Sonderdrucke aus der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
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Iraq in World War I
ite Mujtahids’ Call for JihÁd׳The Turks, the Germans and the Shi
Originalbeitrag erschienen in: Rudolph Peters (Hrsg.): Proceedings of the ninth Congress of the Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants : Amsterdam, 1st to 7th septembre 1978. Leiden: Brill, 1981. (Publications of the Netherlands Institute of Archaeology and Arabic Studies in Cairo ; 4), S. [57]-71 IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I: THE TURKS, THE GERMANS AND THE SHIITE MU JTAHIDS' CALL FOR JIHAD
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One day in January 1915, a small squad of men on horseback was approaching the Shi cite holy town of Kerbela. Five of them, wearing a mixture of both Turkish and German military uniform, were German officers. In addition, there were Ahmad Khan Qajar, a relative of the Shah of Iran accompanying the Germans as inter- preter, and a few Arab and Armenian servants. The group was under the command of major Friedrich Klein, a former German military attaché in Tehran and Cairo. The Iranian ambassador to Istanbul, Mahmild Khan Qajdr, had been instrumental in preparing the ground, in Kerbela, for this rather unusual group of visitors to the tomb of Imam Husain b. 'Ali. The leading men of Kerbela had been notified in advance that major Klein and his group would come as a special delegation from the German Emperor. When approaching the Euphrates, the group was met there by a delega- tion from Kerbela led by a son of the "grand mujtahid", and was guided to the town. There the delegation was received by the grand mujtahid himself and a number of other prominent 'Warn(/' and notables. In the ensuing conversations, which lasted several days, the mujtahids pointed out the recent financial difficulties of Kerbela and Najaf resulting from the outbreak of the war, as the British had stopped disbursement of the grants which until then had been sent regularly to Iraq from India, and had been handed over for distribution to a number of mujtahids by the British Resident in Baghdad. [The most important of these grants was the so-called Oudh(Awadh)-Bequest, established by the Shiite Nawabs of Lucknow a long time ago. This was a large sum of Indian rupees allocated annually to the shrines of Najaf and Kerbela] .1
1 Hamid Algar: Religion and State in Iran, 1785-1906, Berkeley 1969, pp. 237-38; Mahmad Mahrniid: Tarikh-i raweibit-i siyeisi-yi Iran wa Inglis (. .), vol. 6(Tehran 1953), pp. 1741-44; S. H. Longrigg: Four Centuries of Modern Iraq, Oxford 1925, p. 28o note 1; Atiyyah (see note 7 below), pp. 81- 84. For Oudh(Awadh) see M. H. Zaidi: Eine Einfahrung zu den Muharram- 58 W. ENDE
The German delegation, in its turn, asked the mujtahids for a fetwa calling on the whole Shiite community, including the Shiites of Iran, to join the Holy War (jihad) which had been declared by the Ottoman Sultan on November 12, 1914, and corro- borated by the Sunnite Shaikh al-Islam two days later, against Britain and her allies. It was planned to use this fetwa in the Klein mission's forthcoming attempts to mobilize the Shiite popula- tion of Iran and—if possible—the whole Muslim East against Britain and Russia. After a series of conversations, and after receiving, as a first major instalment, the equivalent of 50 000.—Reichsmark in Turkish gold coins, the five leading mujtahids of Kerbela promised to write and sign with their seals the fetwa the Germans had asked for. They also sent a telegram of homage to the Kaiser. In addition, the grand mujtahid said he was ready to provide the Germans with a letter addressed to the Shah of Iran, in which the latter was urged by the grand mujtahid to abandon his neutrality and actively support the Central Powers. When still in Kerbela, the German delegation was informed by an emissary of the German consulate in Baghdad that the Turkish authorities there were viewing these direct contacts with the Shi`ite divines with the utmost uneasiness and suspicion. After their return to Baghdad on January 27, 1915, news reached Klein and his comrades that the mujtahids had had second thoughts about their decision regarding the fetwa. Therefore one of the officers, lieutenant Edgar Stern-Rubarth, returned to Kerbela in order to make sure that the mujtahids would keep their promise. Finally this officer and the Persian interpreter (who had remained in Kerbela all the time) received the fetwa, written on a piece of parchment sized zto x 6o cm, and also the letter of the grand mujtahid to the Shah. The fetwa is said to have been distributed secretly by leaflets in the Shiite world as far as India. The letter to the Shah proved useless, as developments in Iran made it impossible to deliver it. It was handed over by Stern-Rubarth to the German Embassy in Istanbul before he left for Europe.
Feierlichkeiten (. . .), in: ZDMG, Supplement III/I: XIX. Deutscher Orienta- listentag (. .), Vortrage, ed. W. Voigt, Wiesbaden 1977, pp. 629-48, and J. Raj : The Revenue System of the Nazvabs of Oudh, in: JESHO 2/1959/92-104; further article "Awadh" in VI, 2nd ed., I. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 59
The above account is based on the memoirs of two members of major Klein s group. They are Hans Liihrs, an archaeologist with earlier experience in Iraq, and Edgar Stern-Rubarth, afterwards a prominent liberal journalist in the Weimar Republic who, for political reasons, emigrated to Britain in the thirties. Ltihrs memoirs (called "Gegenspieler des Obersten Lawrence") were published as early as 1936 and within a very short time went into several re-editions. 2 Stern-Rubarth briefly mentions the Klein mission, including the expedition to Kerbela, in a book about contemporary European politics published in English in 1939 and in German in 1948. $ He gives a more detailed account, however, in his memoirs published in 1964.4 To the best of my knowledge, the negotiations of major Klein s group in Kerbela are nowhere mentioned in the works of Arab or non-German western authors dealing with the history of Iraq and Iran in World War I and/or the role of the Germans behind the Shi cite jilted propaganda. In German historiography, the accounts of both Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth have been used for an important study, by Ulrich Gehrke, about Germany s relations with Iran in World War I. In accordance with the main topic of his book,5 however, the author treats the episode of the negotiations in Kerbela and the related problem of the Shiite mujtahids call for jihad only as a side issue. The internal situation in Kerbela and the other shrine towns and the personal background and political role of the mujtahids who conferred with the German delegation remain, of course, outside the scope of Gehrke s investigation. It is especially to this aspect, and to the general problem of German and Turkish contacts with the Shiite religious establish- ment of Iraq, to which I would like to draw your attention in the present paper. The political attitude of the Shi cite community of Iraq during
2 For the present paper I have used the 5th edition, Berlin s.d. [1937 ?], esp. pp. 10-21. 3 Three Men Tried . . . Austin Chamberlain, Stresemann, Briand and their Fight for a New Europe, London 1939, esp. pp. 24-26. (German version: Drei Manner suchen Europa, Munich 1948). 4 Aus zuverlcissiger Quelle verlautet . . . Ein Leben fur Presse and Politik, Stuttgart 1964, pp. 66-83. 5 Persien in der deutschen Orientpolitik des Ersten , Welthrieges, 2 vols. Stuttgart s.d. [1961], esp. I pp. 56-57, II p. 45.—See also Renate Vogel: Die Persien-und Afghanistanexpedition Oskar Ritter v. Niedermayers 1915116, Osnabruck 1976. 6o W. ENDE
World War I and the years immediately following it, as well as the internal situation in the Shiite shrine towns have been treated, of course, by a number of Arab (mainly Iraqi) and western (mainly British) authors. As examples of recent studies concerning this subject by Arab authors I may mention the following: 1) Vol. IV (publ. Baghdad 1974) of 'Ali al-Wardi's Lamahcit ijtinui(iya min terikh al-hadith (this volume. being devoted to the years 1914-18), 2) (Abdallah Fand al-Nafisi's book Daur al-shica fi tatawwur al- `Iraq al-siycisi al-hadith, 6 and 3) Ghassan R. Atiyyah's Iraq 1908-1921. A Socio-Political Study.?
Wardi's 8 multi-volume work, incidentally, is an interesting and entertaining mixture of social and cultural history, social an- thropology and traditional adab. The books by Nafisi (who is a Kuwaiti) and Atiyyah (an Iraqi of Shiite origin) are based on Ph.D. dissertations submitted to British universities. 9 In the three works just mentioned and in the others concerning the same subject which are known to me, German activities in support of the jihad movement in general and the Shiite jihad in particular are mention- ed here and there. 1° Sometimes the names of Germans, Iranians and Arabs involved in these activities are given. Information concerning this aspect of Iraqi internal politics is drawn almost exclusively 11 from British sources and the memoirs of Iraqi Arab contemporaries of the time under discussion here. German sources and secondary material are—in most cases, of course, for linguistic reasons—conspicuously absent in the footnotes of the paragraphs where this aspect of the story is discussed. (The same holds true, incidentally, for the use of Turkish material concerning this period). Of course I do not claim that the use of both Turkish and German material by Iraqi and other historians would solve all open questions
6 Beirut (Dar al-Nahar) 1973. Beirut (The Arab Institute for Research and Publishing) 1973. 8 About this author see Der Islam (Berlin), 52/1975/176-77. 9 Nafisi: Cambridge; Atiyyah: Edinburgh. 10 See, e.g., Wardi, Larnaheit, IV, pp. 21-23 and 134-35, and Nafisi, Daur al-shi`a, 62 and an. In spite of many mistakes and other shortcomings, the article by G. Ducrocq: "Les Allemands en Perse" (in: Revue du Monde Musulman, 54/1923/55-199) is still useful also for Iraq, but it is rarely used. The Klein mission is briefly mentioned by Ducrocq (p. 123), but there is no reference to the negotiations in Kerbela. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 61
with regard to the internal history of Iraq in World War I. Nor do I claim to know all the relevant German source material—not even where it is to be found. I am sure, however, that the combined use of Arabic, Turkish, Persian," English and—in some cases—German source material can bring about the clarification of many details and a solution to a number of open questions concerning this period of Iraqi history. Like any other source material, the German material will pose some problems to the specialist of Iraqi history using it. The accounts of both Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth concerning the Klein mission s contacts in Kerbela are a case in point. There is, e.g., the problem of the names of the mujtahids with whom the members of the Klein mission may have had their negotiations in Kerbela. Both authors mention only one of them by name. He is, to use their own words, "der GroB-Mudschtahid Ali el-Irakain, Herr beider Irak"." If we suppose that by the title "GroB-Mudschtahid" a marja` al-taglid is meant, we may expect that it would not be difficult to find in modern biographical dictionaries of the Shia as, e.g., Agha Buzurg Tabaqdt a`lcim al-shica, some information about a person named Ali (Shaikh) al- II-again. There are even a number of articles in German in which we might expect to find his name in connection with the jihad-declarations of the mujtahids of Iraq, i.e. Martin Hartmann s translations of—and comments on—these declarations in vols. III and IV of Die Welt des Islams." Surprisingly, the name of Ali (Shaikh) al-gra,qain or a name similar to that does not appear in Hartmann s articles. Even more surprising is the fact that Agha Buzurg al-Tihrani in the four volumes of his Tabaqcit devoted to the biographies of
12 With regard to the Persian material we should keep in mind that many of the leading Shiite Warne of Iraq are traditionally of Persian origin. Some of those active in the Shiite jihad propaganda during World War I in Iraq later settled in Iran. Information about their participation in the jihad is therefore to be found in publications (i.e. biographies, memoirs etc.) which have appeared in Iran. As an example see Abdul Hadi Hairi s article Khwansari in EI, 2nd. edition, IV, p. 1028. 13 Liihrs, op. cit., p. 14; Stern-Rubarth: Aus zuverldssiger Quelle verlautet, p. 68. 14 Vol. III (1915), no. 1, pp. 48-57, "Ausziige aus der Zeitschrift Chäwer," ibid. 111/2, pp. 131-33, "Heilige Befehle samtlicher grossen Miidschtehiden", 111/3-4, pp. 2o5-I3, "Sammlung schi citischer Fetwas", ibid. IV (1916), no. 3-4, pp. 217-25 (see note 55 below).—About the weekly Kheiwar used by Hartmann for his articles see ibid., III/I, p. 68. 62 W. ENDE
culanui) of the 14th century (hijri) 15 has no separate biographical item about a person named 'Ali (Shaikh) al- cIra.ciain or the like. This can be explained, however, by the fact that Stern-Rubarth and Liihrs obviously were deeply impressed by the laqab Shaikh al- g ra:lain and did not bother to find out the full name of the shaikh 'Ali whom they considered to be the grand mujtahid of Kerbela. It should be noted here that the laqab Shaikh al- graqa.in was given, in the 19th and 2oth century alone, to more than one Shiite scholar. As examples I may mention cAbd al-Husain al-Tihrani (d. 1869 or `70) 16 and (Abd ar-Riclä Al Kashif (d. I968)." These two cannot be identical with the person we are looking for. There is, however, in Dihkhudd's Lughatndmah, on the authority of Mu'in's E arhang-i _Tarsi, a short notice that a son of the Shiite scholar Lain al-(Abidin al-Mazandarani had been given this honorific title. 18 In fact in Aghd, Buzurg's Tabaqdt &lam al-shi ca, in the biography of that Shaikh Lain al- `Abidin al-Mdzandardni (who died in 1891 or `92), 19 his second son is briefly mentioned as "Shaikh `Ali al-mulaqqab Shaikh al-(Iragain, the author of the printed (work) Fihris al-jaze,,cihir". 20 This information is corroborated, and can be slightly enlarged, by a few words devoted to our Shaikh 'Ali al-Mazandarani in Agha Buzurg's bibliography al-dharica ild tadnif al-shi ca on the occasion of his mentioning the Fihris al- j aw dhir , 21 and in Muhammad Mandi al-Milsawi's Ahsan al- wadi ca , where a chapter is devoted to Shaikh (Ali's father, the above mentioned Lain al-(Abidin. 22 According to Agha Buzurg's
15 Tabaqat a clam al-sili ca, 2 vols., vol. I in 4 parts: Nuqabei) al-bashar fi 1-qarn al-rabi c (ashar, Najaf 1956. 16 (Abbäs al-Qurnmi: al-kung wa-l-alqab, vol. II, Najaf 1970, pp. 397-98, and Mandi 135,mdad: Shark rijal-i Iran, vol. II (Tehran 1347 h/sh), PP . 243-44. 17 Gurgrs (Awvvdd: Mu cjam al-ciraqiyin, vol. II (Baghdad 1969), p. 104. 18 Lughatneimah, s.v. shaikh al- ciraqain; Muhammad Mu in: Farhang-i farsi, vol. V: a clam, Tehran 1348, p. 948. 19 Nuqaba) al-bashar (see note 15 above), pt. 2, pp. 805-6. 20 Ibid.,.805. 21 Vol. 16 (Najaf and Tehran, 1968), p. 383 no. 1778. 22 2nd. edition, Najaf 1968, vol. I, pp. 95-98, and portrait on one of the last pages of vol. II. This portrait is reproduced in Ziriklf: al-aclam XI/i no. 457; see also ibid., III, 106. Both Zirikli and (Umar Ridd Kahhäla: Illu cjam al-mu allifin, IV (Damascus 1957), p. 198, mention a biographical chapter on Shaikh Zain by Muhsin al-Amin in his A c cyan al-shica, vol. 33, Pp. 339-41. This volume of the A cyan is not available to me. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 63
Dharica,23 our Shaikh 'Ali b. Zain al- `Abidin al-Mdzandarani (Shaikh al- gra:gain) died on the 23rd Shawwal 1345 hijri, i.e. the 13th of April, 1927. Both the Tabaqiit earn al-shica and Ahsan al-wadi `a give much more space, however, to Shaikh Zain al-(Abidin's first son. 24 He is (Muhammad) Husain al-tiViri al-Mazandardni (d. 1921), a leading mujtahid of Kerbela and, like his father, considered marja c al- taglid by many believers. In fact both Stern-Rubarth and Lars in their accounts mention a brother of 'Ali (Shaikh) al- graciain as another leading mujtahid of Kerbela, "seinerseits ein Mitglied des `Kardinalskollegiums' ", as Stern-Rubarth puts it. 25 He is said to have received the members of the Klein mission in front of the house of the grand mujtahid.26 As the latter, however, Stern-Rubarth and Liihrs unanimously consider 'Ali the Shaikh al- cIrdqain and nobody else. At the time of these negotiations in Kerbela, however, our `Ali al-Mdzandardni with the lagab Shaikh al- cIrdqain was certainly not recognized as a grand mujtahid (marja` al-taglid) by any sizable number of believers there. From the Arabic and Persian material at my disposal it is even doubtful whether he ever reached this position afterwards. On the other hand, his elder brother (Muhammad) Husain is mentioned, by both Agha Buzurg and the author of Ahsan al-wadi `a, as a marja c al-taglid, who was widely held to have this position after the death of his father, Zain al- cAbidin (1891/92). He is said to have been one of those leading mujtahids of Kerbela who had been entrusted with the distribution of the money sent to the catabeit of Iraq from India every year.26a It was he, then, and not his younger brother 'Ali from whom a fetwa on the jihad and a, letter to the Shah of Iran concerning this subject was to be expected in the first place. In fact Muhammad Husain Mazandaräni had supported the jihad by signing a joint statement to this effect which was composed and issued by all the leading mujtahids of the Shi cite shrine towns of Iraq already in December 1914, i.e. some weeks before the
23 Vol. 16 (1968), p. 383 no. 1778. The date as given in vol. 2 (Najaf 1355 h), p. 399 no. 1599, i.e. 1346 h, is most probably wrong. 24 Nuqaba) al-bashar (see note 15 above), pt. 2, p. 586, and Ahsan al-wadi `a (see note 22 above), I, p. 97, with portrait at the end of vol. II. Aus zuverlassiger Quelle verlautet, p. 7o, see also Liihrs, op. cit., p. 14. 26 A picture of this house is to be found in Liihrs, op. cit., facing p. 145. 26a Matimild Mabmild (see above note I), vol. 6 p. 1744.
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Klein mission reached Kerbela. This is corroborated by Martin Hartmann's translation of this document, based on the Arabic and Persian text as published in the Persian-language paper Kizdwar in Istanbul. Mazandaräni is mentioned there as "Scheich Husain Zainal`dbidin"," representing the mujtahids of Kerbela together with Sayyid Ismail Sadr 28 [incidentally, the grandfather of the present day Imam Musa Sadr of Lebanon], Sayyid "Mohammed Alkaschani" and "Scheich Hadi Al'isfahani". On another occasion he is mentioned by Hartmann—whose insight into the difficult "Who's Who" of contemporary Shiite scholar- ship was necessarily limited—with his full name "Mohammed Husain Alba'iri Almazandarani".29 Having solved the problem of Shaikh al- graqain's identity, we may ask why this man figures so prominently in the memoirs of both Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth, while at the same time his elder brother, a real marja , and the other leading mujtahids of Kerbela are not even mentioned by name. Is there a connection with the fact that, according to Stern-Rubarth, the Iranian ambassador to Istanbul had paved the way to Kerbela for the Klein mission 3°- i.e. did he mention the Shaikh al- graqain as the grand mujtahid to whom the Germans should turn there ? And if so—for what reason did he do that ? There is, moreover, the question why Klein and his men concentrated their efforts to wrest a special fetwa from the mujtahids almost exclusively on those in Kerbela. Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth do not even mention the fact that another German, Dr. Preusser, had left the group some days earlier and had gone alone to Najaf in order to promote the jihad propaganda there.3' This is the more surprising as Preusser, who knew Iraq from his time as one of the excavators of Assur, figures prominently in a British document (used by Nafisi) as the man who distributed German money to the tribal leader (Ajami al-Sean and to some Shiite (ulanici) in Najaf and elsewhere.32
27 Welt des I slams 111/2 (1915), p. 133. 28 Also known as Ismail Sadr al-Din, see Tihräni: Nuqabie al-bashar (note 15 above), pt. 1, p. 159 f., and Ahsan al-wadi`a (s. note 22 above), I, pp. 169-7i. 29 Welt des Islams III/1915/3-4/206 (no. 5) and 207 (8, 6). 30 Aus zuverldssiger Quelle verlautet, p. 68. 31 Gehrke, op. cit., I, p. 57. 32 Nafisi, op. cit., p. 62 (Nafisi erroneously writes "Preussen"); see also N. N. E. Bray: A Paladin of Arabia. The Biography of Brevet lieut.-Colonel G. E. Leachman, London 1936, p. 349. According to Bray, Preusser was IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 65
There are, of course, a number of additional questions related to the motives and the fate of the Klein mission, but they cannot be discussed within the scope of the present paper. With regard to the one mentioned above and concerning the strange prominence of Ali Shaikh al- cIrdqain in the memoirs of Liihrs and Stern- Rubarth, however, I would like to suggest at least one possible explanation : The four leading mujtahids of Kerbela had signed a jihad proclamation, together with other mujtahids of the shrine towns of Käzimain, Najaf and Samarra, already in December 1914.3$ This was in accordance with the interests of the Turkish authorities who had been confronted, since November 7, 1914 with the fact of the British invasion of the Shaft al-`Arab and since November 22 with the fact of the occupation of Basra." It should be noted here that even Muhammad Käzim Yazdi,35 the marja c al-taqlid of Najaf, had been won over to support openly the jihad-call already in mid-December. This Shad been a difficult task for the ruling Young Turks and their Shi cite partisans in Iraq, as al-Yazdi had been on bad terms with the Turkish authorities for quite some time: From 1905/6 onwards al-Yazdi had opposed, in one way or another, the Iranian pro-constitutionalist mujtahids residing in Iraq and involved in the events of the Persian Revolution." Thereby he captured by British troops near (Ana at the end of March, 1918. His docu- ments and a diary recording his intelligence activities in Iraq were taken possession of by the British. The British document used by Nafisi is based on this material. 33 Welt des Islams 111/1915/2/131-33. 34 History of the Great War, VI: The Campaign in Mesopotamia, 1914-1918, ed. F. J. Moberly, 4 vols. London 1923-27; P. W. Ireland: Iraq. A Study in Political Development, London 1937, pp. 63 ff.; B. C. Busch: Britain, India, and the Arabs 1914-1921, Berkeley 1971. 36 For biographical data see Alzsan al-wadVa (s. note 22 above), vol. pp. 152-57; Muhsin al-Amin: A cyan al-shi ca, vol. 46 (Beirut 1959), pp. 206-07; Khänbaba, Mushär : Mu allifin-i kutub (. .), vol. V (Tehran 1343 h/sh), cols. 26-30. 36 See Abdul-Hadi Hairi: Shicism and Constitutionalism in Iran, Leiden 1977, passim (Index p. 274, s. n. Yazdi) ; Wai di, Lamaliat (see above page 6o), vol. 3 pp. 103-27, and Atiyyah (note 7 above), pp. 49-50. For a description of the struggle in Najaf between al-Yazdi s "royalist" group and the consti- tutionalists, led by Mullä Muhammad K4im al-Khurdsdni, see also Mils5. Ibrahim al-buyiitat al-adabiya fi Karbala (. .), Kerbela 1968, p. 414 (a quotation from Hibat al-Din al-Shahrastäni s memoirs as cited in `Ali al-Khaqäni s Shu cara) al-Ghariy). About Khuräsani see Hairi, op. cit., passim, and idem, article "Khurdsdni" in EI, 2nd. ed., V, p. 61 f.; further `Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Ali: al-mujahid al-shaikh Muhammad Kazim al-Kh., Najaf 1972.
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had caused the annoyance of the allies and protectors of the constitutionalist mujtahids and their circles, the Young Turks, who consequently threatened al-Yazdi with expulsion after their takeover in Istanbul in 1908/9. When Turkey entered the war, al-Yazdi at first refused to support the Ottoman call for jihad, using, inter alia, the argument that the Shiites were not prepared to fight. Others close to his circle came forth with the argument that, in the absence of the 12th Imdm, 37 jihad was allowed for the Shi`ites only in direct defence of the holy shrines.38 The British advance in Southern Iraq and the appeals of many `itlama) seem to have changed al-Yazdi's attitude. On December 16, 1914, he addressed a large crowd from the minbar of the great mosque of Najaf, calling on them to defend the Islamic territories.39 In the weeks to follow, he and a number of other leading mujtahids of Iraq sent a great number of proclamations to the Shiite tribes in the South, to Shaikh Khaz'al of Muhammarah 39a etc., calling on them to rise in a jihad against the infidels." [Later on, to be sure, al-Yazdi was one of the first to establish secret contacts with the British, but this part of the story falls outside the scope of the present paper]."
" According to certain classical autors of Twelver jihad was not possible at all in the absence of the Imam. This view was already modified by Abu Ja`far al-Tusi (d. 1067), who allows a defensive jihad, and almost completely reversed by some leading Warne in the 19th century under the impact of the Perso-Russian wars of I8o8-13 and 1826-28. For a good analysis of this process see E. Kohlberg: "The Development of the Imdmi Shiq Doctrine of jihad", ZDMG 126/1976/64-86. 38 Atiyyah, op. cit., p. 79. Wardi, Lamahat, vol. 4, p. 128. 39a About Khaz al see the unpublished Ph.D. dissertation (Indiana University, 1977) by William Th. Strunk: The Reign of Shaykh Khazral Ibn Jabir and the Suppression of the Principality of Arabistan. A Study in British Imperialism in Southwest Iran, 1897-1925. (Not available to me). 4° Welt des I slams 111/1915/3-4/205-13, where he is mentioned as "Moham- med Kazim AttabätibVi". For the names and activities of other Shiite (ulama) and notables who took part in this jihad see Wardi, Lamahat, vol. 4, p. 127 ff.; al-Tihrani: Nugabei) al-bashar, vol. 2. p. 818; Fariq al-Muzhir Al Fir`aun: al-haqViq an-nasi`a fi 1-thaura al-(iraqiya sanat 1920 wa-nate- ijihei, Baghdad 1952, pp. 36 ff. For quotations from (and comments on) Arabic jihad poetry composed in Iraq during World War I by both Sunnite and Shiite authors see Yasuf (Izz al-Din : al-shi`r al-hadith wa-athar al-tayyarat al-siyasiya wa-l-ijtimeeiya fih, Cairo 1965, pp. 71-127.—H. Ritter s article "Arabische Kriegspoesie aus Mesopotamien and dem Irak" ( = Mesopotamische Studien, III), Der Islam 13/1923/268-77 is almost use- less in this respect, as it is based on popular songs etc., which were recorded by Ritter for dialectological reasons. 41 Atiyyah, p. 84. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 67
In any case, the claim of both Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth that the Klein mission had brought about, for the first time since early Islam, a Shiite call for jihad under the leadership of a Sunnite caliph, is an exaggeration." There had been proclamations to this effect even earlier than December 1914: recognition of the Ottoman Sultan as the Caliph and the leader of a joint jihad can be found in telegrams of a few, but prominent, Iranian mujtahids residing in Iraq as early as 1908/9 and, on the occasion of the Italian invasion of Libya, in 1911." For the Turkish authorities, then, the fetwa the Germans wanted and finally got from the mujtahids of Kerbela was no particular "historisches Ereignis" (as Stern-Rubarth seems to have believed still half a century later). The text of the fetwa, which is not given by Liihrs or Stern-Rubarth, may perhaps differ from the Shi`ite jihad proclamations already issued in December 1914 only with regard to the stress it presumably puts on the duty of the Shi cites outside the Ottoman Empire to join (or otherwise support) the jihad against the Allies. The Turks may have welcomed the money paid by the Germans in exchange for the mujtahids fetwa and the letter to the Shah of Iran mentioned above, as this money was filling part of the financial gap resulting from the non-arrival of the Shiite grants from India." This consideration, however, was certainly outweighed by their suspicion of far-reaching designs behind the Germans direct contacts with the mujtahids, including fears of colonialist schemes in connection with the Baghdad Rail- way.45 The mujtahids, in their turn, may have been aware of the Otto- man attitude from the very beginning of the contacts or may have been warned in due time by persons close to the authorities. [It should not be overlooked that some of the younger Shiite culanuP ,
42 Stern-Rubarth: Aus zuverldssiger Quelle verlautet, p. 72; idem: Three Men Tried (see above note 3), p. 26. 43 Hairi, op. cit., pp. 88-9o, 125, 242-43; idem: Why Did the (Ulamee Participate in the Persian Revolution of 1905-1909, in: WI, XVII/r-4/1976-77/ 127-54, esp. 133-36, and idem: The Responses of Libyans and Iranians to Imperialism as Reflected in two Documents, in: ZDMG 130/2/1980/372-92. 44 See above, note 1. 45 See U. Trumpener: Germany and the Ottoman Empire, 1914-1918, Princeton, N.J., 1968, pp. 5-8, 285-316 and the literature mentioned there; more recently F. H. Kochwasser: "Das Deutsche Reich und der Bau der Bagdad-Bahn", in F. H. Kochwasser and H. R. Roemer: Araber und Deut- sche. Begegnungen in einem j ahrtausend, Tubingen and Basel 1974, pp. 294-349. 68 w. ENDE as, e.g., Muhammad Ricla al-Shabibi, had become regular members of ttihdd ye teraqqi].46 Under these circumstances, the mujtahids may have found it wise to put one of their own ranks, but not himself a marja c, into the forefront of their negotiations with the Germans, making their guests believe that he was the grand mujtahid of Kerbela. The fact that they chose 'Ali al-Mazandaräni can be explained by at least three considerations : i. he was the brother of a real marjac, 2. he was known to the Young Turks as one of those Persian Shiite (ulamei) who already in the past had eagerly supported the Young Turks' pan-islamic appeals. 46a 3. his laqab Shaikh al-cIrdqain carried much weight with the German visitors, who translated it for themselves as meaning "master (Herr)" of all the Shiite believers of Iraq and Iran (= 'Iraq cajami).47 Accordingly his name had to be on the original of the fetwa which was given to the Germans. This would explain the fact that both Liihrs and Stern-Rubarth mention five mujtahids as having signed and sealed the fetwa,48 while on other occasions, as can be seen from Martin Hartmann's articles, only four mujtahids represented Kerbela in the jihad-proclamations amongthem, to be sure, `Ali al-Mazandarani's elder brother." A letter from 'Ali al-Mazandardni (Shaikh al- qr.-again), which was to be delivered to the Shah of Iran by German agents, was not likely to arouse much suspicion from the side of the Turks who otherwise observed German activities towards Iran with growing uneasmess.5° The Klein mission's negotiations in Kerbela can be regarded, then, as a rather amateurish attempt to establish direct contacts with the spiritual leaders of the Shiite world. It must be admitted, however, that the expedition to Kerbela was planned—in connection with future activities of the Klein mission in Iran—at a time when the readiness of the Shi cite mujtahids of Iraq to support the
46 Yfisuf fizz al-Din (see note 4o above), p. 29, on the authority of Merfif Shabibi s biography by (Abd al-Razzaq Muhyi al-Din: I:Iaytit al- Sh. wa-siratuhu, Baghdad 1969, is not available to me. 46a See Revue du Monde Musulman, 13/1911/386. 47 Stern-Rubarth: Aus zuverleissiger Quelle verlautet, p. 68; op. cit., P• 1 4 48 Stern-Rubarth: Aus zuverldssiger Quelle verlautet, p. 73; Liihrs, op. cit., p. 20. 49 Welt des Islarns, 111/19 I 5/2/133 . 5° Gehrke, op. cit., I, esp. pp. 66-69, 86-87, 109-12, 174-77, 254-61. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 69
Ottoman jihad was not certain. 51 When the Klein mission arrived in Iraq, however, the British invasion of the South had changed the situation, leaving the mujtahids no choice but to call on the be- lievers to defend the Islamic territories side by side with the Turks. To end this paper, I should like to say a few words about the problem of explaining to the uneducated mass of the Shiites the lawfulness of joining a jihad led by the Ottoman (Sunnite) Sultan in alliance with non-Muslim powers such as Austria and Germany. Here again, a number of Shi cite 'Warn(/' and litterateurs belonging to the pro-constitutionalist (pro-Young Turk) circles mentioned above proved helpful. Shi cite (as well as Sunnite) poets praised the Kaiser as a friend of all Muslims. 52 Sayyid Hibat al-Din al-Shahrastäni, a leading Shiite modernist," even produced a special fetwa, in 1915, concerning the friendship between the Muslims and the Germans. [Obviously he had not much to say about the Austrians]. It is doubtful whether this fetwa has ever been published in Iraq or elsewhere, but it may have been used, in Southern Iraq and in Iran, by German and pro-German Arab and Persian agents. However a German translation of the Persian text was made by Hellmut Ritter (at the time dragoman with the 6th Ottoman Army in Iraq and a friend of Shahrastäni's) " and published in Die Welt des Islams.55 According to an editorial note, the Persian original of the fetwa was kept at the University of Halle, where Carl Brockelmann com- pared it with Ritter's translation before the latter was printed in WI. Shahrastäni's argumentation starts from Koran 6o : 8-9. The two verses read, in English translation, as follows : 56 (8) God forbids you not, with regard to those who fight you not for (your) faith nor drive you out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them : For God loveth those who are just.
51 Ibid., pp. 31-33, and vol. II, 20-22. 52 CIzz al-Din (see note 40 above). 53 For biographical data see Tihräni: Nuqabei) al-bashar, vol. IV, pp. 1413- 18; Kirbäsi (see above note 36), pp. 411-17; Ja`far Hakadh d caraftuhum, vol. II, Baghdad 1968, pp. 193-212. 54 See his remarks in Der Islam 15/1926/109 note 1, and ibid., p. 308. 55 Vol. IV/1916/3-4/217-2o. 56 Quoted from Translation of the Meanings of the Holy Quran by Abdulla Yusuf Ali, presented by The Muslim World League, Mecca 1965. 70 W. ENDE
(9) God only forbids you, with regard to those who fight you for (your) faith, and drive you out of your homes, and support (others) in driving you out, from turning to them (for friendship and protection). It is such as turn to them (in these circumstances), that do wrong.
After a short coniment on the two verses of the Koran just mention- ed, 57 Shahrastani proceeds to enumerate a number of cases where Germany had shown her good intentions toward the Muslims : the Kaiser s visit to the tombs of both Salah al-Din [ incidentally, not a particularly popular figure in the collective memory of the Shi cites] 58 and Muhyi al-Din ibn al-`Arabi ; the release of the Muslim prisoners from the armies of the Allies rin fact only a few, mostly North Africans, had been released and sent to Istanbul to parade in the jihad-demonstrations there]; finally Germany s stand in favour of Turkey during the Balkan War. To Shahrastani s fetwa, a certain Muhammad al-Fdrisi added a commentary strongly confirming the author s statement. This commentary is also printed, in Ritter s translation, in Die Welt des Islams. 59 There is no further information about al-Farisi s identity. A contemporary Shiite scholar known by this name is mentioned in a number of bio-bibliographical dictionaries.60 With the material at my disposal, however, I am unable to prove that he is identical with the author of the commentary attached to Shahrastäni s fetwa. It is even possible that "Muhammad al-Farisi" is used as a pseudonym in this case.
57 Koran 9:4 could also have been quoted on this occasion, as had been done by the Ottoman Shaikh al-Islam in Istanbul, see Gehrke, op. cit., II, p. 20 f. note 58. Koran 9:4 is not mentioned, however, in the Shaikh al- Islam s first declaration of the jihad on November 14, 1914, see original text and German translation in Der Islam 5/1914/391-93, and also in F. v. Kraelitz- Greifenhorst: "Die Fetwa fiber den Heiligen Krieg", Osterreichische Zeit- schrift far den Orient (Vienna), 41/1915/19-21. See also G. Lewis: "The Otto- man Proclamation of Jihad in 1914", in Arabic and Islamic Garland. Histori- cal, Educational and Literary Studies presented to Abdul-Latif Tibawi ( . .), London 1977, pp. 159-65, and Ahmed Emin: Turkey in the World War, New Haven 1930, pp. 174-77 (a proclamation of the Sultan-"Caliph" and the religious dignitaries). 58 Salah al-Din s anti-Shiite measures in Egypt, especially the burning of Shiite theological works etc., is severely criticized even by modern Shi`ite authors, see, e.g., Muhammad Jawad Mughniya: al-shi`a wa-l- ltakimiln, 3rd. edition Beirut 1966, pp. 190-94. 59 Vol. IV, pp. 220-25. 60 See, e.g., (Awwdd (see note 17 above), vol.III (Baghdad 1969), p. 223. IRAQ IN WORLD WAR I 71
Sooner or later I hope to learn something more about this person and some others who appear, in a variety of sources, as participants in this strange, adventurous and—as seen from today s perspective —highly irresponsible "Holy War, made in Germany".61
61 For this label see C. Snouck Hurgronje in Verspreide Geschriften, III (Bonn and Leipzig 1923), pp. 257-84, and the comments of C. H. Becker in Islamstudien, II (Leipzig 1932), 281 ff.