England. And why should it not be the case?" Shadman, the forgotten thinker, thus became one of the articulate precursors of a discourse which two decades later became known as gharbzadegi He was a man quite familiar

"Ibid., 71-76. " Shadman, Tashkir-e Tamaddon-e Faranai: 41.

**The nearly unanimous omission of Shadman from any evaluation of the historical evolution of the discourse of gharbzadegi is possibly attributable to his high-profile positions in various government posts before and after the

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 140 with Western intellectual traditions, yet more at home with his own cultural heritage. His criticism of the West, the Western-oriented modernists, and the traditional sectors of his own society represented an important turn by some Iranian intellectuals toward a more home-grown synthesis of

the Orient/Occident cultural encounter. His views on the West were both devoid of the overall naivete of earlier generations of Iranian intellectuals as well as the antagonistic radicalism which beset their successors. Through his critique of the West and Western-infatuated Iranians, Shadman laid down the political groundwork for the

discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse." Before becoming popular, however, this discourse needed the acquirement of a philosophical foundation. It was to be provided by the philosopher Ahmad Fardid.

Ahmad Fardid; The Oral Philosopher

Trotsky's famous dictum, "Publish or Perish," always

popular among academics, does not seem to apply in the case of Ahmad Fardid, one of Iran's least known yet most influential philosophers." A brilliant man with a

1953 Coup, which compelled anti-establishment intellectuals to overlook his accomplishments. "Fardid is a contemporary philosopher who, like Shadman, has gone through both the traditional Iranian educational system as well as the modern academic training of Germany and France. In the 1940s and 1950s, he was a member of the intellectual circle formed around Sadeq Hedayat, and was active in the research branch of Iran's Teachers' Association. In the late 1960s he was appointed

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 141 disorganized mind, he is generally credited with having introduced German philosophy into modern Iran. For the last four decades, Fardid allegedly has served as Iran's leading authority on the philosophy of Martin Heidegger. Influenced by Heidegger and the German historicist

tradition, Fardid gave the Orient/Occident dichotomy a philosophical twist. Rejecting the political, economic, and geographical definitions of this binarism, he utilized a philosophical language rooted in strong symbolism to designate the two competing Weltanschauung. Employing Heidegger's premise that during each historical era a truth

arises which obscures other competing truths, Fardid maintained that the historical destiny of the contemporary world is the destiny of the Occident. Borrowing a phrase from Heidegger, he contends that with the advent of Greek philosophy the moon of reality has risen while the sun of truth has gone into an eclipse.** Ever since then, he maintains, the Orient representing the essence of the holy

books and divine revelation has been concealed under a

variety of Occidental mantles. Conceiving of history of

professor of philosophy at University of Tehran, and gradually formed an intellectual circle around himself made up of some of the country's leading intellectuals, philosophers, translators, and social thinkers. This circle, which became known as the "Fardid Circle," used to deliberate on Oriental and Occidental philosophical questions.

**Ahmad Fardid, "Chand Porsesh dar Bab-e Farhang-e Sharq," ["Some Questions on the Culture of the Orient"] Farhang va Zendeai 7 (December 1971): 33.

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philosophy as a centrifugal motion away from the essential Truth, Fardid envisions the ontological circuits of Oriental and Occidental philosophy in such a way that the authentic ecclesiastical thought of the Orient has engendered Greek cosmologism and cosmocentrism, which later brought the theologism and theocentrism of the Middle Ages, and finally

led to anthropologism and anthropocentrism of the Modern Age (see Figure 1). Fardid charges that during each of these eras the primary subject of contemplation went through a metamorphosis. While the Orient was contemplating on the "true and spiritual essence," Greek philosophy was preoccupied with the "world," the Middle Ages with the

metaphysical "God," and finally modern humanity with the individual "self. For Fardid, then, the West's inception occurs with Greek philosophy, and its growth with Renaissance humanism.

He viewed this humanism as the historical destiny of the

modern age, making homo sapiens the focus of all thinking.

This evolution, he claims, has given rise to a technological, all-encompassing ethos that has deprived modern man of morality. Thus, according to Fardid's

"ibid., 34. Fardid's criticism of the Middle Ages concerns the fact that, although the subject of contemplation changed once again from the world to the God, this "God" is still understood based on Greek cosmological and metaphysical thought, and not on "true" religious thought. He cites Thomas Aquinas' interpretation of the Bible based on Aristotelian philosophy as an example of this deviant interpretation.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 143 True Orient which is in a State of hidden and unidentified Truth

Greek Cosmoiogism and Cosmocentrism

Middle Ages: Theologism and Theocentrism

Modern flge: Anthropologism and Anthropocentrism

Fig. 1. FAADID’S PEACEPTIQN OFTAE ONTOLOGICAL CiACUiTS OF OAIENTAL AND OCCIDENTAL PHILOSOPHY

Source: “Chand Porsesh dar bab-e Farhang-e Sharq,” Farhang ua Zendegi. 7 (December 1971), 35.

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ontological couplet, the Orient is the kingdom of benevolence and compassion, while the Occident is the terrain of domination. Persuaded by Heidegger's views on the spirit of historical eras, the philosophy of Being, and the imprisoning nature of modern technology, Fardid speaks of gharbzadegi as the interlude between the self and the Being. According to him, such humanistically-oriented

philosophical schools of thought as existentialism or nihilism does not provide a means of escape from the present crisis besieging humanity. Fardid's final judgment is that Gharb [the West] is to be abandoned both as an ontology and as a way of life. As one English critic put it, for Fardid it is "...closing time in the gardens of the West."“ Fardid believes that gharbzadegi is thus a transitional phase which one has to leave behind in order to reach to the essence of the West. To undertake this

intellectual odyssey, however, one has to become Westernized, not in the sense of becoming alienated from his own self, but in the more subtle sense of becoming cognizant about the adversary. In order to confront the West, Fardid asserts, we need to get to the very core of its philosophy

and ontology. Getting to know the other became a prerequisite for knowing the self.

^®From Cyril Connolly, cited in Alfred Kazin, "We See From the Periphery, Not the Center: Reflections on Literature in an Age of Crisis," World Literature Todav 51 (Spring 1977): 187.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 145 Fardid's conception of the West is warmly received by an important segment of the community of Iranian intellectuals eager to reassert their own identity during a time of change both in the East and in the West.^* Although Fardid should rightfully be acknowledged as the progenitor

of the term "gharbzadegi,” the person who did the most to popularize this concept was Jalal Al-e Ahmad.“ It is to an examination of his ideas that we now turn.

Al-e Ahmad; An Iconoclast Hommes de Lettres In the fall of 1962, amidst a social transformation which was rapidly altering the configuration of Iranian society, a monograph entitled Gharbzadegi was published by

Jalal Al-e Ahmad." The monograph was essentially a report

"Some prominent philosophers and literary figures who gathered around Fardid were Abdollah Anvar, Daryush Ashuri, Najaf Daryabandari, Reza Davari, Amir-Hossein Jahanbeglu, Abolhasan Jalili, Shahrokh Meskoob, and Daryush Shayegan. Some of these individuals were mere followers of Fardid while others reflected the letter's influence on their own writings and deliberations.

"Fardid and Al-e Ahmad probably first met in 1954 at the Mehregan Club of Iran's Teachers' Association.

"Jalal Al-e Ahmad (1923-1969) was born into a religious family from northern Iran. In 1943 he was sent by his father to the holy city of Najaf in Iraq to become a "talabe" [theology student], but Al-e Ahmad stayed there for no more than a few months. Upon his return to Iran, he broke with religion and joined the ranks of the Marxist Tudeh Party, where he soon rose to a high position within the party's publicity department. In 1947, however, he and a number of other intellectuals seceded from the Tudeh party initially over some internal matters while still remaining faithful to the Soviet Union. After they were denounced as traitors by Radio Moscow, Al-e Ahmad retired from the political arena for a few years. Yet he became involved

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that Al-e Ahmad had prepared for the Commission on the Aim of Iranian Education organized by the Ministry of Education in November 1961 and January 1962." The book proved to be

an intellectual bombshell immediately upon its release because it called into question the basic foundations of Iranian social and intellectual history. This quality made Gharbzadegi" the intellectual bible of several generations

with politics once again when he introduced two influential political figures, Mozaffar Baqa'i and Khalil Malekhi (d. 1969) to one another. The two later formed Hezb-e Zahmatkashan-e Mellat-e Iran (Niru-ye Sewom) [Iran's Toilers Party (The Third Force)] which played an influential role during the oil nationalization campaign led by Dr. Mohammad Mossadeq. After the 1953 Coup, Al-e Ahmad abandoned his organizational ties with Hezb-e Zahmatkashan and concentrated more on his literary interests as a teacher, belletrist, translator, and ethnographer while remaining an independent political activist. By the 1960s, he had earned a reputation for being the most tireless social critic of the Pahlavi regime. Al-e Ahmad served as the leading spokesman for anti-establishment Iranian intellectuals, as well as a mentor to a great many of them.

"The Commission was one result of ideas initiated by Mohammad Derakhshesh, the leader of the Teachers' Association who had just become Minister of Education. The ten-member Commission (which included Ahmad Fardid) discussed Al-e Ahmad's report in its entirety. Although Derakhshesh was a close friend of Al-e Ahmad, he informed me that the Commission was not able to publish Al-e Ahmad's essay due to its overtly critical view of the regime. Mohammad Derrakhshesh, interview by author, 10 February 1990, Chevy Chase, Maryland, tape recording, interviewee's residence. "There is no general consensus as to the exact translation of the title of this monograph. Gharbzadegi has been rendered into various English translations such as: "Weststruckness," in Gharbzadegi rweststrucknessi. trans. by J. Green and A. Alizadeh (Lexington: Mazda Publishers, 1982); "Occidentosis," in Occidentosis: A Plague From the West, trans. by R. Campbell (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1984); "Plagued by the West," in Plagued Bv the West, trans. by Paul Sprachman (Delmar: Caravan Books, 1982) ; "Western-

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 147 of Iranian intellectuals. Gharbzadegi performed a variety of functions. First, it depicted the dilemma of a changing society by providing a critical chronicle of a century of Iranian enlightenment. Secondly, by putting the question of national and ethnic identity once again on the agenda, Gharbzadegi enunciated a

nativistic alternative to the universalise of the Iranian left so popular in the previous decade. Thirdly, by providing a passionate eulogy for a passing era and its customs, Gharbzadegi articulated an anti-modernist populist discourse very much skeptical of all that the West had to offer. Finally, it exhorted many Iranian intellectuals to reassess their passive and unreflective embrace of Western ideas and culture, and called for an awakening and resistance to the hegemony of an alien culture which

increasingly dominated the intellectual, social, political, and economic life of the Iranian society.

mania,” in James Bill, The Eagle and the Lion; The Tragedy of American-Iranian Relations (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988); "Euromania," in Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet (New York: Pantheon Books, 1985); "Xenomenia," in Islam and Revolution: Writings and Declarations of Imam Khomeini, trans. by Hamid Algar (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1981); "Westitis" in Edward Mortimer, Faith & Power (New York: Vintage Books, 1982); and "Westoxication," in Nikkie Keddie, Roots of Revolution (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981). In all instances the term gharbzadegi was generally meant to convey Iranian society's and its intellectuals' indiscriminate borrowing from the West. I prefer "Westoxication" since it most closely resembles Al-e Ahmad's usage of gharbzadegi as a medical metaphor denoting a social illness. However, throughout this chapter I will continue to use the original Persian term "gharbzadegi" since its use somewhat differs from one author to another.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 148 Al-e Ahmad begins his defiant monograph with a definition of gharbzadegi as "the aggregate of events in the life, culture, civilization, and mode of thought of a people having no supporting tradition, no historical continuity, no gradient of transformation..."" His clear intention was to sensitize the Iranian public to the problem of growing rootlessness in their country, which he perceived as a "disease." I speak of "gharbzadegi" as of cholera...I am speaking of a disease: an accident from without, spreading in an environment rendered susceptible to it [emphasis added]. Let us seek a diagnosis for this complaint and its cause— and, if possible, its cure." Al-e Ahmad's conception of gharbzadegi as a contaminating social malady was approached from two angles. The "accident from without" and the "environment rendered

susceptible to it" represented, respectively, the foreign and domestic dimensions of the sense of otherness that Al-e Ahmad addressed. Influenced by Heidegger's views on technology and machinism (which were somehow conveyed to him

through his mentor, Ahmad Fardid) Al-e Ahmad regarded these phenomena as the essence of Western civilization. Viewing

machinery and technology as a "talisman" to the Westoxicated," he formulated his basic concern in the

"Jalal Al-e Ahmad, Occidentosis: A Plague From the West: 34. "ibid., 27. "ibid., 80.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 149 following terms: We have been unable to preserve our own historico-cultural character in the face of the machine and its fateful onslaught. Rather, we have been routed. We have been unable to take a considered stand in the face of this contemporary monster. So long as we do not comprehend the real essence, basis, and philosophy of Western civilization, only aping the West outwardly and formally (by consuming its machines), we shall be like the ass going about in a lion's skin." Al-e Ahmad believed that this disease could result in the eradication of Iran's cultural authenticity, political sovereignty, and economic well-being. His usage of a medical analogy to symbolize a cultural, political, and an

economic ailment deliberately emphasized intellectual

vigilance. Grounding his discussion in the familiar dichotomy of "us" versus "them" or "East" versus "West," Al- e Ahmad depicts himself as "an Easterner with his feet planted firmly in tradition, eager to make a two- or three- hundred year leap and obliged to make up for so much anxiety

and straggling." Later, continuing his comparative

reasoning, Al-e Ahmad writes: "As the West stood, we sat down. As the West awoke in an industrial resurrection, we passed into the slumber of the Seven Sleepers."*® In criticizing the "we," however, Al-e Ahmad first and foremost incriminated those Iranian intellectuals who were looking to the West as an alternative. He viewed these

"ibid., 31. *®Ibid., 55.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 150 intellectuals as the agents most responsible for creating an environment susceptible to Western ingress and domination. Denouncing all notable thinkers of the Constitutional era,

he wrote; So far as I can see, all these homegrown Montesquieus of ours fell off the same side of the roof...they all had an instinctive feeling that our ancient society and tradition could not withstand the onslaught of Western technology. They all went astray in opting for "adoption of European civilization without Iranian adaptation," but in addition to this vague and unproven remedy, each sought a different cure. One thumped the tub for foreign embassies; another believed one must, in imitation of the West, revive ancient tradition through a religious "reform" like Luther's; a third called for Islamic unity in an age when the Ottomans' ignominy was being trumpeted about the world with the slaughter of the Armenians and the Kurds.** Broadening the perimeter of his criticism from intellectuals to the common people, he wrote: 1) A Westoxicated person stands on thin air. 2) A Westoxicated person is devious. 3) A Westoxicated person seeks ease. 4) A Westoxicated person normally has no specialty. 5) A Westoxicated person has no character. 6) A Westoxicated person is effete. 7) A Westoxicated person is a man totally without belief or conviction. 8) A Westoxicated person hangs on the words and handouts of the West.**

**Ibid., 58. ** Ibid., 92-97. Al-e Ahmad's stylistic deployment of repetitive rhetorical tropes is akin to the manner in which the "fokolis” were depicted by Shadman (whom Al-e Ahmad acknowledges in two of the footnotes of Gharbzadegi). This style of prose, which is deeply rooted in the Persian language and the oral culture of Iran, was a conscious move on the part of both Shadman and Al-e Ahmad to underscore the significance of the problem as well as to arouse emotionally and incite their readers.

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In a subsequent two-volume book pointedly entitled On the Service and Treason of Intellectuals. Al-e Ahmad further delved into the history of the Iranian intellectual movement. He identified nobility, clerics, landlord/tribal leaders, and the urban middle class as the four sources of Iranian intellectuals. Al-e Ahmad designated the last group as the most logical birthplace of intellectuality and described its members as the "hopes" of Iran's future intellectual movement (see Figure 2) .** At the same time, however, he was also very critical of this group. Al-e Ahmad criticized modern Iranian intellectuals for their isolation from the masses, their superficiality, their rejection or ignorance of the majority's traditional beliefs, and the ease with which they are often coopted by the ruling classes." To rectify this condition, he concluded that intellectuals must form an alliance with the

clerics who historically have been the second major pillar

of intellectuality and dissent in Iran. Al-e Ahmad

maintained that the clerics have the following advantages which make them valuable allies: (1) they tend to be men of learning by the very nature of their profession; (2) they

"Jalal Al-e Ahmad, Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran [On the Service and Treason of Intellectuals] (Tehran: Khwarazme Publications, 1978), vol. 1: 185-186.

"For a similar indictment of Western intellectuals, which coincidentally has the same title as Al-e Ahmad's Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. see Julien Benda, The Treason of the Intellectuals FLa Trahison des Clercs!. trans. Richard Aldington (New York: W. Morrow & Co., 1928).

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TV and Radio Writon, Announoara. Parformar

Elafnantary School Taachaci

Doctor*

PoeU

Judges and Lawyers

Government Employees

Journalists

Fig. 2. Al-e Ahmad's Circular Theory of Intellectuals

Source: Jalal Al-e Ahmad. Dar Khedmat ua K hi an a t-eRoufShon fekran [On the Seruice and Treason of Intellectuals] uol. 1 (Tehran: Khuiarazme Publications, 1978), 81-88.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 153 tend to be radically-minded, coming mainly from lower class backgrounds; (3) they tend to be trusted by the masses as guardians of the faith; (4) and finally, they can be agents for social or political uprising due to their ability to speak the language of the masses.” Al-e Ahmad's major

thesis was that in the last 100 years, whenever the

intellectuals and the clergy have cooperated with one another they have been able to achieve victory and accomplish progress. By the same token, however, their disunity has resulted in defeat and decadence.” To facilitate this cooperation, Al-e Ahmad insisted that the

intellectuals must reach out to the clergy and the masses, while the clerics have to abandon their conservative

stances.” Due to his status as Iran's leading intellectual of the 1960s, Al-e Ahmad's views on the West, role of

intellectuals, and religion deserve a more in-depth

analysis.

“Here Al-e Ahmad was referring to the role the clergy had performed in such events as the Tobacco rebellion (1891- 1892), the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1911, oil nationalization of the early 1950s, and the June 5, 1963 protest led by Ayatollah Khomeini. Inspired by the latter event and appalled by the indifference shown toward it by the secular intelligentsia, Al-e Ahmad began to write the book On the Service and Treason of Intellectuals shortly after the 1963 protest. Ibid., 16.

”Al-e Ahmad, Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. vol. 2: 52. “Ibid., 61.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 154 On Machinism Al-e Ahmad's theory of gharbzadegi is weakest in its analysis of the cultural and socioeconomic nature of modern Western societies. Al-e Ahmad is representative of a generation of Iranian intellectuals who became disillusioned with both liberalism and socialism as political alternatives. His disillusionment about the former was caused by the fact that despite its vow to safeguard democracy, all that the West provided for Iran was colonialism and support of autocratic rulers. The

disillusionment with the latter was due to Soviet expansionism, the failure of existing socialism to live up to its many promises, as well as the submissive attitude of the Tudeh party leadership toward Soviet demands and policies. Al-e Ahmad's writings also came at a time in which the West was undergoing a process of self-doubt and questioning. Hiroshima, the Vietnam war, student rebellions, the rise of counter-culture movements, as well

as the writings of thinkers like Henri Bergson (1859-1941),

Albert Camus (1913-1960), Erich Fromm (1900-1980), Herbert

Marcuse (1898-1979), Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1980), George

Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), Oswald Spengler (1880-1936), and

Arnold Toynbee (1889-1975) exemplified this age of self questioning. The range of books that Al-e Ahmad chose to

translate is representative of this disillusionment process:

Dostoevsky's The Gambler (1948); Camus' The Stranger ( 1 9 4 9 ) ;

Reproduced with permission of the copyrightowner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 155 Camus' The Misunderstanding (1950); Sartre's Dirty Hands (1952); Andre Gide's Return From the U.S.S.R. (1954); Eugene Ionesco's Rhinoceros (1966), and Ernest Jiinger's Crossing

the Line (1967).” Al-e Ahmad was further influenced by the ideas of Martin Heidegger, Bertrand Russell, and Antonio Gramsci on the nature of technology and materialism in the West.” For him, the West was not just an imperialist entity, but also the heart of technological development, which was to be

viewed not as a mere instrument, but rather as a mode of thought. Al-e Ahmad maintained that technology did not allow for an equal exchange among nations, since some were

exporters of it while others were its importers; some were producers of machinery while others were mere consumers of it. As the first eloquent critic of machinism in Iran,“*° Al-e Ahmad lamented the crumbling of his traditional society at the hands of machines: As the machine entrenches itself in the towns and villages, be it in the form of a mechanized mill or a textile plant, it puts the worker in local

”Dates of Al-e Ahmad's translations are in parenthesis.

”This knowledge, however, was quite limited and distorted since Al-e Ahmad was neither a man of philosophy nor did he have a thorough competence over French, the only European language in which he was conversant. Henceforth, Al-e Ahmad's rudimentary acquaintance with Western philosophy was mainly acquired through his conversations with his friends and colleagues who had studied in the West.

^ i s criticism of machinism was later picked up by such other critics as Ali Shariati, Daryush Shayegan, Ehsan Naraqi, Reza Davari, Morteza Mutahhari and Reza Baraheni.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 156 craft industries out of work. It closes the village mill. It renders the spinning wheel useless. Production of pile carpets, flat carpets, felt carpets is at an end.*' Al-e Ahmad, however, was willingly oblivious to the reality that these "alien" machines also curtailed workers' hardships by reducing their work hours and increasing their productivity. He wanted to put the machine, a monstrous giant, back in the genie bottle, and turn it into an obedient servant ready to obey its master at any time. However, Al-e Ahmad did not discuss how this could be accomplished. In the entire Gharbzadegi essay, no mention is made of the positive results of machinery. Al-e Ahmad

perceived the machine in a similar vein as the Orientalist viewed Easterners: as tools or people which, out of

necessity, one was forced to employ in order to accomplish his needs or goals. His preoccupation with the role of machines prevented Al-e Ahmad from appreciating the complexity of advanced capitalism. Although he did not make any comments on such

1960s debates as the dependency theory, the North-South

debate, or the New International Economic Order, Al-e Ahmad was clearly influenced by the amalgamation of these debates. His theory of gharbzadegi could be viewed as a less

**Al-e Ahmad, Occidentosis : 68.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 157 systematic version of the dependency theory,** which besides Al-e Ahmad was captivating many other Iranian intellectuals at that time.** Furthermore, from the perspective of political psychology, this resistance to machinism can be perceived as a byproduct of the mentality of many Third

World intellectuals of that era. One Iranian thinker explained this dilemma regarding machinism in the following way: In its encounter with the West, the Westoxicated world sees its problem as one of confrontation with the former's power. They [the people] either become captivated or intimidated by it, or become fascinated and ready to sacrifice everything they have for the sake of obtaining this power. This power can best be witnessed in the technology and sophisticated machinery of the West. It is thus that, in the eyes of the Westoxicated world, the totality of the West is equated with machinism, technology and capitalism.**

**For a treatment of the dependency theory as it was articulated by Iranian intellectuals see; Mehrdad Mashayekhi, "Dependency as a Problematic: A Study in the Political Implications of the Dependency Perspective" (Ph.D. diss.. The American University, 1987).

**The following books which were published more or less at the same time as Al-e Ahmad's Gharbzadegi were representative of that genre: Mehdi Bahar, Miraskhar-e Estamar [Inheritors of Colonialism]; Abdolrahim Ahmadi, Nahamahangv-e Rushd Eohtesadi va litima'i dar Donvav-e Moaser [The Disharmony of Economic and Social Development in Contemporary World]; Majid Rahnama, Masavel-e Keshvarhav-e Asia'i va Efrigha'i [Problems of Asian and African Countries]. In addition, books and articles by Aime Cesaire, Frantz Fanon, and Albert Memmi, which were overly critical of colonialism, were frequently translated.

**Daryush Ashuri, "Dar Amady Be Manay-e Jahan Sevom," ["A Preface to the Meaning of the 'Third World'"] Ketab-e Agah (Tehran: Agah Publications, 1983): 206.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 158 On Intellectuals The 1940s was the formative decade of Al-e Ahmad's intellectual life. During this decade he became acquainted with the ideas of Ahmad Kasravi as well as those of such prominent intellectuals as Sadeq Hedayat, Nima Yushij, and Khalil Maleki. From the ideas and life of each of these men, Al-e Ahmad learned a different lesson: atheism from the first, short-story writing from the second, the new style of poetry from the third, and political activism from the fourth.” In addition, during the 1940s Al-e Ahmad abandoned religion, experimented with Marxism, and gradually moved toward a more nationalistically oriented ideology. These experiences would leave their mark upon him for years to come. Finally, during that decade Al-e Ahmad was introduced to the thoughts of Jean Paul Sartre, a man whom he respected for the remainder of his life.” Notwithstanding the fact that Fardid did not think too

highly of Existentialism, Al-e Ahmad viewed it as the first

”Al-e Ahmad was particularly attracted to the latter two figures who, like himself, were independent-minded pioneers in their respective roles as poet and political activist. ”Mohammad-Tagi Ghiasi, an Iranian literary critic, spoke of an encounter he had with Al-e Ahmad upon the former's return to Iran from France in 1964. Asked by Al-e Ahmad about Sartre, Ghiasi responds: "Oh, Sartre is now [intellectually] dead, nowadays everyone is talking about Michel Foucault." Upon hearing this, Al-e Ahmad irritatedly responded "But for us he [Sartre] has just been born." Mohammad-Tagi Ghiasi, "Ghehel-o-shish Sal Zendegi, sey-sal neveshtan," [46 Years of Living, 30 Years of Writing] Advneh 27 (September 1988): 41.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 159 genuine post-War movement bent on calling into question the very foundations of Western thought. While Fardid was closer to German philosophy as articulated by Heidegger and Karl Jaspers (1883-1969), Al-e Ahmad was more inclined toward the French existentialists, Camus and Sartre.” From Sartre, he borrowed the idea of social commitment as a fundamental component of a writer's task. Al-e Ahmad was thereby able to transform the sad and subdued literature of Hedayat's generation into an aspiring and activist literature.” Despite this Western influence, Al-e Ahmad also had an eye on the East. He believed the Western orientation of Iranian intellectuals must be balanced with a more Oriental outlook. Al-e Ahmad looked in particular to India as an example from which Iranian intellectuals could draw inspiration. This proposition was rooted in a number of

premises. Firstly, India was the living museum of Oriental

religions; secondly, it had just fomented a strong anti colonial movement and produced a world-class statesman and

”While Fardid was a philosopher, Al-e Ahmad was an iconoclastic man of literature and political activism who, for obvious reasons, did not at all have the former's semi deep grasp of Western philosophy. **Daryush Ashuri, "Jalal Al-e Ahmad," in Yad Nameh-e Jalal Al-e Ahmad [In Commemoration of Jalal Al-e Ahmad], ed. Ali Dahbashi (Tehran: Pasargad Publications, 1985): 254.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 160 intellectual;” and thirdly, it had strong historical ties with Iran. Indeed, Al-e Ahmad erroneously considered India to be the mother of Iran and even suggested that instead of sending students to the West, Iran should start dispatching students to India and Japan. Further, he encouraged many Iranian intellectuals and translators to start writing about

and translating from Oriental languages.*® This last suggestion was a legitimate one since most educated Iranians were quite unaware (and still remain so) about intellectual developments in their neighboring countries to the East. Richard N. Frye, the professor of History at Harvard University who had been the director of

the Asia Institute of Pahlavi University in Shiraz from 1969 to 1974, maintained that "Iranian universities did not teach their students anything about the Far East or even neighboring India, but they were offering courses in the history of Europe and even American history."** This

”Al-e Ahmad viewed Gandhi as a model intellectual who put commitment to his utopia above any class interests. According to Al-e Ahmad, Gandhi had the most accurate views on Third World independence. See Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. vol. 1; 169. *®Daryush Shayegan recalled that on one of the few occasions he saw Al-e Ahmad, the latter congratulated him for his two volume book Advan va Makateb-e Falsafev-e Hend [Religions and Philosophies of India] (Tehran: Tehran University Press, 1967), which he very much liked. Daryush Shayegan, interview by author, June 27, 1989, Bethesda, Maryland, tape recording. Foundation for Iranian Studies. **Richard N. Frye, in an interview recorded by Shahla Haeri, October 10, 1984, Cambridge, Massachusetts, tape no. 4. Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 161 situation began to be rectified toward the latter part of the Pahlavi regime when a handful of professors were recruited to teach courses on Indology and Oriental philosophy. For the most part, however, Iranian intellectuals were quite up to date on European, North

American, and even Latin American intellectual and literary trends, but remained largely ignorant of what was happening closer to them in such neighboring states as India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey and the Arab world. Al-e Ahmad's hopeful quest to come up with a more

authentic Third World alternative to liberalism and socialism had earlier led him to other places. In his

socialist phase, when he grew dissatisfied with the kolkhoz model of collective farming practiced in the Soviet Union, he went to live for a while in the kibbutzim of Israel. Al- e Ahmad's unorthodox views and practices came under

criticism from both the religious establishment and the

radical left. Less than a year after he died, the Fedayeen

published an essay entitled Resentful of Imperialism. Fearful of Revolution. This essay, which was supposedly the

translated text of an interview conducted by a European journalist with a leading Latin American writer, was in fact

written by the Fedayeen theoretician, Amir-Parviz Pouyan. In this essay, the Latin American writer, who intellectually resembles Al-e Ahmad, is scrutinized by the radical

journalist for his infirm position of opposing imperialism

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 162 on the one hand while repudiating revolution as a solution on the other. The "journalist” wants to convince the famous "writer" that under the conditions of imperialist domination and dictatorship, the only choice remaining is to take up arms and start a revolution.” The place where Al-e Ahmad deserves much criticism is in his analysis of the role of intellectuals. Al-e Ahmad viewed intellectuals as the promoters of gharbzadegi; yet he was not willing to accept that, as a social group, they were only a reflection of the internal contradictions and incoherence of their own society. He criticized

intellectuals while ignoring the fact that in a society such as Iran, which was rapidly becoming urbanized, industrialized, and incorporated into the world capitalist system, new social classes were emerging which demanded a new definition of self. Inappropriately, Al-e Ahmad held Iranian intellectuals solely accountable for all the anguish

and misery of their society. It is as if there were no relationship between these intellectuals and their place of upbringing — as if they were weeds that grew at will. Al-e Ahmad's chiding critique puts the intellectuals, rather than social relations, on trial. He was apparently unaware of the contention of Sartre: "Intellectuals are...a historical

”This revelation was probably first made by Al-e Ahmad's close friend, Nemat Mirzazadeh. See Nemat Mirzazadeh, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, May 25, 1984, Paris, France, tape no. 2, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

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phenomenon. Therefore, no society can blame its intellectuals without accusing itself, insofar as they are the products of these very societies."”

On Religion His encounter with Western thought and the modernization process compelled Al-e Ahmad to turn toward nativism. Judging from the progression of his ideas, as they were explicated in Gharbzadegi and Par Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. one realizes that Al-e Ahmad came more and more to believe that the preservation of indigenous customs would be possible through a turn toward Shi'ism. Although the above works manifest an eclecticism on the part of their author, who alternatively drew from Iranian nationalism, Marxian economic analysis, and European existentialism, one can discern a strong subterranean religious ambience in Al-e Ahmad's discourse.” He believed that ever since the advent in the sixteenth-century of the

Safavids - who upheld Iran's sovereignty against the

Ottomans in the name of religion - Shi'ism had acquired a specialized position for itself within the core of the

”Jean-Paul Sartre, "Rowshanfekr keyst va Rowshanfekri Chist?" ["Who is an Intellectual and What is Intellectualisa?"] Naahd-e Aaah. trans. by R. S. Hosseini (Tehran: Agah Publications, 1984): 244.

”For more on this point see: Maryam Mir-Ahmadi, "Taseyr va Nofuze Mazhab dar Asar Jalal Al-e Ahmad," ["Effect and Influence of Religion in Al-e Ahmad's Works"] Sokhan 26, 10 (December 1978): 1077-1081.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 164 Iranian social psyche.” Thus for Al-e Ahmad, Shi'i Islam had become "...part and parcel of Iranianness and necessary to the survival of Iranian identity."” Al-e Ahmad maintained an instrumentalist view of religion. He prescribed the revival of Shi'i Islam as

Iran's most effective "vaccine" against the epidemic of gharbzadegi. Logically, he considered the clergy, as the meticulous guardians of faith, to be the most qualified as "doctors" who could distribute this identity-saving vaccine. His high esteem for the clergy stemmed from his regard for the ulama as the only group in Iran that did not succumb to Western domination, with a sense of deep regret over the

hanging of the conservative Sheikh Fazlollah Nuri at the hands of progressive minded Constitutionalists, Al-e Ahmad declared: "I look on that great man's body on the gallows as a flag raised over our nation proclaiming the triumph of gharbzadegi after two hundred years of struggle."” Al-e Ahmad's instrumentalist view of the positive

function of religion as a mobilizing political ideology was

further reinforced by the course of events in India,

Algeria, and Vietnam, as well as the 1960s' European

”Al-e Ahmad, Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. vol. 2: 33. ”Michael C. Hillmann, "Preface," in Iranian Society: An Anthology of Writings bv Jalal Al-e Ahmad, ed. Michael C. Hillmann (Lexington, Ky: Mazda Publishers, 1982): xi.

”Al-e Ahmad, Occidentosis: 57.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 165 rebellious movements in which the left-wing clerics played a progressive role. Mancuchehr Hezarkhani, an Iranian secular leftist translator and close friend of Al-e Ahmad, professed that the scenario Al-e Ahmad saw for the future of Iran was modeled after the Algerian Revolution. He recalled a conversation with Al-e Ahmad in which the latter told him; "How come you do not understand that the cells of the Communist party must be formed within the mosques? The Algerians, who were neither Moslems nor as committed communists as you are, realized this and won."” Yet perhaps the best explanation for his turn toward religion was provided by Simin Daneshvar, Iran's best selling

novelist and Al-e Ahmad's wife, who wrote: If he turned to religion, it was the result of his wisdom and insight because he had previously experimented with Marxism, socialism and, to some extent, existentialism, and his relative return to religion and the Hidden Imam was a way toward deliverance from the evil of imperialism and toward the preservation of national identity, a way toward human dignity, compassion, justice, reason, and virtue. Jalal had need of such a religion.®

As Iran's leading intellectual of the 1960s, Al-e

Ahmad epitomized the puzzling state of mind which besieged Iranian intellectuals in the post World War II era. This was a generation tormented by the Cold War, the prospect of

”Manouchehr Hezarkhani, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, June 1, 1984, Paris, France, tape no. 2, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

®Simin Daneshvar, "Jalal's Dusk," cited in Michael Hillmann, "Preface," in Iranian Society: An Anthology of Writings bv Jalal Al-e Ahmad: xi.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 166 nuclear annihilation, de-Stalinization, neo-colonialism. Western self-doubt, endemic dictatorships, economic dependency, and nationalist uprisings. Al-e Ahmad belonged to a generation that was at once inspired by the West yet politically opposed to it; a generation xenophobic toward the West, yet drawing inspirations from the thoughts of its leading thinkers; a generation dodging religion and traditionalism, yet pulled toward them; a generation aspiring for such modernist goals as democracy, freedom, and social justice, yet skeptical of their historical precedents and contemporary problems; and finally a generation in need

and search of a definition of "self" and "other." Al-e Ahmad's Gharbzadegi underscored the dilemma of Iran's divided intellectual polity by delimiting the choice to two alternative models: the model of the contemporary Western societies, or that of the supposed "perfect utopia" of early Islam. Through Al-e Ahmad, "Orientalism in Reverse" had succeeded in proclaiming its forceful entry into the Iranian

intellectual landscape. Since then it has not been possible for Iranian intellectuals to speak of their cultural conflict with contemporary Western civilization without

acknowledging Al-e Ahmad's theory of gharbzadegi. His other major accomplishment was to bridge the gap between modern intellectuals and the clergy. Al-e Ahmad's works were read

seriously and discussed both on the university campuses and

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 167 in the theological seminaries.*’ People on both sides of the historical divide were beginning to show an interest in a rapprochement. It was soon to emerge.

Darvush Shaveaan; The Oriental Philosopher Another acquaintance of Fardid, Daryush Shayegan, turned Al-e Ahmad's political critique of the West into a more elaborate philosophical critique. As one of the few Iranian intellectuals who balanced his interest in Western philosophy with an equal attention to Asian philosophy, Shayegan remains an intellectual exception worthy of in- depth consideration.*’ From 1976 to 1978 he served as the director of the Iranian Center for the Study of Civilizations, a small institute” aimed at familiarizing Iranians with the civilizations of Eastern and Asian

“Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet (New York: Pantheon Books, 1985): 287 *’Born in 1935 in Tehran, Shayegan was educated in Iran, England, Switzerland, and France, respectively. In 1968, he received his doctorate in Hindu and Sufi philosophy from the Sorbonne under the supervision of Professors Corbin and Lacombe. Upon his return to Iran he became a professor of mythology, Indology and comparative philosophy at Tehran University. After the revolution he served as the Director of The Institute of Ismaili Studies in Paris, and is presently the editor of Iran Nameh. a Persian journal of Iranian Studies published by the Foundation for Iranian Studies in Maryland. ”Some of the intellectuals and researchers brought together in the Center included Jamshid Arjomand, Daryush Ashuri, Mir-Shamseddin Adib-Soltani, Shahrokh Meskoob, and Hossein Zia'i.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 168 countries such as China, Japan, India, and Egypt.” One of the first books published by the Center was a collection of essays by Shayegan himself on the socio-cultural mutations of the traditional societies of Asia.” Shayegan presented in his book an Oriental critique of Occidental philosophy, and warned Iranian (and Asian) intellectuals about the "double illusion" of trying to acquire Western technology while maintaining their own cultural identity. He contended that the traditional societies of Asia have fallen behind Western history and that this has become their predicament ever since. Shayegan writes: My years-long research on the nature of Western thought, which from the point of view of its variety, richness, searching and mesmerizing power is a unique and exceptional phenomenon in our earthly world, made me conscious of the fact that the process of Western thought has been moving in the direction of gradual negation of all articles of faith which make up the spiritual heritage of Asian civilizations.”

Shayegan maintained that the elements of Western thought which were gradually negating all Oriental articles of faith were to be found in "technical thinking." Like his Heideggerian predecessors, he called this mode of thinking

”One of the projects undertaken by the Center was an international symposium held in Tehran in 1977 entitled "Does the Impact of the Western Thought Render Possible a Dialogue Between Civilizations?"

”Daryush Shayegan, Asia Dar Barabar-e Gharb [Asia Facing the West] (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1977). ”lbid., 3.

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the "inevitable end of Western thought." Disagreeing with the early twentieth century Iranian intellectuals who argued that one can borrow such elements as technology from the West as long as they are compatible with one's indigenous cultural heritage, he rebutted: "One cannot say that we borrow technology but would abstain from its annihilating

consequences, since technology is a product of a transformation of thinking and the outcome of a process

lasting a millennium."” Reminiscent of French sociologist Jacques Ellul's characterization of a "technological society" based on automatism, self-augmentation, universalisa, autonomy and

monism, Shayegan put forward a philosophical critique of "technical thinking.He viewed technical thought as a by-product of the amalgamation of four descending trends in the evolution of Western thought: 1. Technxcalization of Thought: The process of descendance from intuitive insight to technical thought, and of reducing nature into material obj ects. 2. Materialization of the World: The process of descendance from substantial forms into mathematical-mechanical concepts, which causes the negation of all mystical and magical qualities of nature. 3. Naturalization of Man: The process of descendance from spiritual drives to instinctive drives, which negates all the

”lbid., 46. ”See Jacques Ellul, The Technological Societv (New York: Knopf, 1964).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 170 divine qualities of celestial man. 4. De-Mythologization: The process of descendance from resurrection and concern with future life (based on cyclical time) to historicism and a conception of time which is empty of any otherworldly meaning (based on linear time.)**

Shayegan*s philosophical reading of history was based

on a dualistic ontology which candidly accepted the West as its culture of reference. For him. Oriental identity could only be constructed and upheld through differentiation from the West. He maintained: In the Orient, science never developed in the same way it evolved in the West because the Orient never became mundane, and nature never got separated from the spirit governing it, and the manifestations of divine blessing never left the realm of our universe. The Orient never produced a philosophy of history, since existence was never reduced to a mere subjectivity or a process such as in the philosophy of Hegel.® In other words, "we" (Orientals) have avoided the destructive repercussions of the four descending trends of Western thought, and so much better for "us." According to

Shayegan, the essence of science and philosophy in Asian

civilizations was altogether different from that of the rest of the world. On the status of science he wrote: In the great Asian civilizations of Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, science has always been subordinate to religion and philosophy. Science

68Daryush Shayegan, Asia Dar Barabar-e Gharb: 47-48.

®Daryush Shayegan, "Din va Falsafeh va Elm Dar Sharq va Gharb," [Religion, Philosophy and Science in East and West] Alefba (Tehran) 6 (1977): 108.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 171 never obtained the independence and possession which it gained in Western culture, and subsequently led to its mutiny against religion and philosophy, making humans into the sole owners and possessors of the universe.™ Turning to philosophy, Shayegan maintained that in Asian civilizations, philosophy has an entirely different

telos: "Asian thought is essentially gnostic and its goal is salvation."” "If Occidental philosophy is a question of existence and being, and if philosophy answers 'why' questions, in Islamic mysticism the questioner is God, and humankind only answers."” In other words, according to Shayegan, Occidental philosophy is based on rationalist

thinking while Oriental philosophy is grounded in revelation and faith.” The first began with relativity and secularized all knowledge, while the latter began with prophecy and divine revelation and viewed all knowledge as sacred. In the Islamic theosophical tradition which is based upon belief in a set of esoteric truths supported by

such axiomatic principles as prophecy, holiness and celestial revelation, there cannot be any "unknowns," since the answers were supposedly provided long before the

™Daryush Shayegan, "Din va Falsafeh va Elm Dar Sharq va Gharb": 102. ”Daryush Shayegan, Asia Dar Barabar-e Gharb; 233. ”Daryush Shayegan, "Din va Falsafeh va Elm Dar Sharg va Gharb": 109. ”See Daryush Shayegan, Bothav-e Zehni va Khaterev Azali [Idols of the Mind and Perennial Memory] (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1976).

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questions were formulated.” Shayegan asserted that since the sixteenth-century, when the West replaced religious order with civil society, it has been losing its spiritual trustworthiness. The outcome, according to him, is the present crisis of the West

which has manifested itself in four forms: cultural degeneration, the twilight of gods, the demise of myths, and the collapse of spirituality.” Viewing the Orient as the only remaining depository of humanity, authenticity and spirituality, he warned Asian intellectuals to safeguard their cultural identity, ethnic memories, and heritage in the face of the intellectual assault of Western thought. Shayegan's basic premise was that the survivors of the great Asian civilizations are living in a no-man's land, between the agony of God(s) and its (their) imminent death. For him, gharbzadegi was the commanding spirit of this transitional phase. Speaking of gharbzadegi, he wrote: "... it is another side of unawareness about the historical destiny of the

West... gharbzadegi equals ignorance about the West, not

knowing the dominant elements of a way of thought which is

the most dominant and aggressive world view on Earth."™ Hence Shayegan appears to be more anti-technological

’“’The effect was that in the West philosophy became autonomous from religion, while in the East it remained contemptuous of profanity. ”Daryush Shayegan, Asia Dar Barabar-e Gharb: 168.

™Ibid., 51.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 173 than Al-e Ahmad ever was. While the latter wanted only to make an obedient servant out of Western technology, Shayegan contended that Western technology and science constitute an inseparable whole. To reject one is to reject the other. The solution, according to Shayegan, was to return to cultural spirituality, which represented the only effective weapon possessed by the Orient against the intrusive West. He maintained that ethnic memories would expedite the flourishing of Asia's ancient, glorious heritage. In the case of Iran, Shayegan viewed Islam, and in particular Shi'ism, to be the constitutive source of Iranians' collective ethnic memory. For Shayegan, just like Al-e

Ahmad, Islamic Iran and Iranian Islam have been so mixed with one another (for over fourteen centuries) that it is no longer possible to distinguish between the two. In a Hegelian fashion he describes the relationship between

Shi'ism and Iran: Contact with this atmosphere means contact with the spirit of Iran which, whether we like it or not, blossomed in the context of Islamic thought and is still influential since Iran is in reality the trustee of the Mohammadian truth, and the light of mysticism in Islam. It is for this reason that Iran gives priority to the descendants of Mohammad and its last heavenly appearance (i.e. the Twelfth Imam) Similarly, Shayegan's upholding of religion as the Iranian's source of identity led him to the same position

previously undertaken by Al-e Ahmad. If Shi'ism was Iran's

77 Ibid., 190.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 174 sole spiritual asset, then the ulama by necessity would be its most conscientious custodians. Shayegan wrote: "Today the class that is more or less the protector of the ancient trust and, despite its weak health, keeps alive the treasure of traditional thought is to be found in the Islamic theological centers of Qom and Mashhad."” He concludes his

critique with a piece of philosophical-political advice: "Against a [Western] culture which is threatening our existence in the most aggressive way, we have no right to remain silent. Like Al-e Ahmad, Shayegan's philosophical expositions demonstrated the preoccupation of Iranian intellectuals with

the enigmatic question of otherness. His construction of the "West" as an "ontological other" complied with the ontological framework of "Orientalism in Reverse." (see table 4). Shayegan*s "othering" of the West and his subsequent castigation of the influences wrought by it

compelled him to: (1) congratulate Islamic and Oriental

cultures (for avoiding the four descending trends of Western

thought); (2) promote an oppositional counter-discourse; and (3) call for an alliance with the clergy, whom he views as the rightful custodians of the treasure-house of traditional thought.

Shayegan's construction of the West is reminiscent of

”lbid., 296.

”lbid.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 175 Table 4.— A TAXONOMY OF SHAYEGAN'S PHILOSOPHY OCCIDENTORIENT Ontological & Subj ect ivity, Intuition, Revelation Epistemological Historicism, Resurrection, Bases of Materialism Prophecy Philosophy Goal of Acquisition of Acquisition of truth Philosophy greater dominance & Salvation through Knowledge

Nature of Mankind as Questioner is God, Questioner Questioner Mankind Only Answers Seeking Answer to "Why" Questions (Being, Existence) Nature of Profane & Sacred & Knowledge Mundane Gnostic Position of Independent of Dependent and Science and Privileged Subordinate to over Religion Religion & & Philosophy Philosophy Descending Technicalization Questioning and Trends of Thought, Abandonment of Secularization Cultural Spirituality of the World, Naturalization of Man, De-Mythologizing

Causes of Cultural Infiltration by Present Degeneration, Western Philosophical Crisis Twilight of Gods, doctrines Demise of Myths, Rise of self- centered Humanity, Collapse of Spirituality

Sources: Bothav-e Zehni va Khaterev-e Azali (1976) ; Asia Dar Barabar-e Gharb (1977); and "Din va Falsafeh va Elm Dar Sharg va Gharb," Alefba (Tehran) 6 (1977): 101-109.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 176 Georg Lukacs's "reification." Inspired by Marx's theory of "fetishism of commodities," Lukacs coined this term to describe the idea that humans come to perceive the products and realities "made" by themselves to have a separate existence from them. As the new objects, humans are then

alienated from, controlled by, and live at the mercy of their own former products.™ It seems that Shayegan's grandiose postulation about the nature of things Occidental has led to a reification of the "West." The "West" is not considered as an assorted amalgamation of disparate entities and qualities but rather as an essence, or a Hegelian Geist.

Like the other proponents of "Orientalism in Reverse," Shayegan appropriated the Orientalists' postulate that primordial religion (in this case Islam) constitutes the "essential essence" or the "spirit" of the Orient."

*°See Georg Lukacs, History and Class Consciousness (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1968): 83-110.

*‘Only in the aftermath of the 1979 Revolution, when his theoretical exhortations were turned into a political reality, did Shayegan realize the shortcomings of his earlier reifications. Incriminating himself as well as his fellow travelers, he wrote: "The deep shocks that the Iranian Revolution caused in regard to our thinking, and values, as well as everyday practices, should lead us to rethink the state of relationships among civilizations. This means that we should not view these civilizations as two distinct geographical worlds or opposing cultural poles. Instead, we should view them as two constellations whose stars constantly enter each other's universe and create eclectic and unclear concepts which to a sharp observer represent the non-cohesiveness of ideas present within the foundation of each civilization." Daryush Shayegan, "Ideologic Shodan-e Sonnat," [The Ideologization of Tradition] Zaman-e Now 12 (1986): 45. For a more comprehensive treatment of Shayegan's auto-critique see his

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 177 The Second Debate; Politics of Occidentalism While the first debate on gharbzadegi repudiated such Western achievements as technology and modernity, the second debate on sharqshenasi (Orientalism) called into question Western scholarship and learning on the Orient. The

subjects of this new cultural criticism were Iranshenasan (Western Iranologists), and Mustashreqyen (Western Orientalists.) The earlier generation of scholars and thinkers such as Mohammad-Ali Forouqi, Mohammad Ghazvini, Parviz Khanlary, Mujtaba Minovi, and Seyyed Hasan Taqizadeh, who were close collaborators of such noted Western Orientalists as A.J. Arberry, H.R. Gibb, Vladimir Minorsky,

A.K. Lambton, Bernard Lewis, and E.D. Ross, had mainly disappeared from the intellectual scene." In their place, a new generation of mostly Western-educated scholars had

entered the central ground of Iranian scholarly life. These intellectuals had studied with a different circle of Western

intellectuals, such as Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Claude Lévi-

Strauss, C. G. Jung, Jacques Berque, J. P. Sartre, Andre Malraux, and had become more sophisticated in their philosophical taste. They were no longer the competent

Ou'est-ce ou'une revolution religieuse? (Paris: Les Presses d'aujourd'hui, 1982). "For an example of this cooperation see Iraj Afshar, "Minovi and Mustashreqyn," [Minovi and Orientalists] Sokhan 25, 9 (March 1977): 904-909.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 178 positivists of the "Anatole France generation."" Instead they had been exposed to the ideas of Camus, Hegel, Heidegger, Marcuse, Marx, Nietzsche, Russell, Virginia Woolf and others. Having been influenced by the West's self-doubt (as alluded to earlier), the gharbzadegi debate, the rise of post-colonial movements and intellectuals in the Third

World, as well as the rapid transformation of their own society, these intellectuals and scholars attempted to redefine the boundaries of "Occidental other" and the "Oriental self." They sought to substitute the polemical texts and ethical responses presented by the likes of Shadman or Al-e

Ahmad with a better-corroborated academic/philosophical critique of the West. One of the first tasks confronting the Iranian critics of Orientalism was to clarify their terminology, namely, what they meant by the term "West."

For some, the "West" consisted of all countries that have

based their economic, social and political system upon a

European civilization that had inherited Greek philosophy, Roman statecraft, and Christian ecclesiasticism.” Others defined the characteristics of the West in the following

manner: "political expansionism, a democratic form of

"The "Anatole France generation" was a term used by the latter generation of Iranian intellectuals to describe such earlier positivist scholars as Yahya Mahdavi, Dr. Gholam- Hossein Sadiqi, Shojaoddin Shafa, and Cyrous Zouka. "jamshid Behnam, "Gharb, Kodum Gharb?" [West, Which West?] Farhana va Zendeai 1 (February 1970): 27.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 179 government, a capitalist economy, and nationalism as its social aspiration."" Still others defined the West from the perspective of political economy as "the totality of Western European and North American countries, which through the Industrial Revolution and liberal bourgeois regimes,

were transformed into world powers, and made the countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America into their own economic and political waste baskets; and began the era of world imperialism in history."** Despite discrepancies in their views of the West, most Iranian critics of Orientalism believed that it constituted a unified whole distinguishable from the East in its philosophical world view, spiritual value system, individual modes of life and behavior, social and political institutions, and arts and literature.

Many years earlier, Shadman had advised his colleagues to establish an antithetical field of study to Western Orientalism called farangshenasx or gharbshenasx

(Occidentalism). These same thoughts were refurbished once again in the late 1960s. In an address to the Twenty-

Seventh Congress of Orientalists in Ann Arbor, Michigan

**Abdol-Hossein Zarinkoub, Na Sharai. Na Gharbi. Ensani [Neither Eastern, Nor Western, But Human] (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1974): 28.

**Daryush Ashuri, "Negahi be Gharbzadegi va Mabani Nazarey An," ["A Look at Gharbzadegi and its Theoretical Foundations"] in Yad Nameh-e Jalal Al-e Ahmad, ed. Ali Dahbashi: 497.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 180 (August 1967), Abolhasan Jalili, a French-educated professor of philosophy at the University of Tehran, justified the rationale for such an undertaking: Gharbshenasx can give to the Orient what Orientalism was unable to deliver, i.e. self- awareness... Orientalism was an attempt to Occidentalize the Orient. But what is gharbshenasx? Is it the exact opposite of Orientalism? No, this is neither possible nor desirable. Gharbshenasx is an attempt to detach from the West and keep a distance from it so that we can get to know its essence through all of its various facets." According to Jalili, Orientalism by its very nature was a Western-oriented field of study which, under the pretext of scientific objectivity, tried to promote a Western way of looking at things. However, since in the social sciences even scientific objectivity is grounded in a set of value systems, he argued. Orientalists have consciously or unconsciously followed the colonialist frame of mind as well as politics. What is important in the quotation by Jalili is the extent to which a systematic

critique of the West was viewed by Iranian intellectuals as

a prerequisite of their own process of identity formation. It was logical for Jalili and others to move from a critique of Western technology to a critical appraisal of its mode of knowledge on the Orient. Orientalism was thus coming under

criticism not only as a handmaid of colonialism but also as a stumbling block to the modern quest for identity.

"Abolhasan Jalili, "Sharqshenasi va Jahan-e Emrouz," ["Orientalism and the Contemporary World"] 'Ulum-e Intima»i 1, 2 (Winter 1969): 55.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 181 One of the more articulate Iranian critics of Orientalism who joined this debate was Hamid Enayat." In an address to the Third Congress of Iranology, which was held in Tehran in September 1972, Enayat provided an account of the faults of Western schools of Iranology as well as the belated criticism the latter was experiencing within Iran at the time. Enayat criticized Western Iranologists for their

(1) Eurocentrism; (2) "excessive preoccupation with the minutiae of philology, archaeology and the history of military and religious conflicts;" (3) lack of attention to the broader features of Iranian history and culture; and (4) neglect of Islamic political philosophy.® Enayat described the contemporary relevance of this latter point in the

following way: Apart from its historical importance, a critical study of Shi'ite political ideas is particularly essential for us in evaluations of the place of Shi'ism in our nation's cultural heritage. Such an evaluation will enable us to decide a more important issue in Iran's social history, that is to say, whether some of the negative traits in our national character, such as fatalism, love of superstition.

"Hamid Enayat (1932-1982) was a British educated professor of political science at the University of Tehran's School of Law and Political Science from 1965 to 1979. Fluent in English, French, German, Arabic, Pahlavi, and Farsi, Enayat translated several works of Aristotle, Hume, and Hegel into Farsi. See Homa Katouzian, "Yadi az Hamid Enayat," ["In Memory of Hamid Enayat"] Alefba (Paris) 1 (Winter 1982): 156-157. ®See Hamid Enayat, "The Politics of Iranology," Iranian Studies 6, 1 (Winter 1973): 2-20. Abbreviated Persian versions of this article also appeared in Neain 88 (September 1972): 5-8; and Rahnamav-e Ketab 7-8 (October/November 1973): 538-549.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 182 submissiveness in the face of oppression, and dissimulation, are, as has sometimes been claimed, the outcome of Shi'ite indoctrination, or whether they have been simply the by-products of sociopolitical circumstances. Enayat attributed the belatedness of this embryonic spirit of anti-Orientalism among Iranian scholars to several psychological factors, such as their "...oft-vaunted tendency to welcome and tolerate alien intellectual trends," their equally "...oft-deprecated infatuation with Western cultural trappings," and the more important historio-

political fact that "Iran never suffered [direct] colonization at the hands of Western powers."” Comparing Iran to its neighboring Arab states makes the significance of the last point more clear. In the latter region, which was under direct colonial administration, an anti- Orientalist intellectual trend appeared in the nineteenth and early twentieth-century, while in Iran it only began to assert itself vigorously in the aftermath of World War II.” Speaking of this contrast, one author wrote:

It should be appreciated that the anti- Orientalist movement in Iran is perforce roughly

™Ibid., 13. ”lbid., 6. ”A notable exception in this regard was Seyyed Jamal ad-din Afghani (1839-1897) who engaged the famous French Orientalist, Ernest Renan, in a brilliant polemic on Europe's claim to a universalist philosophy as well as its self-appointed mission to "civilize" the rest of the world. See Nikki Keddie, An Islamic Response to Imperialism: Political and Religious Writings of Sawid Jamal al-din Al- Afghani (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 183 fifty to seventy-five years behind its Arab counterpart. Not only this, but it would appear to be moving in the opposite direction. While the Arab branch of the movement peaked in the early years of this century and has since wound itself down to relative oblivion, the Iranian movement, beginning in the early to middle decades, has gradually gathered strength and is now building up a crescendo.” Although Enayat himself took part in the anti- Orientalist discussions of the 1960s and 1970s,” he was aware of its many shortcomings. Enayat realized that the Iranian intellectuals were consciously or unconsciously supplementing their antipathy toward the West with an uncritical glorification of their own ancient past and culture. He forewarned his compatriots by writing: Yet if the basic and implicit assumption of Orientalism was that Western civilization was innately and eternally superior to Eastern civilization, our own Iranology ought not to commit the opposite error, and assume that everything pertaining to Iranian culture is a paradigm of perfection. It ought not to be forgotten that

” William G. Millward, "The Social Psychology of Anti- Iranology," Iranian Studies 8, 1-2 (Winter/Spring 1975): 52. This may be the only article written in English by a Western scholar that took the charges raised by Iranian scholars against Orientalism seriously and responded to them accordingly. For the most part, however, this important debate among Iranian intellectuals went unnoticed in the West. ”For some other examples of this discussions see: Daryush Ashouri, "Iran-Shenasi Chist?" [What is Iranology?"] Rahnama-ve Ketab 14, 4-6 (July/September 1971): 218-226; Abolghasem Injavi-Shirazi, "Illat-e Vujudi-e Isteshraq va Mustashreq" ["Risen de'tur of Orientalism and Orientalists"] Neain 8, 85 (May 1972): 5-8; and Shapour Rasekh, "Ertebat-e Tahghighat-e Iran-Shenasi ba Neyazhay-e Jamaeya Konuni," ["The Relation Between Iranology Research and the Needs of Contemporary Society"] Sokhan 22, 2 (September 1972): 114- 126.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 184 fanaticism begets fanaticism, and the excesses of some of our scholars in demonstrating the excellence of Iranian culture have stimulated among some Persian-speaking people undesirable cultural reactions..." Another scholar who contributed immensely to the popularization of the integrated discourses of gharbzadegi and anti-Orientalism in the 1960s and 1970s was Ehsan Naragi." As a founder and subsequent director of one of the country's leading social science institutions

(University of Tehran's Institute for Social Research)” for more than a decade, Naraqi became a well-known and sought- after sociologist. In three consecutive books published between 1974 and 1977, he attempted to cover such topics as

"Hamid Enayat, "The Politics of Iranology": 10. "Naraqi (b. 1926) was educated in Iran, Switzerland, and finally France, where he earned his doctorate in sociology from the Sorbonne in 1957. Upon returning to Iran, he became a professor of sociology at the University of Tehran. For six years he served on the staff of UNESCO, where he held such positions as director of its youth department and, later on, as the organization's cultural attache to Asia. His 1966 report for the United Nations on Third World brain-drain stirred a lively debate in Iranian intellectual circles. "Founded in 1959, the Institute soon became Iran's leading social science center. It addition to publishing a journal, 'Ulum-e litima'i. the Center also published more than sixty books and monographs related to various social science disciplines. Some of the leading social scientists working with the Center were: Jalal Al-e Ahmad (writer), Ahmad Ashraf (sociologist), Daryush Ashuri (economist & translator), Jamshid Behnam (demographer), Khodadad Farmanfarmayan (economist), Ali-Hohammad Kardan (psychologist), Abassgolie Khajenouri (mathematician), Khosrow Khosrowi (agricultural sociologist), Asghar Mahdavi (economist), Hushang Nahavandi (economist), Majid Rahnama (economist), Shapour Rasekh (sociologist), and Firouz Tofiq (sociologist).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 185 the intricacies faced by modern Iranian social scientists in applying their Western-imported knowledge to the domestic conditions at hand, the nature of Western society and technology, and Iranians' search for cultural identity in a rapidly changing world." On the first subject he criticized his colleagues, in a less acrimonious way than Al-e Ahmad had, for their outmoded approach to solving social problems in Iran. Referring to the class of technocratically-oriented officials occupying high positions within the Iranian administration,® Naraqi lambasted these "Massachusetts- type" technocrats for their excessive scientism and cosmopolitanism, as well as their corresponding obliviousness to indigenous Iranian conditions, norms and values.Turning to the question of the nature of Western thought and civilization, Naraqi echoes themes raised by Shayegan. For Naraqi, the Judeo-Christian tradition of thought, as it is practiced in the West today, does not have

much to offer the Orient in the way of original thought. He

"Naraqi's three books were: Ghorbat-e Gharb [The Exile of the West] (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1974); Anche Khod Dasht... [What He Himself Had, He Was Requesting from Strangers] (Tehran: Amir Kabir Publications, 1976); and Tamae Kham rCrude Greed] (Tehran: Tous Publications, 1977). "Mottahedeh points out that "... of the 4,478 people listed in the Iranian Who's Who of 1976, 45.6 percent had at least one degree from a foreign university and 30.7 percent had doctorates." See Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet: 317.

to oEhsan Naraqi, Tama Kham: 13.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 186 writes: "The power of Western civilization arises from its submergence in reality. The glory of Eastern history, on the other hand, emanates from the eternal glow of truth." Rejecting Shayegan*s hesitancy in approaching cultural eclecticism, however, Naraqi immediately adds: "Today we

inevitably have to articulate and unite Western reality with Eastern truth."’” The "reality" Naraqi is speaking of refers to Western science and technology, whereas the "truth" alludes to Oriental faith, mysticism, and esoteric philosophy. Hence, according to Naraqi, Iranians should maintain their culture and civilization while borrowing Western knowhow. This borrowing, however, had to be done discriminatingly if Iranians were to avoid such harmful consequences of technologism and machinery as alienation and spiritual/cultural poverty.’” By calling into question the Western idea of progress, the shortcomings of its Marxian

and liberal political philosophies, as well as the ominous repercussions of some of its technological breakthroughs,

Naraqi attempted to make Iranians aware of their own cultural heritage and sense of national pride.’” The Iranian critique of the West, for the most part.

’”Ehsan Naraqi, Anshe Khod Dasht...: 7. ’“Ehsan Naraqi, Ghorbat-e Gharb: 173-174.

’“For a critical view of Naraqi*s ideas see: Asghar Fathi, "Farhang Iran va Tamadon Gharbi," ["Iranian Culture and Western Civilization"] Rahnama-ve Ketab 21, 3-4 (June/July 1978): 165-176.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 187

remained an ethical one. The West was criticized for its past colonialism and present imperialism, its excessive admiration of technology and rampant irreligiosity, its materialism and consumerism, and its abandonment of moral convictions and justice. An illustration of this critique is found in a presentation made by Mohammad Ali Eslami- Nodoshan, for the 1967 Harvard University International Summer Seminar.Eslami-Nodoshan's paper, "The Modern Man and the Underdeveloped Man" outlined the characteristics of two types of people in the modern world. The modern man was portrayed as one who is well-to-do, enjoys luxury goods, believes in following technicalism and technology, is alone,

lacks peace of mind, and finally substitutes intelligence for wisdom. The underdeveloped man, on the other hand, was pictured as mystical, angry, absent, hungry, faithful, bitter, and subject to prejudice.He believed the two obstacles to world progress were the oppressive behavior of the industrial world and the inequality and injustice

prevalent in the less-developed countries. Eslami-Nodoshan

**Eslami-Nodoshan (b. 1925) is an Iranian writer with a doctorate in international law from University of Paris. For many years he was a professor of Persian literature at the University of Tehran. The Seminar, which was run by Henry Kissinger in the 1960s, used to bring together rising literary, intellectual, and political figures from around the world to discuss a variety of issues. Other notable Iranians who in the 1960s participated in the summer seminar included Mohammad Moein, Sadeq Chubak, Jalal Al-e Ahmad, and Simin Daneshvar. “®M. A. Eslami-Nodoshan, Azadi-e Moiasamah [Freedom of the Statue] (Tehran: Tous Publications, 1977): 197-202.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 188 confronted Kissinger's realist approach to world affairs with classical idealism. He suggested that the United Nations be replaced with an international autonomous organization in which the representatives of the peoples instead of governments would take part.*®*

Another Iranian critic of the West engaged in criticism of the Western literary persona in order to demonstrate the moral bankruptcy of the West: None of the four mythical characters of Western civilization, i.e. Faust, Hamlet, Don Juan, or Don Quixote represent the material spirit of that civilization. Instead each one of them is wandering in pursuit of a utopian end totally alien from the economic principles of the West.*®*

A number of observations on the two debates are in order. The typology presented in the first part of this chapter was an attempt to trace the trajectory of the discourse of gharbzadegi through an examination of the

process by which the "Occidental other" was formed within

the social imagery of a number of leading Iranian

intellectuals. The discourse of gharbzadegi is far from being monolithic; on the contrary, it is a paradigm - full of internal contradictions and currents - that was refined at each turn by its advocates. It metamorphosized from Shadman's and Al-e Ahmad's chilling political critiques into Fardid's and Shayegan's philosophical formulations. Under

*°*Ibid., 206.

*®*Jamshid Behnam, "Gharb, Kodum Gharb?": 33.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 189 the call to establish an Oriental identity, all four thinkers discussed here depicted the West as a radical other. They each employed imaginative geography the other way around, in the service of an "Orientalism in Reverse." The result has been the gradual essentialization and purification of the categorical dualism of gharbzadegi. Its internal/external figurative speech forged a discursive space in which a radical mental boundary separated "us" from "them." This dichotomous rendition was both vital and detrimental to the endeavor of Iranian intellectuals in constructing a collective identity of their own. It was indispensable because their defense involved devaluation of the "other" from the very beginning, and detrimental because they were consumed with this imaginary "Western other." In their attempt to come up with an indigenous "identity," the four intellectuals discussed in the first part of this chapter experimented with "Iranian,"

"mystical," "Oriental," and "Asiatic" sources of identity. While some blamed the West, others mourned its self- inflicted death. Nonetheless, throughout this progression the nativistic, Third-Worldist, and even Islamic aspects of the discourse were strengthened, while its anti-Western sentiments continued to escalate. Capitalism, modernism,

secularism, humanism, and rationalism as some of the

cardinal virtues of the "Western other" came under a chiefly ethical/emotional critique. Post World War II self-doubt

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 190

and criticism within the West further fueled this dissenting

inclination. If for the Iranian intellectuals of the nineteenth- century the prevalent social malady was one of "backwardness," for those living in the second half of the twentieth-century it became one of "Westoxication." In less than a century, the attitude changed from one promoting catching up with the West, to one calling for abandonment of the West.*®* Ironically, however, neither was achieved. Despite its progress, Iran was not able to reach parity with the Western world, nor were its intellectuals able to let go of the West as their primordial source of inspiration. Perhaps the words of Ivan Turgenev,*®® as expressed through the main character in Smoke. best describe this love/hate

relationship: It wouldn't be so bad if we really did despise [the West]; but that is all talk and lies. We swear at it and abuse it, but its opinion is really the only one we value; and fundamentally it's the opinion of Parisian idiots.**® The second debate also proved disappointing. The idea

*®*This trend can be seen symbolically in the abandonment of Hegel's optimistic philosophy of history in favor of the pessimistic outlook of another German philosopher of history, Oswald Spengler. Spengler's classic book The Decline of the West became a favorite of Iranian intellectuals in the post-World War II era. *®®Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev (1818-1883) was a Russian writer who enjoyed some popularity among the Iranian intellectuals of this era. **®Cited in Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet: 314.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 191 for the development of an antithetical field of study to Orientalism never materialized. No genuine research was undertaken in comprehending the West or its various dilemmas and accomplishments. Indeed, despite the great expansion of the volumes of books translated, only a few of the classic works of Western philosophy were ever translated. Until the end of the 1960s none of the major works of Hegel, Spinoza, Descartes, or Kant were rendered into Farsi. The Marxian literature was not doing any better; its scope was limited to a few clandestine translations such as Marx and Engels' The Communist Manifesto. Engels' Anti-Duhrinq. Plekhanov's

Role of Individuals in Historv. and a brief summary of

Marx’s Capital. My interviews with two of Iran's most philosophically-oriented translators also revealed that they were not following any systematic agenda in their selection of books to translate."* A similar tendency can be

detected among other philosophically inclined translators

such as Ahmad Aram, Amir-Hossein Aryanpour, Mahmoud Houman, Mohammad-Baqer Houshyar, and Mahmoud Sana'i.**^ Occidentalism as a discourse on the Western other thus was predicated upon a deeply rooted feeling of moral and

***Najaf Daryabandari, interview by author, 20 July, 1989, Vienna, Virginia, tape recording; and Daryush Ashuri, interview by author, 29 May, 1989, New York, New York, tape recording. The two are respectively known for their seminal translations of Russell and Nietzsche. **^A notable exception in this regard was Manouchehr Bozorgmehr who consistently translated the works of a number of Western positivist philosophers.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 192 cultural superiority of Oriental civilizations. These predispositions, however, were never subjected to a critical scrutiny. Supplementing this philosophical unawareness about the other was a shortage of critical knowledge about the self. The Iranian secular intellectuals complemented their harsh criticism of the modern West with a non-

critical, nostalgic attitude toward their own historic past. While some tended to take refuge in the glory of pre-Islamic Iran,*" others showed more interest in the country's religious or mystical traditions. Homa Nateq, a leading Iranian historian, criticized this yearning for cultural archaeology by stating: Whenever we Easterners want to stand up to the West we retreat into the cover of an archaeologist looking for mythical glory in the ancient past. In the process of this inquest, we forget both the present and the future. What good is it for us to constantly repeat that the origin of sciences, philosophy, mathematics and antiquity comes from us? Why is it that others take pride in what they have, and we in what we want to have in an illusionary world?"* Another shortcoming of the Iranian secularist

***Two of the leading academic advocates of this approach were Zabih Behrouz (1890-1971) and Ebrahim Pourdavoud (1885-1968). Both men were specialists in the history of ancient Persia as well as in Zoroastrianism. Pourdavoud translated Avesta into Persian, and in the 1940s formed an intellectual circle around himself which included such figures as Mohammad Moein, Sadeq Hedayat, and Mehdi Bayani. ***Homa Nateq, "Farang va Farangi-Maabi va Resaley-e Enteqadi-e Shaykh va Shukh," ["The West, Westernization, and the Critical Essay of the Cleric and the Joker"] Alefba (Tehran) 6 (1977): 63.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 193 intellectuals was their unfamiliarity with the intricacies of Iranian society, religion, and psyche.*" Their upper- class origins, elitist upbringing. Western training, and high academic or political positions were among the factors contributing to this estrangement. Furthermore, the

predominantly ethical nature of their critique of the West, their distorted knowledge of the letter's philosophical traditions, and their proclivity for glorifying the Islamic- Iranian heritage all unintentionally contributed to the strengthening of the conservative groups and their discourses.

In sum, the 1960s and the 1970s produced mixed results for the secularists. On the positive side, deep inroads were made in the field of literature, as elegant new styles and innovative writers (including many women) emerged. The return of many young professors from abroad drastically

improved academic standards. Corresponding to the

quantitative expansion of the class of writers and intellectuals, book reading and publishing also experienced a quantitative boost. Translations of foreign works also flourished resulting in the development of a more

sophisticated reading audience. Modern social science

***My personal interviews, as well as those conducted by Harvard University and the Foundation for Iranian Studies with a good number of secular intellectuals, strongly corroborated my hypothesis about the letter's obliviousness toward the more traditional sectors and religious sentiments of their own countrymen.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 194 centers and institutes were set up, and new philosophical as well as sociological styles of prose started to take shape. New organizations entered the political arena, promoting a

novel approach to political struggle. Finally, the question of self/other identity came to the forefront of intellectual deliberations and stayed there. On the negative side, however, none of these intellectuals could stand up to such towering figures of the previous generation as Nima, Hedayat, Foroughi, Kasravi or Dehkhoda."* Preoccupation with political causes prevents many intellectuals from performing their scholarly tasks.

Political populism deterred many of these intellectuals from calling into question the shortcomings of their own culture and society, using instead the state and the West as suitable scapegoats. Finally, the quest for identity led to an archaic nativism, as the critics of Orientalism could not

come up with a better alternative to it than its exact

opposite — "Orientalism in Reverse."

*‘®Nima's new poetry, Hedayat's modernist prose, Forougi's grasp of Western philosophy, Kasravi's meticulous historiography, and Dehkhoda's encyclopedia are still regarded as the masterpieces of their respective genres.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER IV

CLERGY AND THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A RELIGIOUS SUB-CULTURE

I think the history of Iran from 1953 until 1978 can be summed up in the sentence: The ever-widening gap between Shemran [a wealthy suburb in northern Tehran] and Qom. And it got so apart that it was unbridgeable. ‘ The circumstances which culminated in the 1979 Iranian Revolution have been designated by a variety of labels, such as the rise of "Islamic revivalism," "Islamic

fundamentalism," and "Islamic resurgence" — labels which are either grounded in Western history and/or rooted in its cultural antipathy toward the Muslim world. The process leading to and following the revolution has mainly been described as a counter-response by the traditional segments of the Iranian polity to rapid modernization and the idea of

progress.

In this chapter and the one that will follow, however, I shall contend that what transpired in Iran was much more complicated than the facile speculations of modernization theorists have led us to believe. Examining the ideas, actions, and political platform of the clerical forces and

‘Richard N. Frye, in an interview recorded by Shahla Haeri, October 3, 1984, Cambridge, Massachusetts, tape no. 1, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

195

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 196 the religious intellectuals, I maintain that what took place was the development of a "religious sub-culture" which was more innovative, enduring, and popular than its secular counterpart. This religious sub-culture involved a "politicization of Islam," which transformed the latter into the primary agency of political socialization and contestation. In other words, Islam became an ideology par excellence capable of such functions as granting identity and legitimacy upon as well as integrating and mobilizing, the masses. Politicized Islam, in turn, promulgated the otherness of the state, the West, and the secularists. I further claim that this otherness is to be understood against the background of: (1) a declining base of power vis-a-vis the monarchical state; (2) an ideological challenge offered by their secular counterparts; and (3) a response to the received Western philosophical doctrines and

political actions. Equipped with such premises, in this chapter I will

look at the intellectual developments and sociopolitical activities of the clerical class. Chapter 6 ventures into a

similar critical inquiry on the contributions made by religious intellectuals for the development of the religious sub-culture. Henceforth, these two chapters shall attempt to demonstrate the process through which the ascendancy of

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political Islam became possible/* The Clerical Establishment: Historical Ambience Since the advent of Shi'ism as the official state religion in 1501, the political culture of Iran has hinged on the two pillars of religion and state to sustain itself. The union of clergy and the royal court, as the two main pillars of Iranian political life, has been at times cordial and at times antagonistic. Despite the proliferation of revisionist historiographies which have claimed an interminable and pervasive oppositional role for Iranian Shi'i ulama because of the state's misdeeds, the relationship between the two has been more problematical/

The congenial relation during the Safavid era (1501-1722), the lukewarm/antagonistic association of the Qajar period

^The proliferation of a good number of scholarly books on Shi'ite Islam, Iranian clergy, and religious intellectuals since the 1979 Revolution, has mostly alleviated the need for a repetitious treatment. Hence these two chapters will attempt to broach the more uncharted domains whereby the religious sub-culture was intellectually and politically articulated. For some of the more competent expositions of the above subjects see: Shahrough Akhavi, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1980); Hamid Enayat, Modern Islamic Political Thought (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982) ; and Nikki Keddie, Roots of Revolution (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981). *For an example of this revisionist line of historical inquiry see Hamid Algar, "The Oppositional Role of the ulama in Twentieth Century Iran," in Scholars. Saints and Sufis, ed. Nikkie Keddie (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971):231-255. For a critique of this very same view see Willem M. Floor, "The Revolutionary Character of the ulama: Wishful Thinking or Reality?" in Religion and Politics in Iran, ed. Nikki Keddie (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983): 73-97.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 198 (1785-1925), and the courteous/confrontational encounter of the Pahlavi era (1925-1979) all defy the naive categorizations presented by the apologetic of both the clergy and the state. The clergy historically has had much common interest with the court. Maintenance of the status quo, preservation of private property, shrewd political

alliances to sustain social privileges, and common opposition to unsettling heretical, radical and secularist movements have constituted some of the common grounds between the two. On the other hand, as the two chief institutional adversaries, they have challenged one another over greater supremacy, popular allegiance, prestige, the pool of disciples, as well as economic rewards. With the coronation of Reza Shah as the first Pahlavi ruler in 1925, the balance of power turned decidedly against the clergy. Secularization of the vital domains of education, mass media, justice, and politics, along with

such controversial acts as the change of civil codes and dress, women's enfranchisement, the purification of language

by removing Arabic words (as well as a host of other

events), signaled this turn of tide. The reign of Mohammad Reza Shah (1941-1979) exasperated this already drifting alliance. The diminishing political clout of the ulama, reflected in their declining presence in the Majlis (Iranian

parliament) and other governmental institutions was one cause of concern. More consequentially, the regime had

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 199 decided to transfer the Iranians' source of allegiance and identity from one based on religion to one grounded in pre- Islamic monarchical legacy.* Economically, the clergy became deprived of independent sources of revenues as the state began to carry on its land reform program and set up its own Endowments Organization.* The traditional petty bourgeoisie which had served as a recruitment ground for the religious establishment was confronting a formidable adversary in the form of a rapidly expanding new middle class. Thanks to the mushrooming of non-religious kindergartens, primary and secondary schools and universities, the number of pupils and theology students was

also dwindling. Finally, the open identification of the

*The extravagant commemoration ceremonies marking the celebration of 2500 years of monarchical rule in 1971, along with a decree in 1975 to change the calendar from one based on the Prophet Mohammad's migration from Mecca to Medina to one dating back to the Achaemenid Empire were only two visible examples of this contestation of Islamic legitimacy by the Shah's regime. *The Endowments Organization (Sazeman-e Awqaf) was set up by the government in 1964 to bring under its control all donated for religious use lands as well as to institutionalize the proper collection and distribution of revenues. Its secondary function was to try to bridge the emerging gap between the clergy and the government by contributing funds to apolitical or pro-government clergymen. To accomplish these goals, the Prime Minister appointed Nasir Assar, the son of the eminent theologian and university professor Sayyed Mohammad Kazem Assar, as the head of the organization (1964-1972). However, the Endowments Organization was not able to carry its designated tasks since it was besieged from onset by allegation of favoritism and corruption. See the reminiscences of Nasir Assar, 1982, pp. 60-65, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 200 government with a secular, powerful, and technologically superior West was quite disheartening to the conservative

clergyman. The above events provided more than ample reasons for the clergy to conceive of the state as its antagonistic other. This perceived otherness brought along an era of self-questioning, reorganization, innovative thought and, finally, victory for the clerical establishment. Brian Turner has recently criticized a central thesis of Western sociology which claims that the economic character of capitalism has been accountable for the dwindling significance of the church. Turner maintains, quite to the

contrary, that the power of Christianity in the modern world is positively linked to its crucial association with the growth of the European nation-state. In other words, as the

state institutional apparatus expanded, so did the church

thrive as a national institution.® A similar analogy can be

drawn for the clergy-state relations in the Pahlavi era. The increasing state bureaucratization of power under the

two Pahlavi kings had paradoxical results. On the one hand, it reduced the previous authority enjoyed by the ulama; yet at the same time it granted the clerical establishment the

recognition of being the quintessential alternative to state power. In effect, state monopoly of power forced the clergy

*See Brian Turner, "Religion and State-Formation: A Commentary on Recent Debates," Journal of Historical Sociology 1, 3 (September 1988); 322-333.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 201 to turn more and more toward the masses. Populism replaced elitism as the predominant discursive repertoire of the clerical class. The clergy faced the herculean task of reforming their institution if they were to meet the challenge of the state. Internally, the house had to be put in order while,

externally, its lost stature had to be reattained. The clerics also stood bewildered in front of a wave of Western philosophical doctrines embodied in the ideas of Marx, Nietzsche, Darwin, and Comte, which had found their way into Iranian philosophical discourse. These doctrines, which had previously contributed to the decline of religion in the West, were now constituting a challenge with which the clergy had to grapple. "Closure of discourse," to borrow Herbert Marcuse's term, was no longer a viable formula for combatting the skeptics and the unbelievers.

The clerical response to this challenge conformed to the contours of what Max Weber has identified as the

"rationalization of life."* Rationalization of financial revenues and economic affairs, advancement of systematic

theology, standardization of the academic curriculum of

religious centers, cultivation of extensive communication networks throughout the country, and establishment of religiously inclined publishing houses and journals were

*See Max Weber, "Author's Introduction," in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism: 13-31.

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only some of "rationalizing" reform moves undertaken by the Iranian clergy in the aftermath of World War II. The reform movement can be said to have begun during the tenure of the Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Hossein Boroujerdi who was regarded as marja'-e taglid (Source of

Imitation) of Shi'ites from the mid 1940s until his death in 1961. While maintaining a conservative outlook that promoted aloofness from political involvement, Boroujerdi did much to inaugurate a reform movement within the ranks of the clergy. A prominent student of his has summarized his

accomplishments in the following way: centralization of all financial contributions to the religious leaders and seminaries; development of accounting procedures to record all such transactions; dispatching Muslim missionaries to Western countries (such as West Germany and the Unitea States) to promote Islam; establishing closer ties between Shi'ite and Sunni theologians in Iran and the Arab world

with the goal of attaining Islamic unity; founding religious

primary and secondary schools; contributing to the construction of mosques and theological seminaries throughout Iran; and encouragement of theology students to contemplate on concrete logical problems instead of abstract and obscure theological hair-splitting.*

*See Mortaza Mutahhari, "Mazaya va Khadamat-e Marhum Ayatollah Boroujerdi," [Advantages and Services of the Late Ayatollah Boroujerdi] in Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat [An Inc[uiry into the Principle of Emulation and

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 203 Boroujerdi's departure from the scene in 1961 created an "uncertainty over the matter of the succession and a fear that government intervention might present the community with a fait accompli.” These concerns led the younger generation of theologians to "consider the functions and

choice of the marja'-e taqlid.”^ Shortly after Boroujerdi's death, a grcup of social reformers, who two decades later would become the leading personalities of the 1979 Revolution, came together to map an appropriate strategy.*® In January 1963, the proceedings of their discussions were published. This book earned such praise as the "most important work to have been published in Iran in the last

fifty years."** The publisher's introduction to the second edition of the book highlights its significance: This book, which is written by a number of

the Religious Institution], 2nd. ed. (Tehran: Enteshar Publishers, n.d.): 233-249.

®Ann K. S. Lambton, "A Reconsideration of the Position of the MARIA' AL-TAGLID and the Religious Institution," Stvdia Islamica xx (December 1964): 119. *®These individuals included Mehdi Bazargan (b. 1907) , first prime minister of the Islamic Republic; Ayatollah Sayyed Mohammad Beheshti (1928-1981), generally regarded as the leading political strategist of the revolution after Ayatollah Khomeini: Sayyed Mortaza Jazayeri; Mortaza Mutahhari (1919-1979), chief ideologue of the Islamic Republic; Allameh Mohammad Hossein Tabataba'i (d. 1981), a most learned Shi'ite theologian; Ayatollah Mahmoud Taleqani (1910-1979), the most popular religious leader of post revolutionary Iran after Khomeini; and Hajj Sayyed Abol- Fazel Mousavi Zanjani. "shahrough Akhavi, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: 119.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 204 informed religious leaders and enlightened writers of the Islamic world, as expected, caused a massive wave [of debates] and can be considered as representing the prospect of a deep and reform- minded movement within the ambient of religious institutions. This book shows that the clergy has reached such a degree of cerebral maturity that it can criticize itself, based on precise scientific and social standards, as well as seek a remedy." Akhavi has summarized the group's major resolutions as

presented in the book: (1) The need for an independent financial organization for the clergy. (2) The necessity of a shura-ye fatva— a permanent committee of mujtahids [Shi'i clergymen capable of issuing authoritative opinions in matters of Islamic law], the members of which were to be drawn from the country at large, to issue collective authoritative opinions in matters of law. (3) The idea that no Shi'i society is possible without the delegation of the Imam's [messianic] authority. (4) An interpretation of Islam as a total way of life, therefore incorporating social, economic and political issues into the religious ones. (5) The need to replace the central importance of fiqh [Islamic theology] in the madrasah [the traditional theological seminary of the Islamic sciences] curricula with akhlaq [ethics], aqa'id [ideology] and falsafah [philosophy]. (6) The need for a new concept of leadership of youth based on a correct understanding of responsibility. (7) The development of ijtihad [independent judgment in the interpretation of Islamic law] as a powerful instrument for the adaptation of Islam to changing circumstances.

(8) A revival of the nearly-defunct principle of al-amr bi-maruf wa al-nahy an al-munkar [the injunction to command the good and forbid evil] as a means of expressing a collective and public will.

"Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat: 7.

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(9) Specialization among mujtahids and making taqlid (emulation of a mujtahid) contingent upon it. (10) The need for mutuality and communal spirit to overcome the individuality and mistrust that pervades Iranian culture. ** These resolutions signified two notable developments within the clerical establishment. The first concerns the

launching of a systematic "war of position" on the part of the clergy to politicize Islam (resolutions 1, 4, 6, 8, and 10). Mutahhari, Beheshti, Bazargan and other politically- minded clerics and laymen argued that the clerical institution was neither capable of challenging the state nor its secular opponents if the clergy persisted in maintaining

their presently ossified ideas and conventions. According to them, the clergy had no political literature or organization; was too preoccupied with apolitical, non social, and non-contemporary issues; abused their positions and/or became accomplices of the government; had nothing to offer Iranian youth; and maintained very lax rules of

behavior among themselves. Mutahhari went even further and

accused his colleagues of having committed yet a bigger offense, that of succumbing to avam zadegi (mass mindlessness).** He alleged that "because of their

"shahrough Akhavi, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran; 119-120.

"Reminiscent of Al-e Ahmad's underscoring of gharbzadegi, Mutahhari accentuates the predicament of avam zadegi by writing "what has paralyzed and weakened our religious establishment is this affliction of avam zadegi, which is worse than the distress caused by floods.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 206

dependence upon the people for their sustenance they [the clergy] have lost their intellectual freedom and become subservient to the wishes of the common people, who are, for the most part, ignorant and opposed to reform."" According to Mutahhari, the dilemma confronting the religious classes was as follows: "If they rely upon popular support they acquire political power but lose their intellectual freedom; whereas if they rely upon the government, they surrender their political power but retain their intellectual freedom."" The remedy, according to him, was to create a financial institution in which the clergy would no longer be directly dependent upon contributions." In this way, they

could sustain their independence against both the government and the masses. The second development resulting from the publication of Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat concerned the emerging prominence of a new school of theological

interpretation, which later on acc[uired the title of fiqh

pouya [dynamic jurisprudence] (resolutions 2, 3, 5, 7, and

earthquakes, snakes and scorpions." Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat: 184. "Ann K. S. Lambton, "A Reconsideration of the Position of the MARJA' AL-TAGLID and the Religious Institution": 133.

"ibid.

"For more on these points see: Ali Ashtiyani, "Ehya-e Fekr Dini va Sarkardeg-ye Islam-e Seyasi dar Engelab-e Iran," [The Revival of Religious Thought and the Ascendancy of Political Islam in the Iranian Revolution] Kankash 5 (Fall 1989): 51-85.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 207 9). While maintaining their belief in the necessity of upholding the principles of taqlid, ijtihad, and Marjaiyat [the Shi'a principle of emulating a living eminent mujtediid}, the reform-minded clerics also called for their modification. They argued that due to the constantly-

evolving nature of scientific and social issues which face the community, theology needs to adapt itself in order to remain a viable alternative in today's world. Mutahhari argued that the clergy needs to follow the example of the scientific community in seeking specializations in their particular fields of expertise." Bazargan contended that

while time, space, life, and humans undergo transformations, so should theology and theologians." Taleqani and Jazayeri both called for a shura-ye fatva as a more democratic, logical, and authoritative alternative to one-man lawmaking. In short, the contributors to this book advocated the

modernization of the clerical establishment as a way of

insuring its survival. Nonetheless, history had a different course of action in store. A mere five months after the publication of this

book. Ayatollah Khomeini, a junior clergyman who survived Boroujerdi, practically invoked resolution 8 (Command the good and forbid evil) as a justification for rebelling

against despotism. In June 1963, at the Faiziyeh seminary

"Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat; 61.

"ibid.. 111.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 208 in Qom, he delivered an inflammatory speech against the

regime for its domestic and foreign policies. This led to a confrontation between the government and theology students in which many protestors lost their lives. Khomeini was sent into exile, first to Turkey and then to Iraq. The June

revolt had two important ramifications: first, it inaugurated a phase of open confrontation in clergy-state relations and, secondly, it helped to polarize the clerical class into those who were advocating confrontational political activism and those in favor of quietist, apolitical, and theologically-bound pursuits.

Khomeini's "war of movement" in 1963 had mixed repercussions for the two central goals of the social reformers — politicization of Islam and the development of a new theological hermeneutics. While not adhering to the thoughtfully crafted and gradual strategy of the latter, it nevertheless produced some of the intended results. The activist clerics established their personal and

communication networks throughout the country; propagated explicitly political literature; suffered imprisonments and martyrdom for the cause of political struggle; and finally,

formed or joined already-existing political organizations such as Hezb-e Melal-e Islami and Nehzat-e Azadi.^

^Hezb-e Mellal Islami [Islamic Nations Party], an armed underground organization made up mainly of the defunct Fada’iyan-e Islam [Devotees of Islam] was formed shortly after the June 1963 revolt. Some of its main leaders were Mousavi-Bojnordi, Hajj Mehdi Iraqi, Jananti-Kermani, Mir

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 209 These developments gave a great deal of legitimacy to the clergy in the eyes of the discontented sectors of the Iranian population. The more the regime resorted to pre- Islamic monarchical glory, the more powerful grew the appeal of Islamic symbolism, myths, and jargon. The youth adored

the fearless pronouncements of Khomeini and his lieutenants, while the traditional propertied middle class and bazaaries took to heart the clergy's call for maintaining the immutable values of traditional culture as well as opposing the large capitalists and their Western supporters. Considering the fact that the polarization of the clerical class undercut the formation of a centralized financial organization (as promoted by the social reformers), the

financial support provided by the bazaar merchants to the radical clerics proved instrumental. The finance of clergy's politics helped to shape the letter's politics of

dissent and opposition.**

Mohammad Sadeqi and Abolghasem Sarhadizadeh. Nehzat-e Azadi [The Freedom Movement] was formed in 1961 by Mehdi Bazargan (a French educated engineer and university professor), and Ayatollah Sayyed Mahmud Taleqani. Other leading members of the organization included Ahmad-Ali Babaei, Mohammad Baste- Negar, Abolfazel Hakimi, Mehdi Jafari, Mostafa Mofidi, Abbas Radnia, Ezatollah Sahabi, Yadollah Sahabi, and Abbas Shaibani. This organization attempted to bridge the gap between the secularized middle class and the clergy. **Abbas Amanat has made a similar argument contending that ever since the Qajar era the bazaar support and not a'lamiyyat (superior learning) has been the deciding judge for the selection of top leaders of Shi'ism. See Abbas Amanat, "In Between the Madrasa and the Marketplace: The Designation of Clerical Leadership in Modern Shi'ism," in Authoritv and Political Culture in Shi'ism, ed. Said Amir

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 210 Likewise, the 1963 events also had major repercussions for the development of fiqh pouya. In light of the polarization that engulfed the ranks of the clerical class, the progressive minded idea of a shura-ye fatva never materialized. Quite to the contrary, while in exile in Iraq, Khomeini delivered a series of class lectures on the necessity of a one man velayat-e faqih (governance of the jurisprudent.) These lectures, which were later published as a book entitled Hokumat-e Islami [Islamic Government], argued for the fundamental opposition between Islam and monarchy, and called for an Islamic system of government in which sovereignty emanates and resides in God. The community is to be led by a supreme faqih capable of interpreting Islamic laws.** In broad terms, Khomeini's idea of an Islamic government can also be analyzed within the confines of fiqh pouya. He agreed with such ideas as delegation of authority, development of ijtihad to fit

changing circumstances, as well as the necessity of

supplementing theology with lessons on ethics, ideology, and

philosophy.**

Arjomand (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988): 98-132. **Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Hokumat-e Islami [Islamic Government] (n.p., 1971). **Khomeini, who had studied philosophy under the learned Sayyed Abol-Hasan Rafi'i-Qazwini, was one of the very few clergymen who used to teach that subject in theological centers. He came under heavy criticism from the more

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 211 More importantly, however, Khomeini's book signified a drastic politicization of a sizeable segment of the clerical class which he himself was leading. Khomeini had learned from his 1963 setback, and was not willing once again to endure the agonies of defeat. His political stand stabilized Khomeini no longer criticized this or that wrongful or despotic policy of the government, but instead attacked its mandate to rule. He no longer hinted about a possible accord with the court, but called for its

overthrow. In short, Khomeini had turned Islam into a powerful alternative ideology, capable of challenging its

rich adversary. This metamorphosis nonetheless must be understood against the background of a formidable religious sub-culture which had painstakingly been developed in the decades preceding the publication of Khomeini's book. It is

to an examination of this sub-culture that we now turn our attention.

Toward a Religious Sub-Culture The activities of the clerical class were by no means limited to those of Ayatollah Khomeini. Indeed in the 1960s and the 1970s, the greater clerical community and their lay

collaborators had launched an inconspicuous campaign aimed at the educated as well as the disenfranchised. The end

result was the development of a religious "sub-culture"

conservative clerics for having tutored his students in Greek and Islamic philosophy as well as mysticism.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 212 which proved quite a challenge for the monarchical establishment.^ In the aftermath of the 1953 coup, to borrow the words of the Palestinian revolutionary Fawaz Turki, the clergy realized that "repeated spasms of despair, muttering cruel prayers, or drinking rain"* were not going to repudiate the sense of otherness that was thrust upon them. As moralists they could not just be preoccupied with the past, since it was in the present that the challenge was most noticeable.

For them, the geography of discourse changed from "yesterday, there, and them" to "today, here, and us." True, the present was still evaluated with an adoring eye for the past, but this was far different from falling into the oblivion of antiquity. What was taking place was not so

much the traditionalization of modernity but the modernization of tradition. The French philosopher Henry Corbin has argued that

tradition by its very essence is a rebirth, and every birth is the renewal of tradition in the present time; it is hence that the verb signifying tradition (transmission) is

^Dictionary definitions describe "sub-culture" as "an ethnic, regional, economic, or social group exhibiting characteristic patterns of behavior sufficient to distinguish it from others within an embracing culture or society." See Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary. 1st ed. (1973), s.v. "Sub-culture." *Fawaz Turki, Soul in Exile; Lives of a Palestinian Revolutionarv (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1988), 25.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 213 generally used in the present tense.* The American sociologist, Craig J. Calhoun, has made a similar argument contending that tradition is "grounded less in the historical past than in everyday social practice."* He

maintains: Tradition is the medium in which interactions take place. Like language, it is at once passed from individual to individual through use and given much of its substantive meaning by the particular instances of its use...* Viewing traditionality as a mode of organizing social action, Calhoun concludes that "the validity of traditional ideas or practices comes not just from their antiquity but from the element of consensus and universality of their use."* In what follows, I will argue that the clerical sub-culture is best represented by this conception of tradition. This interpretation,. I believe, best explains why religion gained momentum in Iran while the process of

modernization was in full swing.

“cited from Ma'aref Islami 5 (March 1968) in Daryush Ashuri, Iranshenasi Chist? va Chand Maaal-e Dicar [What is Iranology? and A Number of Other Essays] (Tehran: Agah Publications, 1972): 147. *Craig J. Calhoun, "The Radicalism of Tradition: Community Strength or Venerable Disguise and Borrowed Language?" American Journal of Sociolocrv 88, 5 (March 1983) 888. “Ibid., 896. “Ibid., 895.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 214 Relation with the State While the process of "secularization" was initiated in Iran in the early parts of the twentieth century, the Iranian state actually never followed a full-fledged ideology of "secularism.Neither the Iranian Constitution nor the Iranian government ever proclaimed

itself to be "secular." The two Pahlavi administrations followed the precedent, set by the Safavid kings in the sixteenth-century, of maintaining Shi'i Islam as the official religion of the country. Furthermore, the Constitution had allowed for the formation of an observatory

body composed of the ulama to oversee the compliance of

civil laws passed by the Parliament with the basic doctrines of Islam. Though Ataturk had completely abolished the Sunni institution of Caliphate in Turkey (1924), no such equivalently daring act was ever undertaken against its

Shi'ite counterpart in Iran. Shi'i Islam had never recognized the separation of religion and state or that of

sacred versus temporal domains of social activity. Hence

the clergy had both a doctrinal vindication as well as a legitimate political claim to intervene in matters affecting

the umma (Islamic nation.) The clergy and the monarchy were also bound together

by common enemies and mandates. The allied occupation of

“For a definition of the terms "secularization" and "secularism," as used here, refer to chapter 2.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 215 Iran during WW II, the threat of a rising communist movement, and the half-hearted support for the oil nationalization campaign constituted some of the common points between the two camps. Furthermore, the elitist disposition of both institutions led them fervently to oppose the idea of democracy and popular rule. To begin with, monarchy as an hereditary institution had no place in its system for popular representation. The neopatriarchal rentier nature of the regime was also strengthening this

predilection. Contrary to their popular rhetoric, the ulama were no more predisposed toward democratic rule. Allameh

Tabataba'i had clearly stated this position by writing; Islam is not just another democratic system as some [have] claimed. Nor is it a communist system. It is a different order: The decrees of the Islamic community (as distinct from the immutable laws of Islam), although they are the results of consultation, are based fundamentally, not on the wishes of the majority, but on the truth, and depend for their stability, not on the desires and inclinations of the people, but on a realization of what is true.

The understanding between the two institutions,

however, did not survive the subsequent political vicissitudes. The land reform program, the granting of capitulation rights to American military personnel in Iran, women's enfranchisement, the 1963 Qom revolt, the state formation of such rival organizations as a Religious Corp

^Bahsi dar Barah-ve Maria'ivat va Ruhanivat: 86. Translation is taken from Ann K. S. Lambton, "A Reconsideration of the Position of the MARJA' AL-TAGLID and the Religious Institution": 128.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 216 and an Endowments Organization and the overall depreciating magnitude of the clerical power base all contributed to the sense of rancor which came to mark the latter stages of the clergy-state association.

Ideological Vigilance By the 1960s, the clergy had recognized that in the marketplace of ideas the only way to reclaim Islam from the dominance of competing schools of thought was through an ideological struggle. The method of assassination of political and ideological adversaries as carried out by the Fada'iyan-â Islam in the 1950s was no longer judged

appropriate.“ The non-intellectual orientation of the Fada'iyan-e Islam had to be abandoned if the clergy was to proselytize from among the more moderate and intellectually- minded sectors of the Iranian polity. Hence the clergy embarked upon a course of ideological struggle, challenging

their contestants.

One way of waging this battle was through the publication of scholarly books. In 1943, Ayatollah Khomeini published his first major work, entitled Kashf-e Asrar [Revealing of Secrets], as a rebuttal to a book written by a

^This underground terrorist organization which was formed in 1946 by Sayyed Mujtaba Nawab Safavi (1923-1956) assassinated the secular historian Ahmad Kasravi (1946), and Prime Ministers Abolhossein Hazhir (1949) and Ali Razmara (1951). For more on this group see; Farhad Kazemi, "The Fada’iyan-e Islam: Fanaticism, Politics and Terror," in From Nationalism to Revolutionarv Islam, ed. Said Amir Arjomand (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1984): 158-176.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 217 disciple of Kasravi promoting secularism. Ayatollah Mutahhari's influential book Usui Falsafa va Ravesh-e Ri'alism [The Principles of Philosophy and the Method of Realism], provided a critique of materialist philosophy as a school of thought.* Ayatollah Nasser Makaram-Shirazi wrote an intriguingly-titled book, Secrets of Orient's

Backwardness. assailing Western civilization, culture, science, and politics while promoting an Islamic/Oriental alternative.* Responding to those Iranian nationalists who were renouncing the contributions of Islam to Iranian culture. Ayatollah Mutahhari wrote a second lengthy book in 1970-1971 on Mutual Services of Islam and Iran.* Ayatollah Taleqani wrote two popular books: the first addressed Islam's views on such crucial economic issues as ownership, private and public property, banking, and interest rates.

*This book was Mutahhari's reconstruction of the lectures delivered by Allameh Tabataba'i in the 1950s on materialist philosophy, with the former's own extensive commentary. Ayatollah Mutahhari had acknowledged that he began studying Marxist literature published by the Tudeh party as well as by the Egyptian Marxists as early as 1946 in order to criticize it. See Ayatollah Mutahhari, Fundamentals of Islamic Thought, translated by R. Campbell (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1985): 11-12. *Nasser Makaram-Shirazi, Asrar Aaab-Mandeai Shara [Secrets of Orient's Backwardness] (Qom: Javan Publications, 1969). Makaram-Shirazi was a publicist who wrote on social problems as well as being the editor in chief of the journal, Darsha'i az Maktab-e Islam, which was the official organ of the Qom theological center. “Ayatollah Mortaza Mutahhari, Khadamat-e Moteaabel-e Islam va Iran [Mutual Services of Islam and Iran] 13 ed. (Tehran: Sadra Publications, 1987).

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while the second laid out what the proper form of government is according to Islam.* Engineer Mehdi Bazargan translated a number of works by the Frankfurt School psychoanalyst and social psychologist Erich Fromm on the alienating conditions of life in the West. He also authored a series of works

allegedly demonstrating the compatibility of many Islamic canons with modern scientific doctrines and findings. These books, which discussed secularism, Marxism, Western civilization, Orient/Occident dichotomy, Iranian nationalism, as well as Islamic views on economics and politics, are only a sampling of the enormous body of literature produced by the clerical class. What is

arresting in the choice of these topics is their modernity of form as well as pertinence of content. Islam was becoming politicized or, better yet, was turning into an

ideology. The clerics' intellectual presence also extended to

popular journals. In 1958 the first issue of the monthly

periodical Darsha'i az Maktab-e Islam was published in Qom

by Ayatollah Shariatmadari's Dar al-Tabligh Islami. The statement of purpose in the first issue of the journal spoke

of the need to present an alternative to the ethical corruption, irreligiosity, and the spirit of materialism

*The two books were respectively titled Islam va Malekivat [Islam and Property] and Hokumat az Nazar-e Islam [The Islamic Concept of Government].

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 219 falling over a Muslim society, especially its youth.* This journal soon found its appropriate place in the Iranian intellectual scene, so much so that, according to one study, by the late 1970s it was enjoying a selling rate of 50,000 copies per month, compared to a mere circulation of 3,000 for Sokhan. Iran's best known literary magazine since World War II.* Darsha'i az Maktab-e Islam was followed by a second Islamic journal published in Qom entitled Maktab-e Tashawu. Pursuing goals similar to its counterpart's, yet

in a more politically engaging manner, the new journal began with a sizeable circulation of 10,000 copies in May 1959 and underwent a second reprint a month later, whereby an additional 5,000 copies were printed.* These statistics were not an aberration. According to a bibliography of philosophical works published in Iran in 1975-76, more than 154 works (83 books and 71 articles) were

written on Islamic topics compared to 48 works (30 books and 18 articles) dealing with modern philosophers' views on

social and literary subjects.'*” The religious works, which

^Editorial Board, "Hadaf Ma," [Our Purpose] Darsha'i az Maktab-e Islam 1, 1 (December 1958): 2-5.

*See Majid Tehranian, "Communication and Revolution in Iran: The Passing of a Paradigm," Iranian Studies 13, 1-4 (1980): 21. The editors of the Maktab-e Islam, however, were claiming to have a circulation of 200,000. *Maktab-e Tashawu 1, 1 (May 1959) : 1.

“Sayyed Hasan Eftekharzadeh, Fehrest-e Maaalat va Kotub Falsafi dar sal-e 2535 [Annual Bibliography of Philosophical Works Published in Iran, 1975-1976] (Tehran: Imperial

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 220 can mainly be divided into ideological, social, and theological categories, dealt with the following pertinent topics: 1. Ideological issues: critique of materialism, economic doctrines, world peace, political conditions in the world, conceptions of ideal life, and the relationship between Iran and Islam. 2. Social issues: the youth, women, child, marriage education, gambling, drinking, music, poetry, and social consciousness. 3. Theological issues: proving the existence of God, imamat, resurrection and after life, responding to Christian criticisms of Islam, and the relationship between science and faith. In the early 1970s the three best-selling books, bought in hundreds of thousands of copies, were all religious in nature: Quran (700,000 copies), Mafatih al- Jenan (490,000 copies), and Rasa* il Amaliwa (400,000

copies) Furthermore, religious books as a percentage of total published books increased from 10.1% in 1963-64 to 33.5% in 1974-75/%

The clergy and their allies also became involved in setting up publishing houses to disseminate their views.

According to a 1976 survey cited by Said Amir Arjomand,

Iranian Academy of Philosophy, 1977): 11-49, 103-113. A note of caution should be mentioned here since, according to the compiler, the above bibliography does not represent an exhaustive list of all the philosophical works that were published in Iran during this time.

%Said Amir Arjomand, "Traditionalism in Twentieth- century Iran," in From Nationalism to Revolutionary Islam, ed. Said Amir Arjomand: 216. 42 Ibid., 214.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 221 there were "forty-eight publishers of religious literature

in Tehran alone, of whom twenty-six had begun their activities with publication of religious books during the decade 1965-75."% These publishing houses were mainly concentrated in Tehran and Qom where the abundance of resources and a positive ambience worked to their advantage.* Hence, one can conclude that the ideological war had compelled the clergy to supplement oral discourse with printed word as the primary means and mode of communication.

Educational Edification Much of the intellectual and scientific heritage of Iran has developed within the Islamic intellectual life of

maktabs (elementary religious schools) and hawzahs (centers of religious education). The administrations of the Pahlavi

Shahs broke the clergy's monopoly hold over the instructional domains by setting up modern, secularized, and

state supported counterparts. This secularization of the educational system deprived the clergy of one of their traditional sources of power. After a period of bafflement.

43 Ibid., 213. * In Tehran such publishers as Bassat, Daftar-e Nashr-e Farhang Islami, Dari al-Kotab al-Islamiyah, Moassesseh Matbouat-e Islami, and the Endowments Organization were active in publishing religious books. At the forefront of religious publishing in Qom were such publishing houses as Dar al-Tabliq Islami, Javan, Tashayyu, Resalat, Hekmat, Majma Zakhayer Islami, and Moassesseh Usui Din.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 222 the clergy realized that they were left with no other option but to pursue a two tier policy of holding to their traditional institutions as well as abandoning their longstanding opposition to their modern educational counterparts. The traditional clergy at first reacted negatively to the founding of institutions of higher education in the mid- and the late 1930s, referring to them as ”atashkadebs” (houses of fire).% Eventually, however, a number of their former students and sons deserted the ranks of the old guards and entered the universities. These defectors were

employed mainly in the broadly-defined faculties of philosophy and theology (Daneshgadeh Maqoul va Manqoul) where they would cover such topics as jurisprudence, philosophy, history, Arabic, and comparative literature. Because of their previous background in the hawzahs, these

scholars were well equipped to teach these subjects. Such

learned scholars as Sayyed Mohammad-Kazem Assar

(philosophy), Nasrollah Falsafi (history), Badioalzaman Forouzanfar (Arabic literature), Ahmad Kasravi (history),

Mehdi Elahi-Qumsha'i (philosophy), Sayyed Mohammad Mishkat (philosophy), and Mahmud Shihabi (philosophy), all graduates

of the hawzahs, were teaching at the university of Tehran in

%The equation of a university with an atashkadeh was based on the belief that both were alien institutions belonging to an "other," the first belonging to the non- Muslims while the latter was the Zoroastrians' place of worship.

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the late 1930s and the 1940s.* During and after the reign of Ayatollah Boroujerdi, the gap between the hawzedis and the universities was further reduced. Boroujerdi was quite cognizant of the importance of propaganda. Thus, he sanctioned many hawzah graduates to enter the universities in order to acquire knowledge of modern sciences as well as to promulgate Islam. His suggestion actually materialized as such traditionally- trained scholars as Sayyed Jalal al-Din Ashtiyani, Mohammad-

Taqi Danechepazhuh, Mehdi Ha'iri-Yazdi, Hojjat al-Islam Mohammad-Javad Hojjati-Kermani, Ahmad Mahdavi-Damghani, Yahya Mahdavi, Ayatollah Mohammad Mofatteh, Mehdi Mohaghegh, Javad Musleh, Ayatollah Mortaza Mutahhari, Ayatollah Mehdi Rouhani, Ayatollah Mousa Sadr, and Sayyed Jafar Shahidi, among others, entered the academic life of universities.% These scholars, many of them prolific writers, contributed

much to the changing atmosphere of Iranian universities.

Their authorship, editing, and commentary on various Islamic texts resulted in the efflorescence of such works. Furthermore, they organized centenary celebrations and commemorations of Islamic sages and saints, formed private

*The reminiscences of Mohammad Baheri, (1983), 17-18, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies.

%Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Islamic Philosophv in Contemporarv Persia: A Survev of Activitv During the Past Two Decades. Research monograph no. 3 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Middle East Center, 1972): 6-8.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Furtherreproduction prohibited without permission. 224 discussion and study groups, led prayer services, engaged in theological or political debates and polemics with their opponents and, finally, trained a whole new generation of students and pedagogues. These pioneers opened the way for many other talabehs (students of Islamic sciences) who followed them into the theology departments of modern universities. The provincial clerical elites had also consented to sending their sons into this new environment, allowing for a new lifestyle. Upon graduation many of these individuals were recruited by such ministries as Education, Finance, and Justice, which

would send them back to their provincial towns as elementary or high school teachers, preachers, notary publics, as well as judges. Accordingly, the clergy secured an influential position for itself in the rapidly-changing cultural life of Iran. Hence, an inadvertent consequence of the

modernization process was to force a relocation of the

terrain of contestation between the clergy and the state, as the former was now attempting to undermine the letter's omnipotence from within its very own structures. The clergy's educational crusade went far beyond the universities. Another prime target of this drive were the

primary and secondary schools. As early as the 1950s such activist clerics as Hasan Ayat, Ayatollah Dr. Mohammad Javad

Bahonar, Ayatollah Dr. Mohammad Beheshti, Ayatollah Dr. Mohammad Mofatteh, and Ayatollah Mutahhari had joined the

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 225 mostly-secular Iran's Teachers' Association to advance their common cause against the state and the communist left.% Mohammad Derrakhshesh, the leader of the Teacher's Association who in 1961 became Minister of Culture, contends that in the 1950s these clerics (in particular Beheshti and

Bahonar) were able to set up a series of private boys' and girls' schools known as Alavi schools. Having been unable to dismantle the new secular school system, the clergy had decided to form their own alternative to it. The philosophy behind the establishment of these schools was rooted in the belief that the graduates of traditional religious seminaries were only capable of influencing the illiterate

rural masses and not the educated strata of metropolitan Iran. Furthermore, the clerics and their lay colleagues expressed their irritation at the limited number of hours allocated for the teaching of theological subjects in modern

Iranian high schools. Having conveyed these concerns, and

along with their longstanding opposition to coeducational schools, they were able to attract the support of the mostly traditional bazaar merchants who were more than willing to provide financial support. With such a strong financial backing, the clergy were

able to build modern schools; provide such benefits as a

private bus service; and, most important, offer higher

%Mohammad Derrakhshesh, interview by author, February 10 1990, Chevy Chase, Maryland, tape recording, interviewee's residence.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 226 salaries to lure better teachers. In return they made sure that, in addition to the regular curriculum designed by the Ministry of Culture, the students would get an adequate dosage of religious instruction, and the girls would be allowed to wear the veil in school. As a result of the more

rigorous method of pedagogy that these students went through, many of them would succeed in the college entrance exams and make their way into highly-competitive Iranian universities.* Although, no precise statistics are available on these schools, it is safe to argue that they numbered in the hundreds and enrolled thousands of

students.“ The clergy also infiltrated the regular secondary schools, where they were often hired as instructors of theology, Arabic, and Persian literature. They would encourage their students to form Anjoumanha-ye Islami (Islamic Councils) to carry a whole range of activities

ranging from offering classes on interpreting the Quran, to

forming study and discussion groups on philosophical and ethical issues, engaging in extracurricular activities, and organizing libraries. These activities proved attractive to

*After the 1979 Revolution, many of the former Alavi schools graduates who were the equivalents of Mao's "red experts" came to occupy influential positions within the new revolutionary administrations. “Al-e Ahmad cites the figure of close to 200 primary and secondary schools, with forty to fifty thousand pupils. See Al-e Ahmad, Dar Khedmat va Khianat-e Rowshanfekran. 2; 31, 71.

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many students.**

The Folk Religion Besides university and high school students, the clergy also appealed to another group that spawned from the modernization excursion — the urban poor. The clergy had

historically been influential in the rural villages where they performed such diverse functions as being the spiritual guide, the literate clerk/teacher, the family troubleshooter, the trusted confidant, and the guardian of the folk religion. The rural migration to the urban centers, however, brought along a transformation of their

constituency. A changing locale demanded a modified strategy on the part of the clerical class, in order to accommodate the new circumstances. The government inadvertently contributed much to this strategy by failing

to fulfill many of its ambitious promises, which it was either unwilling or unable to deliver. The clergy responded

by picking up where the government had left. Through their charitable enterprises, which were subsidized by the financial contributions of bazaar merchants and the practicing Muslims at large, they provided housing.

**Alireza Mahfoozi, who later became a leading member of the Marxist Fedayeen Organization, provides an account of how in high school he was pulled toward these Islamic libraries where he would study books with the sole purpose of refuting the doctrines of Marx, Freud, and Darwin. See Alireza Mahfoozi, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedqhi, April 7, 1984, Paris, tape no. 1, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 228 education, health care, employment, and job-training services for the urban poor. One example of this charitable enterprise can be found in the northeastern city of Mashhad, where a bazaar wood- carver and glass-maker, Hajj Ali-Asghar Abedzadeh, began his philanthropic campaign in the mid 1940s. The son-in-law of

a town cleric, Abadzadeh would attend the sermons of another cleric, Hajj Mehdi Isfahani, and would then convey the same materials to his guild fellows in more lay terms. As his popularity increased, he established a number of charitable organizations named after the fourteen infallible personalities of Shi'ism (e.g. a Mahdiyeh, an Askariyeh, a

Naqaviyeh, a Javadxyeh, and a Razaviyeh.) These endowments, which were to serve both as religious reading and lecture halls as well as affordable medical clinics, mainly catered to the needs of the urban poor and the lower classes whose

fold was rapidly swelling in a developing city such as

Mashhad.%

The popularity of Abadezadeh's altruistic foundations, which continued until the 1979 Revolution, also translated into political clout. By the time of Mossadeg's administration he had already become a local power-broker to be reckoned with. His case is illustrative of religiously- inclined grass-root groups that surfaced in the Iranian

%Ahmad Mahdavi Damghani, interview by author, 24 March, 1990, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, tape recording, interviewee's res idence.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 229 sociopolitical scene in the last forty years. These groups and foundations constituted one way in which the clergy and their lay allies challenged the policy of "civil privatisa" promoted by the state. The numerous Mcdidiyeh, Hosseiniyeh, rowzeh khani, dasteh and hay'ats, ta'zieh, anjumanhay tafsir Quran, alavi schools, Muslim student associations, Islamic libraries, and Islamic lending associations contributed much

to the religious sub-culture already developing at the time.* The sheer size of the clerical class, which in the late 1960s was in the neighborhood of seven to ten thousand, along with their extensive network of mosques (varying in

estimates from 9,015 to 20,000), supported the rise of the clerical counter-culture.* This numerically-significant size allowed the clergy to maintain a strong presence in their traditional stronghold of rural villages as well as in the metropolitan urban centers. Furthermore, the clergy's

utilization of modern means of mass communication such as radio and television, cassettes, leaflets, books, and

newspapers provided them with a broader audience with whom

^^Hosiniyeh is a religious lecture hall; rowzeh khani is a mourning ritual in which tales are recited from the venerable lives of the Shi'ite imams; dasteh and hay'at refer to bands organized by believers during religious processions; ta'zieh is a passion play enacting the Karbala tragedy where Imam Hossein was martyred; and anjumanhay tafsir Quran are societies which meet to interpret and discuss Quranic exegeses.

*These figures are taken from Shahrough Akhavi, Religion and Politics in Contemporarv Iran: 129.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 230 to interact. This presence particularly increased during the three religiously-marked months of Muharram, Safar, and Ramadan, when they would deliver sermons, lead prayer services, and appear in radio and television interviews and discussions. The clerical folk religion was also reinforced by the general cultural inclinations and religious convictions of the greater masses. The traditionalism, conservatism, male chauvinism, xenophobia, and patriarchal orientation of the society at large served as a fertile ground for the clerical summons. By emphasizing such provocative issues as the regime's numerous socioeconomic shortcomings, corruption, elitist orientation, disintegration of traditional family bounds, rampant irreligiosity among youth and their disrespect for elders, materialism, and consumerism, the clergy were able gradually to turn the tide of public

opinion (especially among the lower classes) to their own favor. Henceforth, their calls about the prevalent moral

decay, cultural malaise, economic hardships, political

repression, and Western encroachment besetting Iranian

society at the time fell into receptive ears. This orientational metamorphosis was further aided by the power of popular mythology. Eslam Kazemiyyeh cites as one example

a case in which an oil well around the city of Qom allegedly was turned into salt water; people began to attribute this

incident to the fact that the Shah had offended the clergy

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 231 in a public speech a few days beforehand.*

Transmutation of Theology The formation of a viable sub-culture capable of ideological belligerency had another prerequisite — a theological coming-to-terms with the age of modernity. Ever

since the beginning of the twentieth-century, the Iranian ulama had been under a mounting pressure to recognize that a rapidly-evolving world requires a changing theology to insure its durability. The age of modernity has drastically altered the terms of reference. Anthropomorphization of God is no longer a caveat but a reality. Sovereignty has changed from one residing with the Holy Being to one emanating from the voice of the citizens. For the greatest majority of people, secularism is no longer the incipient doctrine it once was, but a reality of everyday life.

Scientific discoveries have subverted most, if not all, dogmas and superstitions. In short, to borrow Marx's famous

aphorism, all that was solid has melted into the air. For the Iranian Shi'ite ulama this realization is said

to have begun with the 1909 publication of Mohammad-Hossein Na'ini's Tanbih a 1-umma va Tanzih al-mella (The Admonition and Refinement of the People). In this treatise, the

eminent theologian provided a critique of absolutism and

*The reminiscences of Eslam Kazemiyyeh, (1983), 27, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 232 supported the idea of a parliamentary democracy. As the precursor of a new way of political thinking, Na'ini (d. 1936) faced a barrage of fierce criticism from his more conservative colleagues.* The second step toward a rapprochement with the modern era was taken by Na'ini's contemporary. Ayatollah Abdol-Karim Ha'iri-Yazdi (d. 1936), who founded the Faiziyeh seminary in Qom, which became Iran's largest and most important theological college.

Ha'iri-Yazdi's stewardship was significant in the sense that it introduced organizational coherence to the scattered and factionally-ridden ranks of the clergy, and allowed for the development of systematic theology. The clerical citadel of dogmatism experienced its

third important act of imaginative challenge in the early 1940s when another Shi'ite modernist theologian, Mirza Reza- Qoli Shari'at-Sangalaji (1890-1944), called into question

the Shi'ite eschatological doctrine of raj 'at (return) by the malevolent Hidden Imam to salvage the world.* This

unorthodox idea called into question the whole messianic beliefs of Shi'ism. The 1950s witnessed the rise of such

politically-consequential leaders as Ayatollah Ali-Akbar

*Na'ini's chief opponent was the anti-constitutionalist cleric. Sheikh Fazlollah Nuri, who was executed by the constitutionalists in the very same year that Na'ini's book was published. *See Yann Richard, "Shari'at Sangalaji: A Reformist Theologian of the Rida Shah Period," in Authoritv and Political Culture in Shi'ism, ed. Said Amir Arjomand: 159- 177.

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Burqa'i, Ayatollah Sayyed Abol-Qasem Kashani (d. 1962), and Mujtaba Nawab-Safavi who, despite their contrasting political standpoints, all engaged in politically mobilizing their supporters. In addition, the emergence of such clerics or clerical born individuals as Mohammad-Kazem Assar

(d. 1975) and Mehdi Ha'iri-Yazdi, who had studied in the West and were competent in at least one European language, provided the clergy with a more reliable view of the modern world. More consequentially, however, since the 1950s a number of Shi'ite ulama and scholars such as Hajj Mohammad-

Taqi Amali, Sayyed Jalal al-din Ashtiyani, Mohammad-Kazem Assar, Mehdi Ha'iri-Yazdi, Ayatollah Mohsen Hakim, Ayatollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Mutahhari, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Ayatollah Mehdi-Qumsha'i, Sayyed Abol-Hassan Rafi'i-Qazwini,

Allameh Tabataba'i, and Ayatollah Mahmoud Taleqani had overcome the traditional clerics' opposition to teaching

courses in philosophy. They tutored students in the areas of: (1) irfan [gnosis]; (2) hekmat [Islamic philosophy], where they taught the peripatetic and illuminationist

philosophies of Avicenna (d. 1037), Suhruwardi (d. 1191), and Mulla Sadra (d. 1640); and (3) falsafah, where the works of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were critically discussed. The late 1960s and the early 1970s also had their own share of theologically-significant events as Ni'raatollah

Salehi Najaf-abadi, a student of Khomeini, reinterpreted the

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 234 Karbala episode as a mere political rebellion and called into question the Shi'i theological dogma on Imam Hossein's prescience about his impending martyrdom.* Najaf-abadi's

semi-scholarly book provoked heated debates in Iranian religious centers by its insistence on subjecting every orthodox source and conventional narrative to a rigorous historical-factual scrutiny. More importantly, however, in 1971 Ayatollah Khomeini published his treatise on velavat-e faaih (Government of Jurisprudent) which altered the traditional Shi'ite doctrine of authority by advocating the

establishment of an Islamic government.* This book laid the theoretical foundation for a revolutionary government which was to materialize only eight years later. Despite the maturation process, the politics of the clergy was not all homogeneous or progressive-minded. In fact, the majority of the leading ulama remained apolitical

and/or quite conservative in their political outlook. Such

grand mujtahids as Ayatollah Mohammad-Hossein Boroujerdi, Ayatollah Mohammad-Reza Golpayeghani, Ayatollah Abol-Qasem Kho'i, Ayatollah Shihab al-Din Marashi-Najafi. Ayatollah

Hadi Milani, Ayatollah Tabataba'i-Qomi, and Ayatollah

*See Ni'matollah Salehi Najaf-abadi, Shahid-e Javid [The Immortal Martyr] 14 ed. (Qom: Sadra Publications, 1985). This book was first published in 1968.

*For more on this book, see Hamid Enayat, "Iran: Khumayni's Concept of the 'Guardianship of the Jurisconsult,'" in Islam in the Political Process ed. James Piscatori (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986): 160-180.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 235 Mohammad-Kazem Shariat-Madari represented the voices of the conservative clerical establishment. After the ouster of Mossadeg in 1S53, the conservative clergy turned their attention inward and launched an anti-Baha'i campaign.*” At the forefront of this campaign was Ayatollah Mahmud Halabi, an ultra-conservative cleric from Mashhad, whose Hojjatiyyeh Society called for combating the Baha'is as the arch-enemy

of Islam. The greater bulk of the clerics remained philosophically ignorant, narrow-minded, and fanatical. Their opportunistic demeanor, preoccupation with trivial

concerns, intellectual rigidity, scientific ignorance, and authoritarian manner account for the overall low-esteem in which they were viewed by most educated Iranians. For the most part, the Iranian clerics' acquaintance with Western

schools of thought remained frivolous. Even when they

undertook such an inquiry, it was done not with the

intention of understanding or appreciating these texts or thinkers but in refuting them. They had entirely misunderstood the spirit of Albert Camus axiom "I criticize, so I am." While for the secular Iranian intellectuals. Westernization implied a positive attitude toward human

beings and the world, a scientific spirit, and the creation

*”Baha ' ism is a religion born in Iran in the mid nineteenth-century which the Shi'ites regard as heretical because of its claim to have superseded Islam as the last chosen religion.

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of a tangible heaven in this transient world, the clergy would too-readily indulge in emphasizing such negative traits of the Western lifestyle as its consumerism, excessive individualism, as well as anthropomorphism of God. Nowhere was the clerics narrow-mindedness more evident

than in issues regarding women's rights and equality. A dogmatic belief in the inequality of sexes underscored much of their social thinking. The clergy used to object vociferously to women's rights to education, employment, enfranchisement, birth-control, becoming judges, or even wearing Western attire. The diminutive status of women was further reinforced by the patriarchal canons of Islam which had codified male polygamy, justified unequal inheritance laws between males and females, and even sanctified modes of appropriate punishment for women at the hands of men. The conservatism of Iranian clergy was not limited to

viewing women as second-class citizens. Additionally, they were opposed to land-reform, infringement of private property, socioeconomic prominence of such minorities as the

Jews and the Baha'is, rise of Marxist or religious intellectuals, formation of new schools based on a secular

educational curriculum, children's school uniforms, radio and television, and a variety of other progressive causes

and platforms. The intensity of their objections varied

according to their class backgrounds, level of education, and bonds to various social groups.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 237 Notwithstanding these antediluvian ideas, the clergy maintained a comparative advantage over their sociopolitical competitors. Their ascendancy to political power in 1979 can be attributed to this comparative advantage, which can be summarized in the following factors: (1) financial

independence from the state; (2) strong communication networks; (3) capable full-time orators; (4) legal centers of mobilization (mosques, seminaries, Islamic councils, religious foundations); (5) numerous religious occasions; (6) historical/mythical figures; (7) populist slogans; (8) bazaar support; (9) a centralized leadership with a well- defined hierarchical structure; and (10) a ready blueprint for action. These characteristics made clerics the most

organized sociopolitical force at the outbreak of the 1979 revolution. The clerical forces were aided by the emotional force generated on religious occasions, impressive popular support, well rehearsed agitators, and an imposing agenda

for political propaganda. Ali-Asghar Hajiseyd-Djavadi, a

leading secular opponent of the Shah's regime, recounted the following event, which demonstrates the way in which the secular opposition was subdued by the clerics: In the day of Ashura or tasu'a [two back-to- back days of mourning for the martyrdom of Imam Hossein during the holy month of Ramadan] I and a group of well-dressed intellectuals, who were all technocrat types, started to march from a northern part of Tehran toward the 24 of Isfand square. Suddenly a massive wave of demonstrators marching from southern parts [of Tehran] approached us. At

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 238 the head of every 200 meters of demonstrators there stood an akhund [a low-ranking clergyman] shouting slogans. They were chanting an entirely religious slogan about Imam Hossein which was suddenly reverberated by [our outnumbered group of] intellectuals.

"Ali-Asghar Hajiseyd-Djavadi, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedqhi, March 1, 1984, Paris, France, tape no. 5, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER V

THE DISCURSIVE REPERTOIRE OF LAY RELIGIOUS INTELLECTUALS

In the 1960s and the 1970s, the Iranian political culture observed the rise of a new class of intellectuals with a new political agenda. This new class, which I shall designate as "religious intellectuals"* was a diverse group of scholars, activists, and thinkers who articulated a

formidable alternative to the state, the laicised intellectuals, and the clerical class. Their combined influence, which was exhibited in the magnitude of their popular support and the degree of their intellectual stamina, proclaimed the indisputable arrival of a new contender into the Iranian intellectual scene.

In this chapter, I will examine the activities and

developments within the ranks of the class of religious intellectuals. First, to provide an account of the intricate process through which these Muslim intellectuals contributed to the formation of the religious sub-culture, I

*In this study, the term "religious intellectuals" is employed to differentiate the members of this class from both the laicised intellectuals as well as the clerical strata. Nevertheless, care will be made to demonstrate the commonalities as well as the differences between them and the latter groups. 239

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 240 present a case study of the holy city of Mashhad. I then proceed to examinations of the ideas of a few religious intellectuals, and of political organizations active from

the early 1950s until the late 1970s. Ideological struggles more than often turn into a

zero-sum games. The matrix of Iranian intellectual life in the post-World War II era bore witness to such an ideological contestation, as a conglomerate of left- wing/ right-wing, modern/traditional, and state/clerical rivalries were waged concurrently. The synthesis of these aforementioned dialectical struggles was the birth of a new

breed of intellectuals who stood at the intersection of these three major divides. These intellectuals were capable of taking radical or conservative, avant-garde or conventional, and revolutionary or statist positions.

Nevertheless, they all proclaimed an allegiance to Shi'i Islam as their principal source of inspiration and loyalty. Iran's lay religious intellectuals waged several

simultaneous ideological battles. Firstly, they saw themselves in competition with an increasingly vibrant

secular movement, as well as a vigorous state-machinery which was becoming increasingly skeptical of its citizens'

religious predilections. Secondly, their attempt to demythicize and reformulate their religion’s history and

heritage brought them into friction with the clerical class, which wanted to maintain its privileged monopoly as the

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 241 guardians of faith, orthodoxy and tradition. Finally, the religious intellectuals' desire to answer and challenge the West and its multiplicity of ideologies compelled them to spend much of their cerebral talent on these perceived

contenders. This tripartite struggle is lucidly illustrated in the intellectual ambience of the northeastern city of Mashhad, a celebrated hometown for many of Iran's leading religious intellectuals.

Mashhad; A Microcosm of Iranian Religious Life The Khorasan Province, located in northeastern Iran,

has historically played an important role in Iranian cultural and intellectual life. Geographically, it has provided Iran with its window into India, southeast Russia, and the rest of Asia; it has been Iran's frontline province

against invasions from the East (such as that of the Mongols

in the thirteenth-century); as well as a sanctuary from the more frequent Arabian aggressions. Culturally, it has been Iran's most fertile intellectual territory, a place where philosophy, arts, and literature have historically

flourished. As the birthplace or the favorite habitat of

numerous well-known philosophers, artists, and poets (such as Avicenna, Ferdowsi, Khayyam, and Rumi), Khorasan's harvest of intellectuals and thinkers perhaps equals that of

the rest of Iran combined. Mashhad, the capital of the Khorasan Province and Iran's second largest city, is also

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the place where Imam Reza, a revered Shi'ite Imam, has been enshrined. This last proprietorship turned Mashhad into the leading sacred pilgrimage site for Iranian Shi'ites. Entrusted with such features, literature and religion became an integral way of life for the people of Khorasan. These

qualities make the Khorasan province in general, and the city of Mashhad in particular, an appropriate case study for our deliberations on contemporary Iranian intellectual life. The strength of Mashhad's religious mood was first tested in 1935 when Reza Shah's decree calling for women's unveiling was met with strong opposition. A sermon

delivered in the Goharshad mosque by a radical cleric denouncing this dictum ignited a demonstration which was put down violently by the regime. Facing police punishment for veiling, many of Mashhad's conservative families who viewed the law as contrary to their Islamic beliefs prohibited their wives or daughters to walk outside the house for many

years. It was only after the abdication of Reza Shah and the Allied occupation of Iran in August 1941, that this

situation began to change. This latter event, however, constituted yet another challenge to the religious forces. The arrival of the Soviet Red Army insured the spread of socialist and communist ideas. The Tudeh Party, which before then did not have a local branch in Mashhad,

established its headquarters and began recruiting members.

In 1943, a local religious scholar, Mohammad-Taqi

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 243 Shariat! decided to form the nucleus of a movement to offset this trend.2 He founded Kanun-e Nashr-e Haqayeq-e Islami [Center for the Propagation of Islamic Truth] (hereafter referred to as the Center) to educate Mashhad's modern- educated youth about the advantages of Islam over Marxism.

For the next four decades, Shariati and his colleagues advocated a scientific and radical brand of Islam which enabled them to attract many of Mashhad's high school and university students as well as a number of its progressive- minded bazaaris. Among them were such figures as; Taher Ahmadzadeh (influential bazaar merchant and father of the

leftist Fedayeen leaders Masoud and Mastcureh Ahmadzadeh); Abolfazel and Mahmoud Hakimi (active members of the Freedom Movement); Hojjat Al-Eslam Sayyed Ali Khaman'ei (former president and present spiritual leader of the Islamic

Republic); Mohammad Khaman'ei (lawyer); Amir-Parviz Pouyan

(ideologue of the Fedayeen Guerrillas Organization); Reza

Pouyan (engineer); Kazem Rajavi (professor of law and older brother of the Mojahedin leader Masoud Rajavi); Nemat Mirzazadeh (well-known poet); Mohammad Shanehchi (an influential broker in Tehran bazaar with close ties to

^Mohammad-Taqi Shariati (d. 1987) was an unconventional, learned cleric who abandoned his clerical garb to devote himself more freely to his lifelong interest in interpreting Quranic exegesis. He later became a teacher of ethics and Arabic as well as a deputy principal at Shah Reza and other high schools in Mashhad. A prolific scholar himself, he is also the father of the renowned intellectual Ali Shariati, whose ideas we shall examine shortly.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 244 leading clergy, and father of four martyred leftist and Mojahed children); and Ali Shariati. Such a distinguished group of alumni propelled the Center into the forefront of Iranian intellectual life, making its presence known well beyond the city limits of Mashhad. The Center's emphasis on an Islam which was militant, class conscious, modern, and dynamic brought it into conflict not only with the leftist forces it was trying to unseat, but also with the conservative elements of the

traditional hawzahs who had staged a comeback after the events of August 1941. Like its counterpart in Qom, the hawzah soon founded a solid administrative and financial structure under the able supervision of Ayatollah Ahmad Kafa'i (d. 1971). More importantly, however, the presence of such prestigious clerics as Ayatollah Hadi Milani (d. 1975), Hajj Mehdi Kadkani, Ayatollah Mohsen Hakim (d. 1970), Ayatollah Hallabi, Mohammad Hashed, and Ayatollah Muttahari

(d. 1979), at one time or another, greatly enhanced the

intellectual stature of Mashhad's hawzah. These mostly- conservative clerics could neither withstand Mohammad-Taqi and Ali Shariati's unorthodox pedagogical approaches toward Islamic teachings, nor were they able to support the latter two's political beliefs and unconventional modes of

behavior. Ali Shariati recalls a time when he and his

father were criticized for their views on the necessity of women's literacy; importance of undergoing modern education;

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possibility of differently interpreting the Quran; seeking non-theological reasons for such natural disasters as earthquakes and tornadoes; not believing strongly in polygamy; as well as such rudimentary practices as shaving the face; wearing a hat or a tie; lecturing through loudspeakers; or even walking in a street designated as "Pahlavi. This war of words and ideas escalated later, as Ayatollah Milani became a frequent subject of Ali Shariati's indirect criticisms, while the latter himself was severely criticized by the clerical establishment/* In the absence of organized political parties, Mohammad-Taqi Shariati's Center also performed a political

task. The presence of such seasoned political individuals as Taher Ahmadzadeh and Mohammad Shanehchi insured the Center's political involvement, as during Mossadeq's oil nationalization campaign of the early 1950s. After the downfall of Mossadeq, the Center continued its ties with the religiously-oriented nationalists who had gathered around

the Freedom Movement through such individuals as Mehdi

^Haft Nameh az Moiahed Shahid Doctor Ali Shariati [7 Letters from the Martyred Mojahed Dr. Ali Shariati] (n.p.: Abu-Dhar, 1977); 20. ^In a monograph which was widely distributed in Mashhad, the son of the late Ayatollah Millani accused the younger Shariati of being under the influence of Isma'ili or Bahai teachings. The most consequential criticisms of Ali Shariati, however, were levied by Ayatollah Muttahari sometimes later on.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 246 Bazargan, Ezzatollah Sahabi, and Kazem Sami.^ Furthermore, the Center maintained its contacts with the more secularly- oriented intellectuals. Nemat Mirzazadeh, a long-time patron of the Center, remembers a meeting late in the winter of 1969 in which Jalal Al-e Ahmad presented his thesis on

the necessity of a clergy-intellectual alliance at one of the Center's discussion groups. Al-e Ahmad's proposal was met with the approval of all participants, including Mohammad-Taqi and Ali Shariati, and Hojjat Al-Eslam Sayyed Ali Khamane'i.* The traditionalist clerics, however, remained opposed to or at best skeptical about the Center and decided to form

their own groupings. They founded such organizations as Jameyat-e Peyrou Quran, Heyat-e Ali Akbarey-ha, and Anjouman-e Hojjatiyyeh, which were led, respectively, by the philanthropist Abadzadeh, Boghar-Nia, and Ayatollah Mahmoud Hallabi.7 Abadzadeh grew hostile toward Shariati's Center, which he regarded as the congregation site for the more

reformist-minded and religiously lax individuals. Ayatollah

Hallabi and his Hojjatiyyeh Society, while professing their indifference to politics, maintained that the Iranian youth

^Nemat Mirzazadeh, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedghi, May 25, 1984, Paris, France, tape no. 1, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

®Ibid., tape no. 2.

^Mohammad Shanechchi, in an interview recorded by Habib Ladjevardi, March 4, 1983, Paris, France, tape no. 1, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 247 were either becoming Tudeh sympathizers or, worst yet, lured toward Baha'ism.* Until the 1950s, Mashhad's intellectual milieu was confined to activities associated with the shrine of Imam Reza, a few high-schools, and a number of strong religious

establishments. With the foundation of the University of Mashhad, however, things began to change.® The presence of a strong state-sponsored institution of higher learning increased the rate of defections from the hawzahs to the universities, which until then was limited to a few exceptional individuals.*® The clergy were most critical of university theology schools, which they perceived as a potential rival to their own base of power. However, as

these graduates began to occupy such less-threatening positions as government employees, notary public, and high

*Ibid. ®The university was first founded as a medical training college in 1942. However, with the addition of the Faculty of medicine in 1949, the Faculty of Literature in 1957, and the Faculty of Theology in 1959, it was transformed into a university. In 1975, with the addition of the Faculty of Agriculture, it was renamed as Ferdowsi University in honor of the great eleventh-century Persian poet.

*°Ahmad Mahdavi-Damghani, a former professor of theology and literature at the University of Tehran, represents a typical case of this earlier generation. Born into a clerical family, he was the first graduate of Mashhad's religious seminary to enter a university. Interestingly enough, Mahdavi-Damghani recalls how his father had to be persuaded by other high-ranking clerics before allowing his son to attend the University of Tehran in 1944. Ahmad Mahdavi-Damghani, Interview by author, March 24, 1990, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, tape recording, interview's residence.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 248 school or university teachers, the clergy cut down their

criticisms. Furthermore, the shape of Mashhad's literature also

underwent a transformation both in agency as well as in style and composition. The older generation of such men as Mohammad-Taqi Bahar (1887-1951), Badi al-Zaman Furuzanfar (1899-1970), and Mohammad Parvin-Gonabadi, who were advocates of purely scholastic or apolitical literature, were replaced by a younger generation with the likes of Mehdi Akhavan-Sales, Mahmoud Dowlatabadi (b. 1940), Esmail Kho'i (b. 1938), Nemat Mirzazadeh (b. 1939), and Mohammad-

Reza Shafi'i-Kadkani (b. 1939), who were partisans of a secular and committed literature. Ferdowsi University's Faculty of Letters bore witness to this changing milieu as leftist and militant students contested the literary and theoretical explications offered by their religious or

apolitical professors." Religious intellectuals' intrusion into the fortress of traditional Islam was fittingly personified in the life of one of Mashhad's prominent sons — Dr. Ali Shariati. As

Iran's most celebrated religious intellectual of the 1960s and the 1970s, Shariati's life is illustrative of the

process through which lay religious intelligentsia were able to contest the conservative and tradition-bound

**Nemat Mirzazadeh, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedqhi, May 25, 1984, tape 2.

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interpretations of Islam offered by the ulama. It is to an examination of his ideas that we now turn.

Ali Shariati: The Luther of Iranian Shi^ism A man ignored by the West and the secularists, admonished by the clerics, and punished by the Shah's regime is nowadays widely regarded as the main ideologue of the 1979 Iranian Revolution.*^ The first camp considered him peripheral, the second suspected him of being a potential threat to their authority, and the third viewed him as a troublesome Islamic-Marxist who needed to be silenced. Because of these reasons, Shariati's popularity has come to exceed that of all other secular and religious intellectuals, or at least those considered here. These characteristics qualify him for theoretical scrutiny.

If the Iranian intellectual panorama of the 1960s was

dominated by Jalal Al-e Ahmad, that of the 1970s undoubtedly belonged to Ali Shariati." Al-e Ahmad had masterfully

*^Yann Richard, "Contemporary Shi'i Thought," in Roots of Revolution, ed. Nikkie Keddie (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), 215.

"shariati was born in 1933 into a religious family in the village of Mazinan, in Khorassan. He attended secondary school in Mashhad and studied under the tutelage of his learned father, Mohammad-Taqi Shariati. His higher education included a B.A. from Mashhad's Teachers' Training College (1953), an M.A. in modern languages from the University of Mashhad (1959), and a Ph.D. in Persian philology from the Sorbonne (1965). Upon returning to Iran from France, he taught intermittently at the University of Mashhad and was arrested a number of times by SAVAK because of his political activities. In 1977, after spending a couple of years under house arrest, Shariati left Iran for

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 250 articulated the dilemma confronting Iranian intellectuals, but fell short of offering a solution. Shariati, however, preoccupied himself with theoretical propositions and practical remedies for altering this predicament. His major notion of bazgasht be khishtan (return to oneself) complemented Al-e Ahmad's discourse of gharbzadegi. In a way, the latter had characterized the West as an "other," while the former had called for its abandonment. Shariati also went beyond Al-e Ahmad's mere condemnation of the intelligentsia, and instead put forward a more concrete definition of their commitment and the appropriate mode of action they must undertake. Thus, gharbzadegi and bazgasht be khishtan came to constitute the two interrelated and ever-popular discourses of the Iranian intellectual polity in the 1960s and the 1970s. In order to analyze Shariati's discourse of "return"

in a more comprehensive manner, it is of paramount

importance first to examine his ontological and

epistemological predispositions, his view of the Orient/Occident divide, his perception of intellectuals, and

finally his well-known anti-clericalism.

England, where he died unexpectedly of a heart attack. The mysterious circumstances surrounding his death led his supporters to claim probable SAVAK involvement.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 251 A Phenomenological Epistemology Shariati is best known in Iran as a sociologist." It is, however, more accurate to consider him as a sociologist of religion. This assigned label can be rationalized in light of two important facts: First, much of what he wrote

about did not digress from the framework of religion and religious thought; secondly, his approach to religion was informed by certain schools of thought within contemporary sociology. In general, it can be said that Shariati primarily spoke the language of Franco-German social philosophy. As a

student in France in the 1960s, Shariati was influenced by the ideas of his acclaimed professors and friends, among whom were Raymond Aron, Jacques Berque, Henri Corbin, Frantz Fanon, Roger Garaudy, Georges Gurvitch, Louis Massignon, and

Jean Paul Sartre. Furthermore, as demonstrated through his sporadic references to Hegel, Marx, Husserl, Jaspers, and Heidegger, one can surmise that Shariati was also exposed to

the ideas of these German philosophers. Shariati borrowed from both traditions. His social thought does conform to the tenets of nineteenth-century

sociological tradition as represented by Hegel and Marx. Shariati saw merits in Hegel's dialectical and historicist

"This misconception was partly due to the newcomer status of the academic discipline of sociology in Iran (first introduced in the 1940s), and secondly a result of Shariati repeatedly referring to himself as a sociologist in his lectures and writings.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 252 school of thought which maintained that ideas are only to be understood historically. From Marx he borrowed the idea of praxis as the basis of man's epistemology, and came to appreciate such indispensable principles of Marx's philosophy of history as base and superstructure, class conflict, alienation, and ideology." To a lesser extent, he was inspired by Heidegger's idea of the "prison of self" which Shariati included along with nature, sociology, and history as constituting the four major "prisons of humanity." Finally, Shariati was influenced by Husserlian phenomenology which he summarized in the following manner:

Phenomenon and phenomenology are based on the principle that absolute truth, core of reality, and the essential essence of the world, nature, and matter can never be known. What is and can be known, experienced, and subjected to our scientific analysis is the appearance and not the being... Physics, Chemistry, and psychology can only analyze, interpret and finally know the recognizable signs and symbols of the world and the spirit. Hence science [can] only speak of the signs and symbols of being." Shariati's attempt to incorporate the insights of Hegel and Marx within his broader Shi'ite world-view led him toward phenomenology as an alternative. He found himself in agreement with the phenomenologist's heuristic contention that all we perceive as concrete objects and subjects are

"For Shariati's views on these subjects see in particular lessons one and two of: Islamshenasi [Islamology] (Solon, OH: Muslim Student Association in the United States and Europe, 1979). 16 Ibid., 53-54.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 253 only appearances of the primary reality. Shariati interpreted this view according to his Shi'ite beliefs, maintaining that the primary reality is hidden, unknown and

beyond man's grasp." Despite these German influences, Shariati's methodological and epistemological tone is closer to that of contemporary French thinkers. This was partly due to the fact that he was a product of social and human sciences as against the discipline of philosophy. Shariati's epistemology centered around his repeated invoking of principles and theories from such disciplines as sociology,

economics, history, anthropology, and mythology to bolster his arguments." Shariati, however, was not a positivist

social scientist. Indeed, he criticized "scientism" as the doctrine most responsible for substituting reality for truth. Shariati approached anthropology not from its scientific entrance but through its philosophical back door; he acknowledged that he prefers mythology over history,

since the former represents history as it should have happened while the latter embodies realities that were made

"For more on Shariati's epistemology see: Shahrough Akhavi, "Shariati's Social Thought," in Religion and Politics in Iran, ed. Nikkie Keddie, 125-144. "This approach was different from one taken by another faction of religious intellectuals, represented by Engineer Mehdi Bazargan, who were trying to prove the accuracy of antiquated Quranic teachings based on the modern scientific findings of such natural science disciplines as nuclear physics, biochemistry and thermodynamics.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 254

up by others." Shariati's pull toward the metaphysical should be understood against the background of his larger desire to help bridge the gap between two abstract views of man; the Homo economicus of Occidental philosophy and the Homo symbolicus of Oriental philosophy.

Finally, Shariati was strongly attracted to the Neo- Marxist dialectical sociology of Gurvitch, the existentialism of Sartre, Massignon's reading of medieval

Islamic mysticism, and Fanon's psychoanalytical approach to Third World revolutionary movements.“ He believed all these approaches could contribute to the reconstruction of the "authentic existence" of Oriental man, a goal he was so

eagerly pursuing.

Shariati and the Orient-Occident Divide Shariati believed Orient and Occident were different

from one another in a number of respects. He held the foremost difference to be one of archetypes; "The cultural

archetype of Greece is philosophical, Rome's is artistic-

"For an example of Shariati's analyses of mythology see: Ali Shariati, "Psychanalyse d'un cas de Revolte Juvenile a Travers la Littérature Epique Persane," Ethnopsvcholoaie 37, 3-4 (1982): 33-58. “shariati translated either parts or full texts of: Fanon's Wretched of the Earth, and Five Years of the Algerian War; Sartre's What is Poetrv?. and Being and Nothingness : Che Guevara's Guerrilla Warfare: Louis Massignon's Salman Pak et les Premices Spirituelles de l'Islam Iranien and Etude sur une courbe Personnelle de vie: Le cas de Hallai martvr mvstigue de l'Islam: and a work by Durkheim which he never published.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 255 militaristic, China’s is gnostic, India's is spiritual, and that of our's [Iranians] is religious and Islamic."^* He maintained that these differing archetypes have brought along different cultural properties in the Occident and in the Orient: Rationalism, materialism, objectivism, and

profit-seeking in the former; and ecclesiastical, collectivist, subjectivist, and moral traits in the latter. Ontologically, then, the Occident has come to seek the "reality" that is, while the Orient is still pursuing the "truth" that shall be. Shariati attributed these larger cultural differences to fundamental dissimilarities in the nature and function of

religion and politics in the Orient and the Occident. He charged that while in the former religion has promoted an activist approach, in the latter it has fallen prey to the rulers and has sided with the oppressors against the

vanquished. Religious leaders in the Occident have become

collaborators with authorities, while in the Orient they

have traditionally spearheaded rebellions against all sorts of injustice. Consequently, for Shariati, Christian churches have come to be the slumber-houses of spirit, while the Islamic mosques are the abode of progressive

revolutionary movements.

^*Ali Shariati, Mashine dar Esarat Mashinism [The Machine in the Captivity of Machinism] (Tehran: n.p., 1977), 70.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 256 Similarly, Shariati deemed politics to have incarnated different qualities in the Orient and the Occident. In the Orient, political philosophy is based on spiritualism, not humanism. An important component of this Oriental doctrine is the quintessential role of the leader. Shariati

contended that in the Orient, leaders are usually prophets who are mandated by divine commandments, in contrast to the politicians who run Western societies based on man-made laws and constitutions. In other words, the basis of power in the Occident is political while in the Orient it has remained anti-political (see table 5)

Shariati and the Discourse of "Return" "The native has spoken," Shariati heralded in the pages of one of his most important works.“ The accent on "native" is what ties Shariati's discourse to that of the

secular intellectuals examined earlier. However, with Shariati, the terms of referentiality and the topics of

discourse undergo a transformation. The language in which the "native" is demarcated, exonerated, challenged, and called into action, as well as the means and methodology through which the "other" is portrayed, vary immensely. Similarly, as the spokesman for a generation of religious intellectuals coming of age, Shariati embodies the formers'

“ibid., 68-71. “Ali Shariati, Bazgasht [Return] (Tehran: Hosseiniyeh Ershad, n.d.), 352.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 257 Table 5.--SHARIATI'S TAXONOMY OF THE OCCIDENT/ORIENT DIVIDE

OCCIDENT ORIENT Cultural Philosophical, Gnostic, Archetype artistic, spiritual, military religious Cultural Rationalism, Ecclesiastical, Properties materialism, collectivist, objectivism, subjectivist, profit seeking morality seeking

Ontological Seeking reality Seeking truth Telos

Role of Justifier of slavery, Promoter of Religion weakness, poverty, jihad (Holy and piety War), glory, and power

Role of Pioneers of Victims of clergyman Colonialism Western Colonialism and pioneers of anti-colonial movements Role of sites Church as the slumber Mosque as the of Worship house of spirit abode of revolut ionary movements

Bases of Will of people & Genuineness of Political humanism Leadership and Philosophy spiritualism Form and basis Non-spiritual, Heaven bound, of Power political anti-political

Type of Leaders Politicians Prophets

Bases of Law Commandments Leadership Mandate

Source: Ali Shariati, Mashine dar Esarat Mashinism (Tehran: n.p., 1977), 68-71.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 258 Similarly, as the spokesman for a generation of religious intellectuals coming of age, Shariati embodies the formers' historical turn from the clerical class. As such, he and his generation attempted to address the dichotomy of Iran's cultural life in the 1960s and the 1970s, whereby secular intellectuals and the establishment clerics largely overlooked developments within each others' camps. Standing at this midpoint, the religious intellectuals endeavored to confront, compete with, and/or make alliances with both their secular and clerical adversaries. Shariati's life and works best illustrate this two fold striving. He reprimanded the secularists for their

ignorance of metaphysical thought, their uncritical

invocation of such foreign-made doctrines as Marxism and liberalism, and their lack of contact with the masses. Correspondingly, he castigated the clergy for obscurantism,

apolitical views, quietism, and their inattentiveness toward the important contributions and influences made by modern

sciences and technological breakthroughs. Shariati believed that Islam and its leadership

institution required a fundamental restructuring, nothing short of what Luther had initiated against Christian orthodoxy and the church hierarchy in the sixteenth-century. He maintained that Islam, like all other religions, has been

utilized differently throughout history. At times it has

been the static and silent religion of the ruling classes.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 259 while at different junctures it has served as the seditious and combative religion of the dispossessed. Searching the root causes of this political vulnerability, Shariati concluded that Islam needed to be reformed both theoretically and organizationally. Theoretically, it had to undergo a transformation process from a culture into an ideology, from a collection of assorted learning into an organized body of social thought. He maintained that Islam was neither a scientific specialization nor a culture but instead an idea, a belief system, and a feeling about how human societies must be governed. According to him, it was only the latter conception of Islam that could lead to such social properties as awareness, commitment and responsibility. This theoretical metamorphosis, however, necessitated an organizational change in which more qualified and fitting agents of change would emerge in

vanguard positions. Shariati advocated that the torch of leadership be transferred from the clerical establishment to

the religious intellectuals. The latter group, he argued,

had the advantage of looking from a more removed standpoint at such critical issues as reinterpreting texts, demythicizing the past, incorporating the new, and abandoning the erroneous. Shariati charged that Islam as a mere culture had only

produced mujtahids and 'aiem (scholars) while as an ideology

it can provide mujahids (those who fight a holy war) and

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 260 intellectuals. The former speaks of "how it is" while the latter propagates "what ought to be."“ Identifying the latter group as the one most needed in the Third World, Shariati maintained that the prime responsibility facing these intellectuals was to find the real root cause of their societies' stagnation and underdevelopment, and to awaken in their compatriots an urgent sense of activism." He wrote: Intellectuals like prophets are neither scientists nor are they members of the dissolute and oblivious popular masses. Instead they are committed and self-conscious individuals whose greatest duty and goal is to transmit that great trust of God, self-consciousness, to the masses." Shariati insisted, however, that Third World intellectuals had to distinguish themselves from their European counterparts, who could generally be recognized by their belief in the following set of ideas: irreligiosity, nationalism, scientism, materialism, cosmopolitanism, anti aristocracy, anti-archaism, and anti-traditionalism. He

charged that those Islamic intellectuals who have advocated imitating Western models of development have failed to realize that "civilization and culture are not like radio, television, and refrigerators that could be imported.

"Ali Shariati, Roushanfekr va Masouliat-e ou dar Jam'eh [The Intellectual and His Responsibilities in Society] (Europe: Muslim Students Associations in the United States and Europe, n.d.), 65. "ibid., 66-67.

"Ibid., 64.

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powered, and allowed to operate.Incriminating them as alienated, assimile, as well as uprooted individuals who have forfeited their characters and identity, Shariati contended that internationalism, humanism, and the ideal of "universal man" are great lies promoted by the West that aspire to negate the cultural character of Oriental societies. In other words, the assimile intellectuals of the Third World contribute to cultural imperialism and their own "ethnocide" at the hands of their Western adversaries. To offset this intellectual-cultural trend, Shariati promoted a discourse of "return to one's roots." This was a

replica of Fanon's discourse of "return of the oppressed," but with a peculiarly Iranian twist. While Fanon's discourse was non-religious in spirit and placed the emphasis on the racial, historical, and the linguistic features of Third World struggles, Shariati's discourse was

religious in tone and placed its emphasis on the cultural.

Addressing the Iranian secularist advocates of "return," he wrote: When we say 'return to one's roots', we are really saying return to one's cultural roots... Some of you may conclude that we Iranians must return to our racial (Aryan) roots. I categorically reject this conclusion. I oppose racism, fascism, and reactionary returns. What is more, Islamic civilization has acted like scissors and has cut us off completely from our pre-Islamic past... Consequently, for us to return to our roots means not a rediscovery of pre-Islamic Iran but a return

2 7 Ibid., 40.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 262 to our Islamic roots.“ Shariati's discourse of return embodies yet another example of the elusive quest for authenticity undertaken by contemporary Iranian intellectuals. His crusade was launched with the aim of posing a challenge to several

contending forces. Firstly, Shariati wished to juxtapose Iran's Islamic heritage to the secular nationalists' glorification of pre-Islamic Iran. Secondly, he wanted to disarm his Marxist rivals with the reasoning that Islam was the commanding spirit of Iranian culture, and that Marxism was an ideology repellent to the masses. Thirdly, Shariati

hoped to establish that it was the ignorance, superficiality, and hypocrisy of the conservative clerics which was precipitating the flight of young Iranians from Islam and toward Western ideologies and culture. Shariati's discourse of "return" is both deceptive and intellectually flawed. The first problem concerns his predilection to use "return" as a transportational metaphor

for communication. Return to what and communication with whom? A general common view assumes that by these Shariati meant return to the mythic past of early Islam, and communicating with the disenfranchised masses whose cause he

championed so fervently. Shariati's "return," however, must be understood more synchronically than diachronically. He

^Quoted in Ervand Abrahamian, Radical Islam: The Iranian Moiahedin; 116.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 263 was more a man of the present than a partisan of the past. The following characteristics attest to the contemporary nature of Shariati's thought: (1) his recourse to phenomenological epistemology; (2) preference for sociology

and other social science disciplines; (3) appealing to the authority of contemporary thinkers; (4) his targeting of the young, urban, Iranians; (5) his relentless opposition to the Shah's regime and his unconditional support for such anti colonialist struggles as the Algerian revolution; and (6)

his challenge to such secularist projects as Marxism and

liberalism.” Furthermore, Shariati's instrumentalist view of the

role of religion in politics, his increasing abandonment of metaphysical notions, his emphasis on practical reason instead of revelation, and finally the belief that traditional Islam was passe and had to be replaced by an

ideological Islam, all helped to bridge the gap between the secularists and the young militants who professed adherence

to his ideas. Shariati's conscientious attempt for a reconstructed

^Perceiving Marxism as a potential ideological contender, Shariati set himself the task of criticizing it as well as presenting an alternative to it. He drew upon classical Islamic doctrines as well as Sartre's critique of Marxism's one-dimensionality to discredit Marxism's philosophical postulates. Shariati's lecture series on "Islamology" constituted his mature attempt at presenting a philosophical and social rebuttal to Marxism. For young Shariati's reflections on the same subject, which tend to be pedestrian, see his Marxism and Other Western Fallacies, trans. R. Campbell (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1980).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 264 and radicalized Islam which was symbolized in the doctrine of "return to one's self" was less concerned with the past than with the future. After all, he argued, the future was still to be lived. Similarly, Shariati's lectures were not directed at the downtrodden but at the urban, middle-class

Iranian youth who became his most enthusiastic follow ers.^

Realizing these important factors, Shariati sought to inject aspects of modernity into the traditional socio-religious relations and value systems of Iranian society. Shariati was speaking of "return" not as an Oriental, but instead as a Third World intellectual. His disdain of the West was not that of an Islamic mystic unaware of the

West but that of a disillusioned Western-educated intellectual. The following quotation captures Shariati's

mood: Come, friends, let us abandon Europe, let us cease this nauseating, apish imitation of Europe. Let us leave behind this Europe that always speaks of humanity, but destroys human beings wherever it finds them.31

Despite this and other similar rhetorical proclamations about Western wrought calamities, Shariati's

3°The power of Shariati as a spellbinding orator first became evident at Hosseynieh Ershad, a splendid religious- lecture hall in northern Tehran. This lecture hall, which had began operation in 1967, was closed in 1973 after the regime realized that thousands of Iranian youth used to regularly congregate there in order to hear Shariati's lectures. 3*Ali Shariati, On the Sociology of Islam (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1979): 23.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 265 thought was permeated by the prevailing presence of the West. Like the secular intellectuals before him, his epistemology, language, rivals, as well as reference points were all Western inspired. Shariati's quest for restoring the "authentic humanity" of Muslim natives and updating

Shi'i concepts and values was rooted in Western concepts and frames of reference.^ He went as far as proclaiming the historical era in which Iran was living at the time to be one between the end of Middle Ages and the beginning of the

Renaissance.33 Hence, he judged it appropriate to advocate

the need for types like Luther and Calvin to spearhead Islamic Protestantism in the latter part of the twentieth-

century . Jacque Ellul, a prominent French thinker, wrote: "The West is a past, a difference, a shared history, and a shared human project, and it is our very life. "3^ Shariati had to

grapple with such a reality. His naivete, however, was in viewing the Western model of development as one that could

easily be reproduced in Iran. Shariati was not willing to acknowledge that in an age of modernity and universal

3^Mangol Bayat-Philipp, "Shi'ism in Contemporary Iranian Politics: The Case of Ali Shari'ati," in Towards a Modern Iran; Studies in Thought. Politics and Society, eds. Eli Kedourie and Sylvia G. Haim (London: Frank Cass, 1980): 165- 167.

33a Ü Shariati, Roushanfekr va Masouliat-e ou dar Jam'eh: 69. ^Jacques Ellul, The Betraval of the West, trans. Matthew J. O'Connell (New York: Seabury Press, 1979): ix.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 266 secularization, Iclrmic Protestantism was neither a progressive platform nor a movement capable of duplicating the revolutionary consequences of Luther's revolt. Finally, Shariati's campaign of anti-clericalism was too fragile to

undermine the clerical establishment.^"

S.H. Nasr: The Philosopher of Traditionalism The most articulate exponent of traditionalism among contemporary Iranian religious intellectuals is Seyyed Hossein Nasr.* A prolific writer and an active member of the Iranian philosophical and religious community for the last four decades, S.H. Nasr has left an indelible mark upon

*Shariati came under severe criticism from among the ranks of the conservative Shi'i clerics (e.g. Ayatollah Milani and Ayatollah Muttahari) and their lay supporters who viewed his thoughts as blasphemous and branded him as an infidel, a materialist, a Sunni, as well as a Marxist. For one example of the conservatives' critique, see; Mohammad- Ali Ansari, Defa' az Islam va Rouhanevat: Pasokh be Doctor Ali Shariati [In Defense of Islam and the Clergy: A Response to Dr. Ali Shariati] (Qom: n.p., 1972).

*S.H. Nasr was born in 1933 into a family of religious scholars and physicians in Tehran. He received his early education in religion and Persian literature in Iran and then came to the United States, where he earned a B.S. in physics from M.I.T. in 1954, an M.A. and a Ph.D. in the history of science and philosophy from Harvard University, respectively in 1956 and 1958. After returning to Iran Nasr occupied such positions as professor of the history of science and philosophy. Dean of Faculty of Letters, Vice- Chancellor of the University of Tehran, Chancellor of Aryamehr University, as well as President of the Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy (1974-1978). In addition to occupying these prestigious positions, Nasr also maintained a close association with the Pahlavi royal court, serving mainly as a cultural advisor. He is presently University Professor of Islamic Studies at George Washington University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 267 philosophical deliberations in contemporary Iran. His intellectual life has been devoted to reclaiming Islam from the dominance of Western schools of thought through a preservation of Islamic values. Nasr's intellectual sojourn took him both to the Western and Eastern lands of philosophy. In the West, he studies with such renowned figures as G. Di Santillana, Hamilton Gibb, Etienne Gilson, George Sarton, Harry Wolfson, and was further influenced by the writings of Titos Burckhardt, Henry Corbin, Rene Guenon, Anada Kentish Coomaraswamy, and Frithjof Schuon. Turning to the East, Nasr studied Hindu metaphysical thought through the writings

of Sri Aurobindo and A. K. Coomaraswamy, and learned about Buddhism through Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki, and Sh. Hisamutsu. After this exercise in comparative religion, Nasr was led to Islamic Sufism and the sagacious theosophy of such Islamic philosophers as Avicenna, Suhrawadi, and Mulla Sadra through

the teachings of Allameh Tabataba'i, Seyyed Mohammad-Kazem Assar, and Sayyed Abolhasan Rafi'i-Qazvini.^’ it was to the

pursuit of this last philosophical tradition that he devoted the rest of his life. Nasr and Shariati not only were born in the same year,

but also belonged to the same intellectual class. Both men were highly articulate representatives of a generation of

3’Seyyed Hossein Nasr, "In Quest of the Eternal Sophia," (n.p., n.d.): 113-121.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 268 ambitious religious intellectuals who wanted to revive Islam and challenge Western thought. Each has studied with some of the looming intellectual figures of the West during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. In their capacities as university professors as well as esteemed guest lecturers, both men promoted Islamic teachings passionately.* The two, nonetheless, differed in important ways. While Nasr had undergone the tutorage of the traditional masters of Islamic

thought, Shariati had no such formal education in traditional Islamic sciences. While Shariati spoke the language of a sociologist of religion, Nasr conversed in the language of philosophy. Shariati could not equal Nasr's

solid grounding in comparative religion, while the latter proved incapable of matching Shariati's familiarity with

such social science disciplines as economics and sociology. Furthermore, Nasr was interested in bridging the gap between the religious intellectuals and the clergy, a project substantively different from that undertaken by Shariati. Finally, Nasr's status as a cultural apparatchik of the

Pahlavi regime was in total opposition to Shariati's anti statist views, leading to the exchange of such mutual accusations as a "reactionary arm-chair intellectual" and a "subversive Islamic-Marxist attempting to infiltrate the

*Shariati and Nasr, along with Ayatollah Muttahari, were the three leading lecturers at Hosseiniyeh Ershad. The latter two, however, resigned from the lecture hall in 1970 in protest over Shariati's blatant anti-regime and anti clerical discourse.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 269 ranks of religious forces." The greatest disparity between these two thinkers,

however, must be seen in the different ways in which they encountered the West. While Shariati drew inspiration from certain developments within the West (e.g. Luther's revolt, advancement of social sciences) and viewed Western society as a mixed bag from which one could pick and choose, Nasr believed in repudiating not the effects but the very foundations of Western civilization.” He describes the process and outcome of his intellectual quest in the

following manner; [My aim has been] to reach the heart of Western civilization instead of just bypassing it; not to be gratified by the demeanor of this civilization but to study and research its various intellectual, philosophical and scientific schools of thought; and finally [I have] become quite contemptuous of the consequences reached by Western civilization [leading me] to a sort of rebellion against it."*® Nasr's strategy to combat an enticing yet intimidating West consisted of the following elements:

1. Reviving the authentic intellectual traditions of Persia by resuscitating Islamic philosophy and mysticism.

2. Admonishing Iranians about the nature of Western sciences, philosophy, and technology and the risks that their acquisition will pose to Iranian culture, enabling Iranians to view the West from the vantage point of a critical outlook rather than an inferiority complex.

”The reminiscences of S. H. Nasr, 1982-83, 9, in the Oral History of Iran Collection of the Foundation for Iranian Studies. "“Ibid., 8.

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3. Informing Iranians about cultures and civilizations of Asia as a possible counter-balancing force to Western influence. 4. Attempting to delineate a way through which it would be possible to maintain Iranian cultural authenticity in the face of Western culture, technology and sciences/" Nasr pursued the first leg of the above strategy through a relentless effort to demonstrate the affinity of

Persians and Muslims for philosophy and metaphysical thought. In his academic capacity as a professor of philosophy he helped train many outstanding graduate students some of whom have become major exponents of Islamic

philosophy both in Iran (i.e. Gholamali Hadad-Adel and Nasrollah Pour-Javadi) as well as in the West (i.e. William Chittick and James Morris). As a dean, Vice-Chancellor, and Chancellor of two of Iran's leading universities (Tehran and Aryamehr) he facilitated the entrance of a number of learned clergymen to the academic environment. His numerous

publications on the lives and thoughts of such long- forgotten philosophers as Suhrawardi and other original Muslim thinkers constituted yet another contribution. Nasr's most systematic attempt in rekindling an interest in Islamic philosophy was launched in 1974 with the

founding of the Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy. As founder and first president, he defined the goals of the

academy in the pages of its first journal in the following

“"ibid., 47-48.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 271 way: The goals of the Academy are the revival of the traditional intellectual life of Islamic Persia; the publication of texts and studies pertaining to both Islamic and pre-Islamic Persia; making the intellectual treasures of Persia in the fields of philosophy, mysticism and the like known to the outside world; making possible extensive research in comparative philosophy; making Persians aware of the intellectual traditions of other civilizations in both East and West; encouraging intellectual confrontations with the modern world; and finally, discussing from the point of view of tradition various problems facing modern man/" Hoping to turn the Academy into a first-rate intellectual center, the Board of Trustees helped to bring together a noteworthy corps of scholars from both the East and the West/" In addition to the regular publication of its journal, Javidan Kherad (Sophia Perennis), during its four years of operation the Academy published numerous books on Islamic mysticism and philosophy." Its cooperation with

two independent institutes which maintained a publication

series on Islamic philosophy, the French Institut Franco-

Iranian, which was directed by the French orientalist and philosopher, Henry Corbin, and the Tehran Branch of the

"seyyed Hossein Nasr, "Preface," Sophia Perennis l, (Spring 1975): 7. "The following were some of the more active scholars affiliated with the Academy: Sayyid Jalal al-din Ashtiyani, William Chittick, Henry Corbin, Mohammad-Taqi Danechpazhuh, Reza Davari, Mehdi Ha'iri-Yazdi, Toshihiko Izutsu, Javad Muslih, S.H. Nasr, Nasrollah Pour-Javadi, Seyyed Jafar Sajjadi and Mahmoud Shihabi.

"Personal Correspondence with Dr. Hadi Sharifi (deputy- director of the Academy before the revolution), May 17, 1990.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 272 McGill Institute of Islamic Studies, co-directed by the Japanese philosopher Toshihiko Izutsu and the Iranian professor Mehdi Mohaghegh, led to the profusion of scholastically sophisticated Islamic texts in the mid

1970s." Nasr was further influential because of his pivotal role in organizing regularly-held private discussions and study groups. One of the most long-lasting and important of such gathering was a series of private discussions between Henry Corbin and Allameh Tabataba'i which lasted for close to twenty years. In the discussions, which were held in the presence of a small distinguished audience," many issues pertaining to Islamic philosophy, the encounter of East and West, the relation of science to religion, Hindu and Islamic mythology, and comparative mysticism were discussed." These gatherings, which were held independently from both the state and the havzahs helped to bridge the gap between

the more intellectually-minded members of the clerical class

"S.H. Nasr, "Islamic Philosophy in Contemporary Persia; A Survey of Activity During the Past Two Decades": 8-10.

"Some of the regular participants of these discussions were; Dr. Sayyid Jalal al-Din Ashtiani, Prof. Badi al-Zaman Furuzanfar, Ayatollah Mohammad-Javad Hojjati-Kermani, Ayatollah Seyyed Hadi Khosrowshahi, Dr. Javad Muslih, Ayatollah Muttahari, Dr. S.H. Nasr, Dr. Daryush Shayegan, Dr. Isa Sepahbodi, and Prof. Mahmoud Shihabi. "For a sample of these discussions see: Musahabah-e Allamah Tabataba'i Ba Ustad Corbin [Interviews of Allameh Tabataba'i With Professor Corbin] (Tehran: Maktab-e Tashayyu, 1960).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 273 and a particular group of university professors and religious intellectuals." Unlike Shariati, Nasr's critique of the West did not revolve around its imperialistic or colonialist ambitions and misdeeds. Instead Nasr found the West guilty of having committed a much more serious sin, that of "modernity;"" Modern civilization as it has developed in the West since the Renaissance is an experiment that has failed— failed in such an abysmal fashion as to cast doubt upon the very possibility of any future for man to seek other ways. It would be most unscientific today to consider this civilization, with all the presumptions about the nature of man and the Universe which lie at its basis, as anything other than a failed experiment.*® Nasr believed that in lieu of the clergy's largely

ignorant attitude toward the West and the deceitful criticisms put forward by modernized Muslims who have found fault only with certain Western individuals and/or characteristics, a much more significant criticism must be levied against the West. According to him, anything short of an absolutely comprehensive critique of the modernity and

"Seyyed Hossein Nasr, interview by author, February 9, 1990, Washington, D.C., tape recording, George Washington University, interviewee's office. "Nasr elaborates on this theme in his following four books; Man and Nature; The Spiritual Crisis of Modern Man (London: Unwin, 1976); Western Science and Asian Culture (New Delhi: Indian Council for Cultural Relations, 1976); Traditional Islam in the Modern World (London: Kegan Paul Inc., 1987); and Islam and the Plight of Modern Man (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Foundation for Traditional Studies, 1987.)

*®Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Islam and the Plight of Modern Man: 12.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 274 secularism which threaten the citadel of Islam in every aspect was a misdirected strategy. Nasr was formatively influenced by the writings of the French metaphysician Rene Guenon, who introduced him to Hindu and other schools of Oriental metaphysics. Guenon's ideas on "crisis of

modernity," "fatalism of progress," and "tyranny of events" left their earmark upon Nasr's system of thought.*% Like most other critics of modernity Nasr assumed that an initial, positively valued state of affairs characterized by man's harmony with God and nature, was somehow eradicated by the onslaught of modernity. He alleged that this "new age," which is marked with "man's revolt against the Heaven,"

"divorce of reason from the guiding light of intellect," and "shortage of virtue," has led to a morass of confusion, decadence, and unrighteousness. Nasr further maintained that by turning away from the authentic and the divine, mankind has brought its present state of crisis upon itself.

His "theology of crisis" was most critical of the secularism

which precipitated the anthropomorphism of God and led to the disappearance of "religious ties, attitudes to

transcendence, expectations of an afterlife, and ritual

**For Guenon's explication of these ideas see: The Crisis of the Modern World, trans. M. Pallis and R. Nicholson (London: Luzac & Company, 1962). In 1970, Nasr wrote an introduction to the Persian translation of this book which had first appeared in French edition in 1927.

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performances. "*% Nasr's critique of modernity tended, however, to be quite subjective and ahistorical. He criticized such central Enlightenment concepts as progress, reason, science,

technology, and freedom of the individual from the vantage point of a revered past. Nasr remained unenlightened by Habermas' perceptive pronouncement that "modernity can and will no longer borrow the criteria by which it takes its orientation from the models supplied by another epoch; it has to create its normativity out of itself His elitist

reading of philosophers and philosophy hampered Nasr's attempt to analyze causes leading to the rise of modernity. Furthermore, his glorification of the antiquated religious cultures both in the East and the West precluded his deliberating on the reality of the state of intolerance,

decadence, misery, repression, and ignorance that became the

hallmark of those eras. Nasr failed to recognize that modernity is not a "failed" but rather an "unfinished"

project, and that the task confronting mankind is not to abandon the premises and accomplishments of the Enlightenment but to further radicalize them.

^Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Aae. trans. Robert M. Wallace (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1985), 6, 3. *3jiirgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity. trans. Frederick Lawrence (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), 7.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 276 Moiahedin: The Militant Religious Intellectuals

The liberal outlooks of Bazargan and the modernist views of Shariati found their radical incarnation in the shape of The Sazemsm-e Mojahedin-e Khalq-e Iran (Organization of Iranian People's Mojahedin.) Founded in 1965, it became "the first Iranian organization to develop systematically a modern revolutionary interpretation of Islam."* The Mojahedin were able to transform the solitary utterances of discontented Iranian religious intellectuals into a collective voice. In the intellectual and political vacuum created by the departure of the Tudeh Party and the National Front from active political struggle, such newly formed organizations as the Fedayeen and the Mojahedin were able to move into the forefront of Iranian political life. As representatives of the militant left and the religious intellectuals, the two organizations developed an unsurpassed grip over their respective constituencies.

Unlike their Marxist counterpart who came mainly from

the ranks of the new technocratic middle class, the Mojahedin were predominantly recruited from the traditional and bazaari classes. Many were graduates of the Alavi

schools, the provincial theology seminaries, high school Islamic councils, or the Hosseiniyeh Ershad lecture series.

They had been involved in the activities of the National

*Ervand Abrahamian, Radical Islam; The Iranian Moiahedin: 1.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 277 Front and/or the Freedom Movement. However, like the Fedayeen, Mojahedin's main source of constituency and recruitment was concentrated in the universities. This must be understood against the background of a change in the composition of the overall Iranian student body. As the modern upper and middle classes were becoming more prosperous, they developed a strong tendency to send their children abroad for higher education. Consequently, the class origin of the student body underwent a transformation as more high school graduates from the lower and traditional classes gained entrance into Iranian universities. These individuals were more inclined toward careers in engineering

and other hard sciences which would expedite their social mobility. Furthermore, the secularization of the educational system made it possible to interpret Islam in a new manner. As a result of these class, cultural, academic, and professional developments, many of Iran's rising

intelligentsia were attracted toward an egalitarian,

progressive, and scientific interpretation of Islam such as the one promoted by the Mojahedin.** Theirs was an Islam interpreted not by the distant ulama, with their cryptic

**Abrahamian' s occupational break-down of the 83 martyrs that the Mojahedin suffered between 1972 and 1979, reveals the following known statistics: 44 college students (with 34 of them majoring in the hard sciences); 14 engineers; 5 teachers; 3 accountants; 2 shopkeepers; 1 doctor; 1 army officer; 1 theology student; 1 factory worker; and 1 housewife. Ervand Abrahamian, Radical Islam: The Iranian Moiahedin: 167-168.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 278 language and outmoded ideas, but by the students' and young professionals' own highly educated and militant cohorts and colleagues.

Mojahedin's Ideology As an active urban guerilla organization, the

ideological world-view of Mojahedin rested upon two of the main characteristics of Iranian social thought at the time: nationalism and populism.* They perceived themselves as inheritors of the radical legacies left by the Constitutionalist revolutionaries of the early 1900s, the

radical Jangali movement of the late 1910s, and the oil

nationalization movement of the early 1950s. Internationally, they were inspired by the anti-colonialist and anti-imperialist struggles in Algeria, Vietnam, Cuba, and Palestine. In the face of these revolutionary and nationalistic developments, Mojahedin came to designate

American imperialism as their principal enemy.

Unlike their secular counterparts, however, they

claimed Islam to be the only ideology capable of mobilizing the masses for such a colossal struggle. In a Weberian manner, they regarded Islam as a "this worldly" political ideology capable of fighting oppression and delivering freedom and democracy. Like the advocates of "liberation

*Manochehr Dorraj, From Zarathustra to Khomeini; Populism and Dissent in Iran (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1990): 152, 175.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 279 theology" in Latin and Central America, the Mojahedin began to circulate a populistic interpretation of their religion. Such themes as resistance, martyrdom, revolution, and establishment of a nezam-e tawhidx (classless society) dominated Mojahedin's discourse in the 1960s and the 1970s.

These themes, however, demonstrate not only the "this worldly" but also the "third-worldly" nature of Mojahedin's program. Similar to the claims put forward by other lay intellectuals, their allegiance to Shi'ism must be examined in light cf the ideas, events, and individuals impacted modern life and philosophy. Perhaps the best example of Mojahedin's ideological contemporaneity can be found in the pages of Tabven-e Jahan. the organization's foremost work on ideology.” Organized as a set of pedagogical lectures, the book was intended to present Mojahedin's beliefs on the nature of "existence," "humans," "history," and "epistemology."* The greater bulk

of this three volume book, however, is devoted to the latter

”This book consists of a long series of lectures delivered in 1979 by Masoud Rajavi. The son of a government employee, Rajavi was born in Tabas in 1947 and attended primary and secondary schools in Mashhad, along with such future Fedayeen leaders as Masoud Ahmadzadeh and Amir-Parviz Pouyan. He later attended the University of Tehran, where he majored in political science. Rajavi joined the Mojahedin in 1967, became a member of its central committee in 1970, and was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment in 1971. He was, however, released shortly before the triumph of the 1979 Revolution and has emerged as the organization's preeminent leader ever since.

*Masoud Rajavi, Tabven-e Jahan [Explaining the World], vol. 1 (Tehran: Mojahedin's Press, 1979), 11.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 280 question as the author attempts to criticize August Comte's, Max Planck's, and Kant's positivism; William James' pragmatism; Freudian psychoanalysis; Darwinian evolutionism; along with a host of other Western "isms" such as scholasticism, scientism, empiricism, and rationalism.” Nonetheless, Rajavi saves his most extensive critical commentary for Marxist materialistic epistemology. The

book's chief target is the Russian biochemist Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin, whose materialistic theory on origin of life transformed this problem from the domain of religious faith to one of natural science. According to Oparin's thesis, which was first formulated in 1922, the origin of

life is an event regulated by natural laws and is an

undeniable and indispensable part of the evolutionary process of the universe.“ By subjecting the materialistic doctrines of Oparin and a host of other orthodox Marxist

”Some of the books consulted by Rajavi on these subjects include: Darwin's Origin of the Species; Albert Einstein's Essavs in Science; Erich Fromm's Psvchoana1vsis and Religion: George Gurvitch's Dialectigue et Sociologie; Max Planck's The Universe in the Light of Modern Phvsics. and Where is Science Going?: Bertrand Russell's The Scientific Outlook, and Historv of Western Philosophy; and George Barton's The Historv of Science. Moreover, Rajavi relied heavily on the most popular university textbook on sociology in Iran at the time, entitled Zaminave Jama-e Shenasi [Foundations of Sociology] which was written by Dr. Amir-Hossein Aryanpour in 1965, based on William F. Ogburn and Meyer F. Nimkoff's Sociology (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1958) . *®See Aleksandr I. Oparin, Life, its Nature. Origin and Development. trans. Ann Synge (New York: Academic Press, 1961).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 281 thinkers to a religious critique, Mojahedin hoped to challenge the more vigorous presence of Marxism within Iranian intellectual circles." The necessity for a philosophical critique of Marxism became even more pressing after 1975, when a sizeable number of Mojahedin's cadres converted to Marxism, thereby causing a split within the

organization. In their quest for a critical analysis of historical and dialectical materialism, Mojahedin drew upon works by both Iranian as well as Western critics of Marxism. Their discourse was mainly anchored along the theoretical line pioneered by Bazargan, Taleqani, Shariati, and the Algerian revolutionary thinker Omar Ouzegan.® Mojahedin's predicament was two fold. Firstly, they did not wish to harbor in the sea of non-scientific and conservative

"According to Mojahedins' own testimony, the organization's ideological reading list included the following materialistically-inspired books: Georges Politzer's Basic Principles of Philosophy; Aleksandr Oparin's Life, its Nature. Origin and Development: Stalin's Dialectical Materialism; John Somerville's Philosophy of Marxism: An exposition. See Organization of Iranian People's Mojahedin, Tahlil-e Amuzeshi-ve Bavanieh-e oportunistha-ve Chaonama [Teaching Analysis on the Manifesto of the Pseudo-Leftist Opportunists] (Tehran: Mojahedin Press, 1979), 150, 160. "Rajavi acknowledges the impact on his own work of the first two thinkers by stating that in his youth he was particularly attracted to Bazargan's scientific defense, and Ayatollah Taleqani's progressive and egalitarian interpretations of Islam. See Masoud Rajavi, in an interview recorded by Zia Sedqhi, May 29, 1984, Paris, France, tape no. 2, Iranian Oral History Collection, Harvard University.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 282 objections to Marxism raised by the ulama; and secondly, the Mojahedin did not want to incur so much intellectual debt to their epistemological contender that they could no longer establish their own distinctive identity. Hence, they opted for a policy of selective acquisition, borrowing mainly from

Marxism's principles of political economy. They concurred with such Marxist-Leninist principles as class struggle, the exploitative nature of capitalism, the need for socialization of the means of production, the necessity of fighting imperialism, and the appropriateness of a dialectical method of inquiry. However, the Mojahedin remained skeptical of Marxism's philosophical postulates, and rejected the letter's cardinal doctrine of historical materialism. They held firm to their beliefs on the existence of God, revelation, after-life, spirit, expectation, salvation, destiny, and of mankind's commitment to these intangible principles.

All in all, Shariati, the Mojahedin, and other like-

minded religious intellectuals succeeded in their task of formulating a revolutionary interpretation of Islam. They

might not have been on par with the ulama as accomplished Quranic scholars, but they were skillful men of ideology. Their ideology was not too philosophically consistent, yet it was capable of exhorting a great many Iranian youth to

rediscover Shi'ism, and return to the Muslim fold which they were deserting in large numbers. This constituted the lay

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 283 religious intellectuals' greatest contribution.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER VI

THE ENCOUNTER OF POST-REVOLUTIONARY THOUGHT WITH HEGEL, HEIDEGGER, AND POPPER

And what work nobler than transplanting foreign thought into the barren domestic soil; except indeed planting thought of your own, which the fewest are privileged to do? Thomas Carlyle

The Iranian Revolution of 1979 represented the first mass revolutionary movement in the modern age that has led to the establishment of a theocracy. As is customary with

every major revolution, this social upheaval fueled the development of thought in the post-revolutionary Iranian polity. The Revolution presented Iranian intellectuals with serious theoretical challenges. While its enthusiastic supporters tried to present Islam as a distinct ideology

capable of offering a viable philosophical alternative to

the modern world, its zealous opponents needed to explain

the reasons for the ascendancy of this much-ignored ideology. This latter group, which included disillusioned and astounded Iranian intellectuals both inside and outside the country, experimented with seclusion, political

marginality, exile, and expatriate life as short and long

term remedies for the anguish that beset them.

While much has been said and written about the plight

284

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 285 of this second group, issues relevant to the first group have gone largely unnoticed. The unfortunate course of events occurring in Iran in the preceding decade (the hostage crisis, Iran-Iraq war, execution of opponents) have rendered abortive any serious attempt to deconstruct post

revolutionary intellectual thought. The intellectual deconstruction of a revolution in the makings requires much more time and serious critical inquiry into Iranian history, culture, politics, and religion than those which have

proliferated in the last eleven years. With such a conviction, this chapter endeavors to provide a glimpse of the intellectual panorama of post-revolutionary Iran through an exposition of a number of important theoretical debates taking place among its leading ideologues. My objective in this chapter is two-fold. Firstly, I would like to conclude my sojourn into contemporary Iranian intellectual thought by demonstrating the continuities and

discontinuities that it underwent after the monumental

events of February 1979. Secondly, I intend to correct a number of prevalent myths and fallacies concerning contemporary Iranian political culture by contending that: (1) despite the many obstacles and restrictions put forward by the present regime in Tehran, the 1980s indeed witnessed the prospering of political philosophy and theology in Iran;

(2) intellectuals do play an important role in shaping the world-view of the Islamic Republic; and (3) far from

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 286 engaging in esoteric and trivial polemics, the discussions now taking place in Iran are indeed philosophically sophisticated, intellectually sound, socially relevant, and

politically modern.

A "Cultural Reawakening?" The 1979 Revolution brought along something more

consequential than the fall of the old regime. By politicizing the polity, it forever changed the intellectual congruity of Iranian society. The theoretical ferment caused by the revolution and the outlandish events that ensued inspired many critical Iranians to contemplate their

past and present. In order to quench their intellectual thirst, they experimented with innovative ideas as well as new means, arenas, and mechanisms of communication. The intelligentsia increasingly abandoned oral discourse as their primary means and mode of communication in favor of the printed word. In literature, novels replaced poetry as

the chief form of artistic expression. In less than a decade, more than 152 novels were written by Iranian writers.' These novels, which focused predominantly on

social and political themes, attracted a large constituency (notably women), leading to the break of all previous sale

'Sima Ali-Nejad, "Fehrest-e Romanha-ye Pas az Engelab," [Index of Post-Revolutionary Novels] Advneh. 43-44 (March 1990): 89.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 287 records.2 It seemed as though, in the post-revolutionary milieu, novels provided a more germane arena for social, political, and philosophic critique than the concise, abstract, and aesthetically-oriented world of poetry previously so central to Iranians' consciousness. These and other intellectual productions were mainly disseminated through publishing houses, whose numbers surged from 283 in 1976 to 1403 in 1985.3 Furthermore, the number of cultural, scientific, and research oriented journals published in post-revolutionary Iran have reached an all-time high. I have so far compiled a list of over 110 such journals.'* These journals cover a

wide variety of subjects, ranging from those targeting distinctive groups such as Zoroastrians, tribes, university students, clergy, teenagers, and children, to those addressing such specialized topics as photography,

transportation, cinema, linguistics, geography.

2por example, as the lengthiest novel in modern Iranian history. Mahmoud Dowlatabadi's ten volume novel Kalidar. which deals with the plight and heroism of a peasant rebellion, set a record tor such books by exceeding a circulation of 30,000. ^Mehri Pariroukh, Rahnam-ve Nasheran-e Iran [A Guide to Iran's Publishers] (Tehran: Center for Iran's Scientific Documents, 1989). Cited in F.A. Faryar, "Sumar-e Nasheran-e Ma," [The Number of Our Publishers] Nashr-e Danesh 9, 3 (March/April 1989): 54.

'‘This figure is based on my reading over a four year period of announcements and reviews published in the following prominent newspapers and journals: Kavhan Havaie. Kavhan Farhanai. Nashr-e Danesh. and Advneh.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 288 translations, and the fine arts. The startling volume of intellectual production can also be seen among the exiled Iranian communities. According to one report compiled by the Center for Iranian Documentation and Research in Paris, more than 130 journals are presently published by Iranians living in diaspora.^ The more than 8,000 articles which have appeared in these journals are concerned predominantly with such topics as the Iranian revolution, democracy, the communist movement, women and intellectuals.* This "cultural reawakening", however, is more than quantitative. Qualitatively, the Iranian educated community is developing a more comprehensive acquaintance with Western philosophy, sociology, political theory and literature. A look at a selective list of authors whose works have been translated into Persian in the last decade alone may serve as an indicator. Among philosophers, one finds works by

*See Liste Des Périodiques Iraniennes Publiées En Dehors D'Iran. 1978-1989 (Paris: Centre Iranien de Documentation et de Recherche, 1989). *The increasing political and social repression in post-revolutionary Iran contributed to a severe case of brain drain as many prominent intellectuals and scholars left voluntarily or were compelled to seek exile overseas. In addition, the setbacks suffered by all political groups ideologically disinclined to the ruling regime in Iran has led to a gradual fading of ideological orthodoxies and banalities formerly prevalent among their supporters abroad. Finally, the coming of age of a young and theoretically- minded generation of Iranian scholars living in Europe and the United States, who do not shy away from tackling formerly inviolable issues, has raised the hope for an end to the standards of mediocrity so characteristic of previous Iranian generations.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 289 Aristotle, Hannah Arendt, Rudolf Carnap, Rene Descartes, Lucien Goldmann, Antonio Gramsci, G. W. Hegel, Martin Heidegger, David Hume, Karl Jaspers, Immanuel Kant, Niccolo Machiavelli, Herbert Marcuse, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Plato, Karl Popper, Bertrand Russell and Benedict Spinoza. Among sociologists the names of Emile Durkheim, Anthony Giddens, C. Wright Mills, and Max Weber figure prominently.’ Turning to historians and political scientists one comes across the names of Raymond Aron, E.H. Carr, Frederick Copleston, Robert Dahl, Will Durant, Mircea Eliade, Wilhelm Floor, H.R. Gibb, Roy Medvedev, Gaetano Mosca, Nicos Poulantzas, Arnold Toynbee, and Leon Trotsky. As for writers and literary critics the works of Gaston Bachelard, Bertolt Brecht, Albert Camus, Charles Dickens, Hermann Hesse, Henry James, James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Nikos

Kazantzakes, Milan Kundera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Andre Malraux, Arthur Miller, and Romain Rolland are prominently

displayed.* The collective vitality of these developments inevitably affected the course of intellectual deliberations

among Iranian intellectuals. The new regime, unlike its

’None of the complete works of Talcott Parsons, ViIfredo Parato, or Max Weber has been translated yet. Parts of Weber's Economv and Society only became available in 1988. *This list was also compiled from the same sources cited in footnote 4, in addition to the catalogues of various Iranian publishers.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 290 predecessor, relied heavily on its propaganda and ideological state apparatuses, and its ideology could not remain secluded from the reverberating echoes of a changing time and new ideas. Meanwhile, the formation of a modern theocracy had confronted the new ruling elites with novel

questions and challenges in terms of how to "govern," and what constitutes a "revolutionary" political culture. The essential needs of "governing" as well as remaining "revolutionary" required quick and immediate solutions to problems that did not previously exist. The revolution posed such serious questions to Islamic ideologues as: (1) Is fxqh (Islamic jurisprudence) capable of solving modern

problems as well as challenging modern sciences? (2) Are technology, nationalism and parliamentary democracy compatible with Islam?; (3) What does the Islamic Republic have to offer to the rest of the world? In addition, such previous questions as how to stop or reverse the advancing march of secularism, and how to confront the "West" and its

various philosophical schools of thought remained unresolved. In a politically repressive yet intellectually

flourishing era these questions were bound to be answered

differently. The above questions were illustrative of the kinds of continuities and discontinuities brought along by the revolution. Shortly after its triumph, the "political

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 291 culture of the revolution" showed signs of disintegration.* The Islamic regime soon began a war against intellectual dissent aimed mainly at its liberal and leftist opponents. It denounced the secular intellectuals and literati as a bunch of Westoxicated, alienated, imitating, and non committed individuals whom the revolution could do without. The anti-intellectual and populist rhetoric of the revolutionary administration also inundated such potential rivals as the Fedayeen and the Mojahedin. The new regime naturally prized devotion over dissent, and conformity over

questioning.

The Two Ideologues: Davari and Soroush The 1979 Revolution also transformed the configuration as well as the constitution of ideological alliances. The clergy formed an unofficial alliance with a group of lay

religious intellectuals in which both sides understood that the latter were to serve only as junior partners.*®

However, the untimely deaths or assassinations of such

*The "political culture of the revolution" has been defined as the "totality of values, expectations, and implicit rules that express and shape the collective intentions and actions of the people during the revolutionary process." Lynn Hunt, Politics. Culture, and Class in the French Revolution (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984): 10. *®Some of the more prominent members of this class of religious intellectuals were: Hasan Ayat, Abolhasan Bani- Sadr, Mehdi Bazargan, Mostafa Chamran, Reza Davari, Hasan Habibi, Gholam-Ali Hadad-Adel, Fakhr al-Din Hejazi, Habibollah Payman, Nasrollah Pour-Javadi, Abdol-Karim Soroush, and Ibrahim Yazdi.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 292 rising political and intellectual figures as Ayatollah Behesti (d. 1981), Ayatollah Mutahhari (d. 1979), and Ayatollah Taleqani (d. 1979) provided a major intellectual vacuum among the ranks of the clergy. This predicament provided an opportunity for two lay religious intellectuals gradually to emerge as the unofficial leading ideologues of the new regime. The two men were Reza Davari-Ardacani and Abdol-Karim Soroush. The philosopher Reza Davari-Ardacani (hereafter Davari)", and the epistemologist Abdol-Karim Soroush" have

"Born in Ardacan (near Isfahan) in 1933, Davari finished his primary and secondary education in his place of birth. After graduating from high school he was hired as a teacher by the Ministry of Education in 1951. He entered the University of Tehran's Faculty of Literature as an undergraduate in 1954 and earned his doctorate in philosophy from the same department in 1967. Since his graduation, Davari has been a professor of philosophy at his alma mater, where he mainly teaches courses on the history of modern philosophy. After the revolution, while maintaining his academic post, Davari served on such capacities as the Director of the philosophy section of the Iranian Academy of Philosophy; a member of the newly-found Farhangestan (The Iranian Academy of Literature); as well as a member of a number of scientific and academic delegations representing Iran in international conventions. Besides numerous articles, Davari has so far written the following books: Farabi: The Founder of Islamic Philosophv; The Civil Philosophv of Farabi; In Defense of Philosophv; Nationalism and Revolution: Islamic Revolution and the Present Status of the World: Poets in the Aae of Hardship; The Present Status of Thought in Iran: and The Theoretical Foundations of Western Civilization.

"Born in 1945 in Tehran, Soroush attended the University of Tehran where he majored in Pharmacy. He later went to the University of London, where he first studied Chemistry and later earned his Ph.D. in History and Philosophy of Science in 1979. Before the revolution he worked mainly in pharmaceutical jobs in Bushehr and Tehran. Since the revolution, however, he has maintained the

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 293 been at the center of some of the most heated debates in post-revolutionary Iranian intellectual circles. Representing two divergent philosophical tendencies, they have debated one another over such issues as historicism versus positivism; traditional fiqh versus dynamic fiqhj religion versus science; and rejection versus selective borrowing from the West. An inquiry into three sets of debates in which they have been involved can provide a glimpse of the divergent trends within post-revolutionary Iranian political and intellectual establishments.

First Debate; Defining the West One of the early disputes between Davari and Soroush started over such questions as (1) What is the "West?"; (2) How should we analyze and encounter it?; and (3) Do we have anything to learn from or to offer to it?

Like his colleagues Daryush Shayehan and S.H. Nasr,

following posts: university professor (teaching such subjects as Philosophy of Science and Philosophy of History); researcher at the Iranian Academy of Philosophy; member of the Iranian Academy of Literature; and member of the High Council of Cultural Revolution (responsible for revising the academic curriculums of Iran's primary, secondary, and higher institutions of learning.) In addition, Soroush serves on such academic and cultural councils as Iran's mission to UNESCO, and the Iranian University Press. A prolific writer, his work include: Preface and Critique to Dialectical Contradiction: Knowledge and Value: Satanic Ideology; The Religious Approach; Philosophv of Historv: Tafaroi-e Sonah: Essavs on Ethics. Industrv. and Human Sciences; Intellectuality and Religiosity; Masked Dogmatism; Metaphor in Mowlana's Poetry; The Restless Foundation of the Universe: and What is Science? What is Philosophy?.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 294 Davari believed that Iranian intellectuals needed to indulge in a process of critical reflection on the very essence and reality of Western history. This critique, he maintained, must undermine the totality of Western thought by aiming at humanism and modernity as its most celebrated legacies.

Influenced by the Hegelian philosophy of history which spoke of the drive, impetus, course, and design of "history," Davari opted to view the "West" as a totality. For him the "West" was not just a political entity, but rather an essence: It is a way of thinking and a historical practice which started in Europe more than 400 years ago, and has since expanded more or less universally. The West portrays the demise of the holy truth, and the rise of a humanity which views itself as the sole possessor and focus of the universe. Its accomplishment is to possess everything in the celestial cosmos. Even if it were to prove the existence of God, it will be done not with the intention of obedience and submission, but in order to prove itself." While Hegel attempted to unite the history of mankind

and the history of nature as one history (the history of the

evolution of the Geist,) Davari has come to view

individuality and humanism as the pivotal truths of modern Western history. He maintained that since its onset at the time of the Renaissance, humanism has served as the very essence of the "West." Davari thus incriminated humanism

not for being just another philosophy, but rather for

"Reza Davari, "Lavazem va Natayej-e Enkar-e Gharb" [The Necessities and Consequences of Refuting the West] Kavhan Farhanai 1, 3 (June 1984): 18.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 295 becoming the blueprint for another man; a man to whom all the philosophies, theories, logic, and new sciences must be subordinated. ** After this indictment of humanism, Davari moved on to a repudiation of modernity and all that the latter stands for. Reflecting on the imposed and imported nature of the latter in Iran and the rest of the Islamic world, he wrote: Modernity is a tree which was planted in the West and has spread everywhere. For many years we have been living under one of the dying and faded branches of this tree, and its dried shadow which is still hanging over our heads. While we have taken refuge in Islam, the shadow of this branch has still not yet totally disappeared from over our heads. In fact, neither we nor it have left each other alone. What can be done with this dried branch?"

As an anti-modernist philosopher, Davari's answer was obvious: Not only the branch but also the tree of modernity itself must be eradicated. In response to the question how may this be done, Davari replied through the formation of a

distinctive intellect, one that is distinguishable and superior to the "Western intellect." He rejected the

Western models of democracy, which are based on the separation of politics and religion, as decadent. Instead of believing in humanism and rationalism, he declared that a virtuous society is one that is grounded in the axioms of

"Reza Davari, Enaelab-e Islami va Vaze Konuni Alam [Islamic Revolution and the Present Status of the World] (Tehran: Alameh Tabataba'i Cultural Center, 1982): 59.

ISIbid., 83.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 296 guardianship and prophecy." Here, Davari draws upon the Platonic idea of "philosopher kings" as it was formulated by Abu Nasr al-Farabi, the tenth-century Muslim thinker who is generally regarded as the founder of political philosophy in Islam." Al-Farabi and other Muslim political thinkers

viewed the prophets as being the true Platonic philosopher kings." The prophets' mandate, however, was not based on human intellect but instead on revelation. Furthermore, Davari reprimanded the West for its abandonment of metaphysical philosophy which deals with the ultimate and highest questions. He contended that this type of philosophy, which had originated with the ancient Greeks

and culminated in the ideas of Hegel and Nietzsche, can no longer be rejuvenated in the West. According to Davari, Cartesian philosophy in the West became subordinated to "method" and "science." Philosophy, which was once

recognized as the queen of the sciences, was now reduced to a primer for a set of natural and social sciences." Yet

"Ibid., 85. "Davari's doctoral dissertation dealt with the influence of Greek thought on the political philosophy of such early Islamic thinkers as al-Farabi.

"s.H. Nasr writes: "Al-Farabi sought to identify the figure of the prophet-king of Plato with the prophet and law-giver of the Abrahamic tradition and described the perfect state in which a single revealed law would reign supreme over the world." S.H. Nasr, Three Muslim Sages: 15. "Here Davari seemed to concur with Edmund Husserl's assertion that the Enlightenment subdued philosophy in the name of science. For more on Husserl's view see his: The

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even worse was the fact that these new sciences became overwhelmingly preoccupied with materialism and rationalism and, consequently, ignored religion.“ Finally following a Heideggerian outlook, Davari charged that science and technology in the West have not been agents of freedom but instruments of imprisonment. Far from making man into a subject, they have led to his subjugation. Based on the above set of characteristics, Davari claimed that Western civilization has now reached its termination point and is struggling against alienation, solitude, and solipsism. He cautioned Islamic intellectuals to recognize that the "West" must be viewed as a "totality," a "unified whole," and an "essence" from which the non- Western world can not pick and choose. The only solution for the West, according to Davari, is to abandon its collective and individual egoism and humanism; to repudiate

intellectualisa, and eradicate the rotten tree of modernity altogether. These tasks, however, can not be accomplished

through any process of cultural exchange. Davari maintained that in the West, where secularism and materialism run

riotously, anything short of a revolutionary detachment from

Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenoloov. trans. by David Carr (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970).

“To substantiate this contention, Davari charged that with a few exceptions (e.g. Friedrich Wilhelm Schelling, Max Scheler, and Soren Kierkegaard) the West has of late not produced any religious philosophers.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 298 humanism and submission to God was bound to fail. He concluded that non-Western societies were not facing individual Westerners but a unified "West." Davari thus suggested that Iranian intellectuals should not be concerned with the destiny of the former but with the latter.

Abdol-Karim Soroush could not have disagree more with what are for him Davari*s sweeping abstractions. He rejected all the above formulations as discreditable "historicism." Soroush maintained, since intellect is unfettered, philosophy cosmopolitan, and knowledge without boundaries, that date and place of birth can not serve as valuative criteria for measuring the accuracy and legitimacy of ideas.’* Addressing Davari, he asked: Where do you draw the boundaries of the West? Is this moral decline present wherever there is the West or wherever there is the West is there a moral decline? Should we know the "Western spirit" based on the West or should we recognize the "West" from the Western spirit?” Soroush contended that Davari's philosophical

postulate about the "West" as a unified and totalizing

entity, was a Hegelian construct that left no room for a constructive dialogue or a mutually beneficial exchange. He criticized Davari*s propositions for coercing people either to fully accept or fully reject the "West." In contrast.

’*Abdol-Karim Soroush, Tafaroi-e Sonah: [Essays on Ethics, Industry, and Human Sciences] (Tehran: Soroush Press, 1986), 236. ”lbid, 231.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 299 Soroush maintained that the "West" did not constitute a unified whole and should not be viewed as such. He rejected the usage of such grandiose concepts as "Western philosophy," "Western art," "Western culture," "essence of the West," "destiny of the West," and "spirit of the West." Soroush insisted that since the "West" does not constitute a homogenous totality with well-defined cultural and intellectual boundaries, the non-Western societies can not face the "West" but individual Westerners. Soroush proceeded to tackle another fallacy. He insisted that what comes from the West is not necessarily

contaminating; one can embrace Western thoughts, politics, as well as technology without inflicting self-harm. For Soroush, the issue was not one of submission or denunciation, but rather of analysis and nourishment. He diagnosed Davari as suffering from a type of benightedness

about the "West," and contended that the Iranian intelligentsia should not blame, mourn, or abandon the West

for the route it has taken or for what it has achieved. Instead they should turn their attention to their own domestic problems and shortcomings.

The Second Debate; Historicism Versus Positivism The translation and publication of Karl Raimund

Popper's The Open Societv and Its Enemies in 1985 triggered

another major debate in post-revolutionary Iranian

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intellectual circles.” The debate was not over Popper” (b. 1902) alone, but over epistemological principles as well as political orientations. The appearance of this book sharpened the "positivism"” versus "historicism"” debate which had already been launched with the translations into Persian of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Nietzsche's Bevond Good and Evil. Descartes' Discourse on Method, and Durkheim's Rules of Sociological Method. Davari attacked this urgency to publish Popper's book as an attempt on the part of translators and publishers to promote "Western democracy" as well as a "rationalist

”ln 1984-85 three translated versions of this book were published. The first translation by Ali-Asghar Mohajer was published in California by the Meli Publishers in 1984. The second translation by Ezzatollah Foladwand appeared in 1985 (Kharazmei Press). Finally, Mohajer's earlier translation was reprinted by Enteshar Press in Tehran in 1985. ”Popper was already known in Iran through the translation of his The Poverty of Historicism which first appeared in the Iranian markets in 1971. See Karl Popper, Faahr-e Tarikhiaari [The Poverty of Historicism], second edition, trans. by Ahmad Araam (Tehran; Kharazmei Press, 1979). “ "The characteristic theses of positivism are that science is the only valid knowledge and facts the only possible objects of knowledge; that philosophy does not possess a method different from science; and that the task of philosophy is to find the general principles common to all the sciences and to use these principles as guides to human conduct and as the basis of social organization." Encvclopedia of Philosophv. 1972, s.v. "positivism." “ "Historicism is the belief that an adequate understanding of the nature of anything and an adequate assessment of its values are to be gained by considering it in terms of the place it occupied and the role it played within a process of development." Ibid., s.v. "historicism."

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 301 movement" in philosophy. In regard to the first charge, he charged that promoting Popper's dream of an open society was in fact a clever way of opposing the revolution, since the political consequences of Popper's ideas were all too clearly in support of capitalism and Western political liberalism. Davari argued that Popper was a typical eighteenth-century intellectual for whom "freedom" is, in reality, "freedom from religion." He asked rhetorically how a man who is opposed to absolute faith, and is so clearly against religious thought, can be portrayed as a guardian of faith in a theocratic society such as Iran.” Davari then proceeded to assault Popper's positivist conception of science.” He claimed that while Popper was a

specialist in the methodology of new sciences, he did not understand the language of philosophers, and hence distorted the ideas of Plato and Aristotle as well Hegel and Marx.

Davari reminded his critics that by claiming that science

deals with what "is" while religion deals with what "ought to be," Popper indeed privileged scientific methodology

(principle of refutability) over religious intuition. Davari concluded by charging that the Iranian positivists'

”Reza Davari, "Elm va Azadi Arey, Elteqat Na," [Yes to Science and Freedom, No to Eclecticism] Kevhan Farhanai 3, 1 (March 1986); 12.

”Davari acknowledged that Theodore Adorno and other philosophers of the Frankfurt School were right in designating Popper as a positivist, since he shared the positivist aim of remaking philosophy in conformity with the logic and epistemology of modern natural sciences.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 302 attempt to reconcile Popper's ideas with Islam went against the Sheuri^ah, led to divisions within the ranks of the uimah, as well as undermined one's obedience and reverence

toward the Supreme Being.” Davari's critics retaliated by initiating a full- fledged attack on historicism. Following Popper, they came to define "historicism" primarily in a methodological sense to denote "...the view that the main task of the social scientist is to discover the laws by which whole societies develop and, on the basis of these laws of historical development, to make predictions about the future."3° They assailed the German historicist tradition of Nietzsche, Hegel, Marx, Mannheim, Heidegger and, by association, Davari as well.3* (For a taxonomy of the ideas of Davari and Soroush see table 6). Soroush and his associates articulated their rebuttals on both the epistemological and the political levels. They

first assailed the philosophical assumptions of Martin Heidegger's (1889-1976) thought, whom Davari had previously

”Reza Davari, "Mulahezati Chand Peyramoun-e Jamai-e Baz va Doshmananash," [Some Observations on The Open Societv and Its Enemies! Kevhan Farhanai 2, 10 (December 1985): 24. “Eugene F. Miller, "Positivism, Historicism, and Political Inquiry," American Political Science Review 66, 3 (September 1972): 797.

3*For one example see; Akbar Ganji; "Gharb Setizi, Dindari va..." [Anti-Westernism, Religiosity and...], Kevhan Farhanai 3, 5 (August 1986); 11-16.

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Table 6.— SYNOPTIC TAXONOMY OF THE IDEAS OF DAVARI AND SOROUSH

Davari Soroush Epistemology Historicism Positivism View of History Philosophy of Science of History History

Relation of Separation Articulation Science & Religion Mode of Attaining Religion Scientific Knowledge Method Role of Denounce Contemporize Intellectuals Intellectualism Religious Knowledge

Major Threat Eclecticism & Ignorance of To Islamic Thought Scientism Scientific Progress View of Religion & Non-Compatible Compatible Nationalism View of the West A Unified Whole A Diverse Collection

Position Toward Rejection Selective The West Borrowing

Solution For Revolution in Rediscovery of the West Thought, Theology & Submission to Pietism God

Note: This table presents my reconstruction of some of the ideas of Davari and Soroush based on their numerous works cited elsewhere in this chapter.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 304 honored as the "...great sage of our time"^’ and "...the pioneer of future philosophy."” The critics charged that Heidegger's contention that the age of metaphysics has ended, and that the age of "philosophy of Being" has begun, neither acknowledged nor denied the existence of God. Furthermore, they charged that Heidegger's philosophical postulates were too speculative, mythological, and anti- scientific.” The Iranian positivists thoroughly disapproved of Heidegger's embracing of ideal terms and

“Reza Davari, Falsafe Cheist? [What is Philosophy?] (Tehran: Iranian Academy of Philosophy, n.a.): 210.

“ibid., 224. ”lt seems that there is a certain degree of merit to the positivists' charge, since such an orientation is implied in Heidegger's Being and Time and appears even more candidly in his later writings. One scholar of Heidegger described the German philosopher's view of science in the following way: Briefly, he opposes all manifestations of the scientization of the study of man. In asking the "big" questions (beginning with the biggest of all, what does it mean to be?), he sets himself against those who in his view are unable to deal with anything important because they allow themselves to become caught up in methodology to the extent of letting the methodology itself determine the questions they ask. He sets himself against those who lack the imagination to break from the boundaries that methodology is always tending to impose upon them. He sets himself against the drive of contemporary scholarship toward ever-increasing specialization, routinization, and trivialization. Allan Megill, Prophets of Extremity: Nietzsche. Heidegger. Foucault. Derrida (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985): 107.

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mystical philosophy. To counter Heidegger's view that all science is philosophy, whether it knows and wishes it or not,” they turned toward logical positivists, whose aim was to remake philosophy in conformity with the logic and epistemology of modern natural sciences.” Like their

European counterparts, the Iranian positivists maintained that instead of following the intangible Heideggerian strategy of deconstructing science, universe, and being, the intelligentsia must follow the task of logically analyzing scientific concepts, statements and explanations. Toward that end, they began to write and translate a number of

books on the ideas of the Vienna Circle,” helping to re enact the epistemological debates of Europe during the 1920s and 1930s.3*

The critics also indicted Hegel (1770-1830) and Nietzsche (1844-1900), whom Davari had previously identified

”lbid., 132.

3*Eugene Miller, "Positivism, Historicism, and Political Inquiry," 802.

3’Fo r example see Baha al-Din Khoramsahi, Positivism-e Manteqi [Logical Positivism] (Tehran; Center for Scientific and Cultural Publications, 1983); Mir-Shamsoudin Adeeb- Soltani, Resalev-e Veyan [The Vienna Circle Thesis](Tehran: n.p.); Aron Naas, Rudolf Carnap, trans. by Manouchehr Bozorgmehr (Tehran: Kharazmi Press). “For two treatments of the original European debates see Ludwig Landgrebe, Manor Problems in Contemporary European Philosophy: From Dilthev to Heidegger, trans. Kurt F. Reinhardt (New York: Frederick Ungar, 1966) ; and Theodore Adorno, et. al. The Positivist Dispute in German Sociology, trans. Glyn Adey & David Frisby (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1976).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 306 as the two philosophers responsible for elevating Western philosophy to its pinnacle.” The former was charged for his speculative philosophy of history, with its heavy emphasis on determinism, while the latter was viewed as the exponent of nihilism and moral relativity.**® Soroush and the other critics rejected Hegel, Nietzsche, and Heidegger for the political ramifications of their ideas as well. Hegel was viewed as an exonerator of the Prussian state, Nietzsche as an enemy of liberal democracy, and Heidegger as a defender of fascism. They charged that the political viewpoints of these three

philosophers were a logical outcome of their philosophical postulates. Hegel's theory of state, Nietzsche's will to power, and Heidegger's existential phenomenology were all suspected of invoking totalitarianism. Hence, the Popper- Heidegger debate in post-revolutionary Iran transcended

epistemological boundaries and become an important and pertinent political debate.

The Third Debate; Revising the Shari^ah

The third and perhaps the most consequential debate began over the question of how to make Shari^ah congruent

”See Reza Davari, Vaz'-e Konuni-ve Tafakkor dar Iran [The Present Status of Thought in Iran] (Tehran: Soroush Press, 1984): 106-107.

“See Akbar Ganji, "Falsafey-e Tarikh-e Hegel," [Hegel's Philosophy of History], Kevhan Farhangi. 4, 2, (April 1987): 10-14.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 307 with the needs and limitations of a theocratic state in the latter half of the twentieth-century. The new revolutionary elites were faced with a wide range of social, economic, and political issues for which there were no clearly defined answers. Birth control, polygamy, universal draft,

universal education, criminal sentences for new crimes, taxes for economic development, subsidies for essential goods, mediation of contract disputes between workers and management, land reform and, finally, the design and structure of government (the Islamic Republic, vilayat-e faqih, elections) all constituted novel questions that

needed to be resolved. The ulama became partly divided over these matters.^ In one instance, a land-reform bill which had the endorsement of such prominent leaders as Ayatollah Beheshti, Ayatollah Montazeri, and Ayatollah Meshgini was

suspended due to the concentrated opposition of the more conservative clerics who denounced the bill's sponsors as

violating Islamic principles.“ The 1979 Revolution and its aftermath rejuvenated some of these old debates, and generated new controversies as

well. The clerics were split into two major camps: those

*‘ln Islam, the field of interpretation has long been subject to contesting explications by jurists. The disagreements between the Asharites and the Mutazilites; Avicenna and Al-Ghazzali; and the Akhbaris and the Usulis serve as examples of this contested terrain. “See Shaul Bakhash, The Reian of the Avatollahs (New York: Basic Books Inc., 1984;: 201-211.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 308 who sanctioned traditional jurisprudence (fiqh sonati), and those who advocated the need for a more dynamic jurisprudence (fiqh pouya) capable of dealing with the contemporary, public, and non-esoteric challenges facing the Islamic ummah. This dispute first began over socio-political concerns, and was gradually transformed into an epistemological polemic. Its focal point came in April 1988, when Soroush published the first of a still-continuing series of articles entitled "Constriction and Expansion of the Shari’ah" in Kevhan Farhanai. a leading state-sponsored cultural journal. The public and open-ended nature of the articles generated fiery as well as contemplative rebuttals and rejoinders, both by clerics and lay intellectuals. Soroush's cardinal claim was that all sciences and fields of knowledge are in a state of constant

transformation, and that changes in any domain of learning are bound to cause modifications in the other domains as

well, including jurisprudence. As a historian of science, he espoused the view that scientific discoveries have an impact on epistemology, which in turn causes a new

philosophical understanding. This new understanding, Soroush maintained, subsequently affects humanity's knowledge of itself and its environment, and finally leads

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 309 to a transformation of religious knowledge.“ As a historical illustration of this domino effect, he referred to scientific breakthroughs in mathematics which transformed the discipline of logic, and in turn humanity's understanding of philosophy, revelation, and theology. Following the method of logical reasoning, Soroush asserted that as a human science fiqh is by its very nature hermeneutical and speculative. Since science and philosophy are continuously evolving, man's comprehension of the Shari^ah (which is based on fiqh, ethics, interpretation, and theology) should follow suit. Soroush came to the conclusion that since philosophy and the natural sciences

are always unfinished and in quest of perfection, jurisprudential theory is also deficient, mortal, and fleeting. Equipped with such a heuristic premise, Soroush proceeded to criticize the hatrzahs for their closed or

narrowly“defined intellectual viewpoint and their systematic

neglect of non-jurisprudential disciplines. Moreover, he found fault with the traditional jurists' obliviousness to modern strides in scientific and social sciences. Accusing the jurists of bigotry, Soroush charged them with paying only lip service to the privileged position of science in Islam, while in fact avoiding or rejecting scientific

“Abdol-Karim Soroush, "Qabz va Bast-e Shari'ah," Kevhan Farhanai. 5, 2 (April 1988).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 310 theories with the bogus claim that they undermine the certitude and indisputability of sacred beliefs.” Advocating a total reversal, Soroush contended that religious cognizance should become contemporary. By this he meant that the Shari^ab should: (1) not contradict modern

scientific findings; (2) acquiesce to the assistance offered by the natural and social sciences in formulating its reasoning; (3) respond to the theoretical questions of our era; and (4) react to the practical challenges of the age of modernity. In other words, Scroush championed the idea that instead of loitering aimlessly in isolation, religious

scholars should participate in the permanent dialogue and intellectual exchange conventional among scientists. Borrowing an inference from "sociology of knowledge," Soroush further claimed that the Islamic jurists' divergent interpretations of the Shari^ah were certainly due to their

”This debate originally began in 1980, when the Islamic Republican regime began its campaign of "cultural Revolution." The campaign was undertaken to purge the opposition forces from the university campuses, and to revise the academic curriculum of universities, high schools, and elementary schools. At this juncture, social sciences were coming under severe criticism for being unscientific. Western-oriented, r ;lativistic, and capable of undermining religious beliefs. Soroush responded by defending social sciences in a series of magazine interviews. Since then he has followed up his counter effort, among other things, by respectively translating the works of two British and American philosophers: Alan Ryan's The Philosophy of the Social Sciences (New York: Pantheon Books, 1970), which was published in Iran in 1988; and Edwin Arthur Brutt's The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Sciences. 2nd edition (International Library of Psychology, Philosophy & Scientific Method, 1980) whose Persian translation is forthcoming.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 311 contrasting understanding of nature, anthropology, and theology. He charged that just as the fatva of a rural jurist differs from that of an urbanite (each reflecting the respective social environment), so the Islam of a philosopher contrasts that of a mystic. Soroush's conclusive remark was that the field of tafsir is far from an exact science, and must indeed be approached as an inexact, inconsistent, and controversial arena of human

inquiry. Soroush was joined in his attack on fiqh sonati by, among others, Hojjat al-Islam Mohammad Mojtahed-Shabastari (b. 1938), a brilliant cleric who himself was a graduate of the traditional curriculum of the Qom's hawzah. In a series of articles entitled "Religion and Intelligence," which were published concurrently with Soroush's essays, Shabastari raised similar themes and concerns. In a remarkably candid

criticism of the educational curriculum of Iran's

theological seminaries, Shabastari wrote:

The fact that our hawzahs have separated their path from that of the social sciences and are minding their own business without any awareness of the developments in these disciplines has brought us to the present condition in which we have no philosophy of civil rights or philosophy of ethics. [Furthermore] we have neither a political nor an economic philosophy. Without having a set of solid and défendable theories in these fields, how can we talk of universal or permanent laws and values? How can we [even] gain admission to international scientific communities?”

“Mohammad Mojtahed-Shabastari, "Din va Aql" [Religion and Intelligence," Kevhan Farhanai 4, 12 (March 1988): 11.

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Shabastari proceeded to counsel the clergy that unless they reconciled their differences with the modern social sciences, their intellectual turmoil was bound to persist. According to him, if the clergy emerged from their sequestered intellectual circles, they would realize that

the theoretical and practical challenges posed by the modern age have not all been settled. This revelation would then convince the clergy that they could no longer take refuge in the verdicts of past jurists. Instead they would realize that the gates of ijtihad must remain open, and that individuals must be granted a bigger role in regulating their social lives. Reminiscent of Popper's assertion that the main question is not "who should rule" but "how to rule," Shabastari maintained that the Quran and the sunnah [tradition] actually emphasize the "values of government"

and not necessarily the "forms of government." Since managing a society requires science and planning, he

proposed that the task be entrusted to those who are qualified, namely politicians and economists. In the

meanwhile, the faqihs should be preoccupied with promoting values derived from the Quran. Shabastari and to a greater extent Soroush were criticized by the more traditionalist clerics who charged

that by relying on the ideas of Popper (falsification principle), Carl Hempel (paradox of confirmation), and Imre Lakatos (research programmes) they were indeed undermining

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the canons of Islamic faith.* The traditionalists objected

that Soroush's postulate about the steady transformation and inter-connectivity of all sciences would lead to "relativity of knowledge" and skepticism, both of which they regarded as Popperian axioms. Furthermore, the traditionalists

protested that to sanctify the proposition that the Shari^ah is subject to contrasting hermeneutical interpretations is tantamount to granting everyone the right to present his own interpretations of it in whatever is pleasing. The outcome would be the same in fiqh as in science: a state of anarchy and divisiveness. So while Soroush and other advocates of

fiqh pouya emphasized epistemological flux, the proponents of traditional theology insisted on the fixity of sacred scriptures (see table 7). In response to Soroush's central thesis that theology is epistemologically related with the other sciences, the critics declared that this one-way

dependence was neither possible nor desirable since fiqh and philosophy are two different domains of knowledge, each with

its own separate methodologies. Lastly, they concluded that

all sciences are suppositional and speculative in nature,

while divine wisdom

*One critic went as far as to say that Soroush's ideas were more horrifying and damaging than the ideas of Marx and Freud since he was assaulting the ideological foundations of the Islamic government from within. When the editors of Kevhan Farhanai refused to publish his lengthy rebuttal, he expanded and published it as a 337-page book in twenty thousand copies. See Hossein Ghafari, Naahd-e Nazareveh Shariat-e Samet [Critique of the Theory of A Silent Shari'ah] (Qom: Hekmat Press, 1989).

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Table 7.— TRADITIONAL VERSUS DYNAMIC FIQH Traditional Dynamic Approach Toward Philosophical Scientific Human Beings Nature of A priori A posteriori Epistemology epistemology epistemology dealing with dealing with "ought to be" what "is"

Geometrical View Linear Circular of Human Knowledge

View of A divine A hermeneutical Jurisprudence knowledge based Science subject on perseverance to divergent of religious interpretations decrees

View of the No necessary Scientific Jurisprudence- cause & effect advances cause Science relationship jurisprudence Relationship exists between theory to them change

Raison d'etre Communicate Guide human's of Prophets God's laws decisions & actions Emphasis Juror's Qualifications Inferences

Preference fi Goal Maintaining Enhancing religious religion's purity capabilities Major Threat Contamination of Inability to to fiqh faith, solve skepticism, and contemporary relativism problems, falling behind scientific developments

Note: This table is my reconstruction of some of the doctrinal principles of the advocates of the two competing schools of thought. It was compiled based on a series of articles, rebuttals, rejoinders, and reviews which appeared in various issues of Kavhan Farhanai between 1988 and 1990.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 315 flies on the wings of conviction. It is clear that the problem of epistemology has been at the heart of intellectual contention in post revolutionary Iran. My suggestion is that the complexity of theological, philosophical, and political discord within Iran today can be better appreciated in light of this grapple over epistemological principles. The historicist- positivist epistemological debate in Iran is perhaps a more

vulgar and obscure form of the one that has been going on in the West now for over half a century. Davari's attack on positivism has mainly relied upon either a character assault

on its proponents or an admonition of the political repercussions of these ideas; neither method effectively deflects criticism.'*’ Moreover, Davari's repudiation of humanism, modernity, and the totality of Enlightenment accomplishments through a set of grandiose postulates does not reasonably enhance the discourse. His philosophical

axioms do not lend themselves to any type of analytical criticism. As soon as one tries to scrutinize Davari's

grandiloquent postulates through any social science methodology, he rebuts with yet another barrage of sweeping

propositions such as "...the scientific method of inquiry is

'•’However, if we were to turn the table against Davari, one could have charged that his anti-modernist philosophical propositions have grave political ramifications for a democratic system of government, since he does not and can not acknowledge any space for doubt, dissent, irreverence, or pluralism.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 316 itself a product of the West and a manifestation of its spiritual decline." These postulates sound too fallacious

to warrant a rebuttal. Another example of this abstract theorizing can be seen in Davari's Hegelian construction of the "West" as an "essence" and a "unified whole" whose history has come or is

coming to an end.* His usage of the term "West" is implicitly a "denigrated term."* For Davari, the "West" constituted the absolute "other" against which Islamic identity was constructed. Furthermore, he maintained that the "West" was left with no other option but to turn toward the "East" for an intellectual loan. Here Davari seemed to have forgotten the comments of Heidegger, that "pioneer of future philosophy," who said: It is my conviction that the constructive reinstatement of modern technology can only originate from the universal heartland from which it first arise, and that this return can not occur

*Davari is ostensibly influenced by Heidegger's statement, "We are latecomers in a history now racing toward its end." Interestingly enough, however, while he speaks of "Western history" Davari is not willing to place himself within any such historical categorization. He wishes to criticize the West from the vantage point of an observer standing outside the perimeters of history. *"The denigrated term essentially functions to highlight the other term's significance; its formal function is to signify, or identify, the dominant term. The very differentiation and exclusion of this subordinate 'opposite' defines the dominant term, which, as it were, draws a boundary around itself and declares: 'This I am, and not that.' 'That,' outside the boundary, is the Other, the not- self, upon which 'This' depends for its identity." James De Derian and Michael J. Shapiro, International/Intertextua1 Relations: xv-xvi.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 317 through borrowing Zen-Buddhism or other Oriental experiences. To transform thought, we need to recourse to and rediscover European tradition. Thought can only be refurbished through another system of thought which comes from the same origin, and has the same essence.* As for Soroush's criticism of historicism, he mainly used the term in a methodological sense. However, if one was to define "historicism" in an epistemological sense, to denote the view that all human knowledge is essentially relative to time and place, then much of Soroush's own hypothesis could be viewed as "historicist. For example, his belief in the idea of the accumulation and successive approximation of knowledge toward truth was itself a shadowy

replica of the 18th century Enlightenment idea of progress, which fits well within the confines of Hegel's philosophy of history. Soroush's assertion about the impact of the social milieu on the theological judgement of Islamic jurists was also in conformity with the Hegelian notion that the ordering principles or categories of the mind vary with a

succession of epochs and cultures. Moreover, he was

negligent of the fact that historicism is itself a salient feature of Shi'ism, and manifests itself in its principle of Mahdism and its unyielding belief that the course of history

*Spiegel's Interview with Martin Heidegger, "Nur noch ein Gott kann uns retten," PER SPIEGEL (May 31, 1976): 214.

**The historicists critique of positivism centers around the following three points: (1) no direct awareness of pure sense-data; (2) the historicity of the human mind; and (3) the relativity of truth. See Eugene F. Miller, "Positivism, Historicism, and Political Inquiry": 800.

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is a movement towards the ideal state.* In addition, Soroush did not recognize that his views on the hermeneutical nature of fiqh or his intellectual debt to the ideas on history of Arnold Toynbee and Robin G. Collingwood were compatible with his positivist Popperian epistemology. One is also taken aback by the extent to which Soroush maintained an implicit and largely unquestioning faith in such ideals as science and progress at a time when the positivist paradigm has been tormented by competing epistemological and methodological schools of thought. This is in addition to all the profound debates on linguistic philosophy, post-structuralism, post-modernity, end-of-ideology or the end-of-history.* Perhaps the most problematical part of Soroush's meditations concerns his attempt at reconciling science with religion. Like his predecessor Ali Shariati, Soroush tried

to demonstrate the compatibility of these competing ways of interpreting the world. In this quest, however, Soroush

overlooked some crucial differences between religion as a world-view and science as an approach. As a world-view,

religion comes to know the world a-priori. The world it

*See Hamid Enayat, Modern Islamic Political Thought: 24. *For a representative sample of criticisms levied at positivism see the works of the following philosophers: Stephen Toulmin, Michael Scriven, Norwood R. Hanson, Paul Feyerabend, Peter Winch, Jürgen Habermas, and Michel Foucault.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 3 19

wants to comprehend is an invention of religion itself. In it, humankind's relation to the universe has already been specified, and questions have all been answered.* The religious world-view does not seek questions but "the truth". It attempts to transcend everyday realities in the

hope of discovering "larger truths." Its interest, however, lies not so much in a praxis based on these bigger truths, but rather in accepting and cultivating a conviction in them. The scientific outlook on the other hand sees the world a-posteriori. The world it wants to understand is not a creation of itself, since it regards nature as an

independent entity.” Whereas the religious world-view attempts to arrive at knowledge and conviction through a return to specific sacred texts, science strives to identify facts through a procedure relying on deduction and observation. The latter approach interrogates common wisdom

by constantly constructing hypotheses and subsequently

testing for their conformity with reality, whereas the religious perspective tries to criticize everyday realities

based on bigger and immutable sets of truths. The frontiers of religious exploration far surpasses that of science, since its telos is to acquire or reassert faith and develop

*Aramesh Doustdar, Molahezat-e Falsafi dar Din. Elm, va Tafakor [Philosophical Contemplations on Religion, Science, and Thought] (Tehran; Agah Press, 1980): 5, 15. ”lbid.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 320 a value system based on ethical obligations in order to

arbitrate human conduct.” The intellectual tension in Soroush's epistemology lays in this very discrepancy between skepticism and conviction, the scientific and the sacred, the modern and

the traditional, and the mundane and the sublime. Soroush's predicament is representative of the theoretical ferment plaguing the Iranian intelligentsia in the aftermath of the revolution. A ferment prolonging with no apparent end in sight.

”By differentiating good from evil, the ethical discourse comes to constitute the operating mechanism of religious authority.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CONCLUSION

Scrutiny of contemporary Iranian intellectuals' balance-sheet calls into question some of modernization

theorists' basic assumptions. To begir with, the following set of questions emerge: (1) Were the Western-oriented intellectuals conduits of secular and progressive change?

(2) Has the ideological doctrine of "secularism" made the same strides in Iran as the sociological process of "secularization?" (3) Has Western rationalistic philosophy as a mode of reasoning been able to replace Iran's theosophic and mystic traditions? In short, has the process of socio-economic modernization been able to alter the geography of thought in modern Iran? It should be clear by now that my answer to all the

above questions is negative. In this summation, I will

recapitulate my overall thesis that since the Iranian intellectual's envisagement of their "self" was constrained by their perception of the "Western other," they did not and

indeed could not share post-Enlightenment intellectual experiences of their Western counterparts. Iranian intellectuals could never study the laws of a civil society,

the exploits of technology, the essence of humanism, the doctrine of secularism and the paradigm of modernity in 321

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 322 their own right. These phenomena were always criticized through the lens of prejudice for the types of mishaps, impediments, doubts, and inconveniences that their imported or imposed status brought for a traditional society such as Iran. The result has primarily been a distorted imagery, an essentialist and dichotomized world-view, a cultural schizophrenia, and an obscurest mind-set. Irrespective of their position on the ideological spectrum, Iranian intellectuals of the twentieth-century have all accepted Western civilization as their culture of reference in their process of identity-formation. They have done so since the time of the Constitutional Movement (1905-

11) when the challenge of Western civilization inspired the ideals of awakening and modernity, and adversely reappeared in the context of the cries dating from the early 1960s of "Westoxication" and for a "return to oneself." While both generations found fault with their respective circumstances,

they each advocated a different solution. The earlier

generation wanted to create a modern, strong and developed Iran through means such as constitutionalism, nationalism

and secularism. The latter generation which was disillusioned by the consequences of these foreign thoughts became consumed by the idea of recapturing their past and authentic identity. Thus, calls for authenticity and

rediscovery of the lost self dislodged the earlier cries for

law and liberty.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 323 The identities, precepts of self-evaluation, language, modes of thinking, value-judgments and political alternatives of Iranian intellectuals have all been molded by their encounter with the West. It seems that Iranian intellectuals have perceived their "only" available options

regarding the West to be between submission/mimicry on the one hand and denunciation/rebellion on the other. While the Iranian proponents of Westernization have consistently complained of the inferiority and intellectual stagnation of the East, their critics have pointed their accusatory finger at the West's prevalent spiritual stagnation. In contrast, they have taken pride in "Oriental" literature, art, mysticism, architecture and spirituality, the celebrated highlights of "Eastern" moral fiber.

The endurance of a dualistic Weltanschauung along with the ideological permeation of the West has led many Iranian intellectuals in the last three decades to turn toward nativism, traditionalism and, for many, Islamicism. The Iranian intellectual is no longer an "Oriental mystic."

Instead, he has become a disgruntled "Third-Worldist man."

Like his counterparts in Asia, he no longer resorts to the language of Confucius, Buddha, or Mohammad but appeals to the ideas of Heidegger, Rousseau, Marx, and Sartre. It is through the eyes of this latter group that he castigates the West and the age of modernity. He identifies with

Heidegger's critique of technology, Rousseau's call for

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 324 social justice, Marx's analysis of class struggle, and Sartre's call for "committed intellectuals." The cultural- ideological dilemma of the Iranian or, for that matter, all Middle Eastern intellectuals emanates from the encounter between tradition and modernity, and is thus not reducible

to a matter of class interest. As the Moroccan scholar Abdallah Laroui has suggested, this dilemma has precipitated the most severe growing pain thus far for Middle Eastern

intellectuals. ‘ As "Third-World natives" facing a dominating "Western other," Iranian intellectuals have experimented with a variety of alternatives. Some have pursued renaissance of the glorious past, and have taken nostalgic lapses into the psychology of antiquated heros. Others have advocated an imitation of Westernization and modernism either entirely or selectively. Still others have aspired to a middle ground through contemporizing traditions as well as secularizing

and politicizing Islam. I have argued that during the last three decades, although oscillating, Iranian intellectuals

have mainly opted for this third alternative. They have rejected the first as archaic, the second as fraudulent. As the dominant intellectual discourses of the last three decades, "Westoxication" and "return to oneself" epitomized this intermediate quest. The first diagnosed the

*See Abdallah Laroui, The Crisis of the Arab Intellectual (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1 9 7 6 ) .

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 325 intellectual's dilemma, while the second prescribed a solution. The partisans of both discourses, however, had to walk a delicate line between rationalism and mysticism,

secularism and religion, elitism and populism and, finally, progress and reaction. "Orientalism in Reverse" proved capable of articulating all these elements. Despite their different languages and political platforms, both the Islamic and the secular segments of the Iranian intellectuals could identify with at least one of the

elusive battle cries of "Orientalism in Reverse." It appealed both to the liberal and the leftist intellectuals who were obsessed with such essential questions as national independence, anti-imperialist struggle and indigenous alternatives. At the same time, "Orientalism in Reverse" left plenty of room for the clerical and religious intellectuals, who tended to emphasize the Islamic nature of

the struggle against the Shah's "...alien, corrupt, and

anti-Islamic regime." "Orientalism in Reverse" could accommodate both the principles of Third World populism as well as the messianic and elitist themes of Shi'ism. To understand the process through which "Orientalism

in Reverse" was able to emerge as the sole ideological candidate suited to unite all segments of the intellectual

polity, one must look specifically at the Iranian

sociopolitical milieu at the time. First and foremost, the legitimation crisis of the Pahlavi regime and its lack of

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 326 ideological hegemony contributed to the rise of the counter discourse of "Orientalism in Reverse." Second, the populist connotation of such discourses as anti-Westernization, anti- Zionism, and anti-dictatorship appealed to both the intelligentsia and the public. Third, the strong dosage of Third-Worldist and anti-dependency rhetoric of "Orientalism in Reverse" easily captivated the post-1953 generation of Iranians still grappling with the outcome of that year's coup. Fourth, the fact that "secularism" as temporal consciousness was lagging far behind "secularization" as a socioeconomic process contributed to the effectiveness of the appeal of "Orientalism in Reverse" to the repositories

of traditional and religious values. Fifth, the vocal anti modernist tone of "Orientalism in Reverse," which called for "collective consciousness" at a time when many people could not bear the agony of the transitional process from a pre

industrial to an industrial society (with its unavoidable atomism and insecurity) proved quite seductive. Finally,

the distinctive features of Iranian Shi'ism, clergy, and the lay religious intellectuals facilitated the unrivaled popularity of "Orientalism in Reverse" as an alternative

discourse. Under the sheltering umbrella of "Orientalism in Reverse," the two discourses of "Westoxication" and "return

to oneself" were able to furnish the theoretical exigency for the formation of an Islamic intellectual movement. The

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 327 1979 Revolution transformed these anti-Western discourses from being the acculturated response of disenchanted intellectuals to becoming the hegemonic discourse of a revolutionary elite. The former uneasy squabbles of a number of critical intellectuals were now transformed to the

theoretical stockpile of a revolutionary movement. This

movement was much more philosophically-assertive, intellectually-aware, and politically-confrontational than any previous revitalization movement in the history of modern Iran. Despite its triumphant political status, "Orientalism in Reverse" remains intellectually tormented. It is based

on too many untenable, questionable ontological and epistemological premises to sustain itself for long. Its nostalgia for the past, attachment to things native, idealization of identity, and ethical rejection of modernity

are all problematical. "Orientalism in Reverse" commits the same mistake as Orientalism proper. It renders the other opaque and undertakes an essentialist and unabashed

criticism of that "other" while refraining from a harsh scrutiny of its own cherished assumptions. The fondness of

many Iranian intellectuals for Heideggerian thought emanates from this yearning for wholeness. These intellectuals

easily relate to the letter's redolent romanticism and unabashed anti-modernism since they themselves feel affronted by and contemptuous of the modern age. The "West"

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 328 and "modernity" have replaced the "Arabs" and "Islam" as the favorite scapegoats of the Iranian intelligentsia. Yet history teaches us that while Iranians detested the Arabs, they nevertheless converted to the religion that the latter brought. Can the same happen with the "West" and

"modernity?" In other words, can the Iranians continue to denounce the "West" while absorbing the paradigm of modernity? This time the answer is positive. Throughout history Iranians have experienced two sides of the Western Civilization; colonialism and imperialism on the one hand, and its modern thought, science, and technology on the

other.’ While they have rightfully criticized the first, their rejection of the second has often been hypocritical or futile. In an age when cosmopolitanism is becoming a reality, Iranian intellectuals need to emerge out of their self-made chrysalis. They need to recognize their

theoretical lacuna and intellectual stagnation. Finally,

they need to realize that they can not continue to clear their conscious cheaply, either through totalizing or reducing the West and its multi-facet elements and experiences. Considering the absurdity of trying to

’For an analysis of these two varied experiences from the sixteenth to the nineteenth-century see: Abdul-Hadi Hairi, Noahostin Rouvarouha-ve Andish-e Garan-e Iran ba Dou Raveve Tamadon-e Bourgeoisie Gharb [The Early Encounters of the Iranian Thinkers With the Two-Sided Civilization of Western Bourgeoisie] (Tehran: Amir Kabir, 1988).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 329 blockade ideas, the Iranian intellectuals need to realize that they can no longer stroll vicariously in the museum of the past and its assortment of heroes, demi-gods and

memoirs. ’ What is to be done? The Iranian intellectuals should

critically re-evaluate the legitimacy of their own intellectual predecessors and social heritage as well as those of the West. They are privileged enough to live simultaneously in two different worlds; the traditional and the modern. Their present distorted imagery can be turned to a comparative advantage if they were to follow a Janus

look. The essential question confronting present Iranian intellectuals is how to transcend the dichotomous thinking which traps them either in a state of fraudulent "modernism" or a nativistic yearning for the past.

^Indeed they would do well remembering the dicta of Samir Amin: "History is filled with the corpses of societies that did not succeed in time."

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ARCHIVAL MATERIAL I. Personal Interviews ♦ The following interviews were conducted at the interviewees' residence or office. The tape recordings are at the author's possession.

Ashuri, Daryush. (May 29, 1989), New York, New York.

Baheri, Mohammad. (June 15, 1990), Roslyn, Virginia. Daryabandari, Najaf. (July 20, 1989), Vienna, Virginia. Derrakhshesh, Mohammad. (February 10, 1990), Chevy Chase, Maryland. Mahdavi-Damghani, Ahmad. (March 24, 1990), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Nasr, Seyyed Hossein. (February 9, 1990), Washington, D.C.

Shayegan, Daryush. (June 27, 1939), Bethesda, Maryland.

II. Harvard University I have used the following interviews conducted by the staff of the Iranian Oral History Project at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University. Tape recordings are available at Houghton Library, Harvard University.

Derakhshesh, Mohammad. (June 29-30, 1983), Chevy Chase, Maryland. Frye, Richard N. (October 10, 1984), Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hadjiseyd-Djavadi, Ali-Asghar. (March 1, 1984), Paris, France. Hezarkhani, Manouchehr.(June 1, 1984), Paris, France. Homayoun, Daryoush. (November 21, 1982), Washington, D.C. Lebaschi, Abolghassem. (February 28, 1983), Paris, France.

Mahfoozi, Alireza. (April 7, 1984), Paris, France. Malek, Hossein. (March 13, 1984), Paris, France.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 354 Nirzazadeh, Nemat. (May 25, 1984), Paris, France. Nateq, Homa. (April 1 & 7, 1984), Paris, France. Pakdaman, Nasser. (May 26, 1984), Paris, France. Rajavi, Massoud. (May 29, 1984), Paris, France. Saedi, Gholam-Hossein. (June 7, 1984), Paris, France. Shanechchi, Mohammad. (March 4, 1983), Paris, France. Shakeri, Khosrow. (July 27, 1983), Cambridge, Massachusetts.

I I I . Foundation for Iranian Studies In addition to the above sources, the following interviews conducted by the staff of the Oral History Project of the Foundation for Iranian Studies were consulted. The reminiscences are available at the Foundation's headquarter in Bethesda, Maryland.

Assar, Nasir. (December 2, 1982), Washington, D.C. Baheri-, Mohammad. (December 1983 & February 3, 1984), Cannes, France. Behnam, Jamshid. (July 20, 1987), Paris, France.

Kazemiyyeh, Eslam. (October 3, 1983 & May 8, 1984), Paris, France. Matini, Jalal. (September 8, 1987 & December 30, 1987), Bethesda, Maryland. Nasr, Seyyed Hossein. (October 1982 & January 1983), Boston, Massachusetts.

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