First, to the Shi’i readers of this blog, عظم اللع اجوزكم بمصيبة ابا عبد اببه الحسين

Tomorrow is the holiest of Shi’i days, Ashura, the day on which in Shi’i Islam the grandson of the Prophet and the legitimate inheritor of his mantle was killed by the caliph Yazid on the banks of the river Euphrates. Its relevance to Shi’a today, at least in their perceptions (which is all that really matters when discussing issues of authority and law in the Shi’i paradigm) is immense, but the subject of another post. Today, I’ll discuss Shi’ism, but with respect to matters more related to the Iraqi state.

As reported in Buratha News a week ago, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani has issued a series of “directives” (irshadat) to his followers during the upcoming Shi’i holy day of Ashura (tomorrow) that I believe tells us much respecting the Grand Ayatollah’s latest thinking concerning the relationship of Islam, and Islamic law, to the state, its laws and its resources. As is typical for such directives, they appear in the form of a long laundry list, in this case consisting of 17 items, without much seeming to connect one directive to the other. Nonetheless, by focusing in particular on the issue of the relationship of Islam to the state, some conclusions may readily be drawn.

1. Muslims may not appropriate the state’s resources as their own.

This is directive six. While this seems logical enough, an extension of an Islamic prohibition against appropriating others’ property that finds its counterpart in just about every religious system, it is nonetheless significant because it grants some form of legitimacy to the state. If the state were an epiphenomenon from which the believer should be isolated, an illegitimate creation of the profane world that deserves no respect, then presumably the Grand Ayatollah would regard with some equanimity the misappropriation of state resources. He doesn’t seem to feel this way, the state does represent the people, and its resources are meant to protect them, and should not be taken from them.

2. It is an (ambiguous) religious duty for Muslims to follow at least some of the laws of the state.

Directive seven goes beyond mere recognition of the state’s legitimacy and seems to endorse its rulings in some capacity. It suggests that the people are “urged” to “implement the law and follow legal agencies since (lamma) they protect souls of the people, such as traffic laws, laws of public gardens, and others”. (My translation). Clearly this hardly seems to be a robust indication that the believers are to follow all of state law, as a more direct and comprehensive directive could have been issued respecting this. Laws against murder presumably do a better job of protecting people than traffic laws. Yet to issue a directive in this respect might seem awkward for the Grand Ayatollah—there are differing shari’a rules concerning murder (respecting standards of evidence, punishment, responsibility and the like) that would make it hard to endorse the state’s rules outright. That is not to say that the Grand Ayatollah sanctions murder, directive ten urges nonviolence and respect of the rights of other groups. However, his position on the state law on murder, relative to the religious rules, can be thought to be ambiguous. “Don’t kill” is different than “obey state rules on murder.”

Traffic, however, is another matter. Whether in the classical world or the modern, it feels administrative, managerial, absolutely necessary to be sure, but not something that depends as much on interpretation of holy text and more simply on the administration and management of some form of public order. This, to the Grand Ayatollah, best belongs to the state, and should not be interfered with by the scholars, and indeed deserves their support. This stands in marked contrast to the Iranian model of Shi’ism, where really the jurists are expected to control everything.

3. Render unto Caesar. . . .

It is clear in directive 11 that the Grand Ayatollah neither seeks nor wants government funding for his religious seminaries, and prefers absolute independence. This seems logical enough, quite simply, relative to the government, which is having trouble getting oil out of the ground, Sistani’s cash flow is constant and uninterrupted. It comes in the form of a Shi’i tithe known as the khums, derived from a Qur’anic verse that urges the believers to hand over to the Prophet one fifth of their “spoils”. Half go to the Prophet. The Shi’i jurists take a rather expansive view of this, suggesting it refers really to earnings beyond necessary expenses (it’s more complicated than this, but that’s a quick and easy definition), that the half of this is to be given to the Prophet’s descendants and other half to the Prophet’s chosen successor, currently the hidden Imam, who will reappear one day basically as the Messiah. But for now he is in hiding, the jurists say, and we act as his deputies until he chooses to reappear, so make the check out to us. That’s not to suggest the Grand Ayatollah is corrupt or uses the money for himself, every indication is that it is delivered to the seminaries and the poor, but as everyone knows, with money comes power and control, and it is impossible to suggest that the Grand Ayatollah does not know this even as he in all sincerity pores over the rules he believes God wills concerning payment of the khums. (Sunni scholars in the modern world, who have no similar institutional structure comparable to Shi’ism, more or less read the spoils refer to spoils gained in jihad and therefore effectively render it largely meaningless. They do their almsgiving through the institution of Zakat, which goes directly to the needy without a clerical intermediary. Those who discount these material factors on interpretation may be shocked to learn that Shi’ism’s clerical intermediaries read Zakat narrowly to refer to dates and camels and I don’t know what else so that we don’t really pay it, our alms are almost all khums. Those who think that perhaps interpretation does have something to do with preserving and maintaining current institutions won’t be as surprised).

So while the separation of tax money from religious alms, the same position as Christ in the New Testament, is laudable, it’s also sensible. Who the hell would take government money and then subject their vast financial network to government control and potential taxation in a country like Iraq, which can barely run itself?

4. The Marja’iyya’s Influence over government policy is that of a Lobby

Directive nine indicates that the government administers and manages itself and is not an instrument of the Grand Ayatollah and the other high clerics of Najaf (collectively, the Marja’iyya), nor does the marja’iyya interfere with it. Rather, the marja’iyya, when they see an “error” and believe that a memo from them might lead to “positive” results, they will issue that memo. All the while, the government is responsible for itself. Again, a respectable position, a secular one in many ways, one that limits the marja’iyya to an outside institution of influence, but also in Iraq’s context quite politically sensible. The marja’iyya has effectively given itself room to argue that it has influenced all that is good in Iraq, and may safely disavow all else. Ultimately it is only responsible for what it does.

5. The State, the Marja’iyya and the believers must work together to combat heresies.

Here the relationship is considerably subtler. The Grand Ayatollah is clearly concerned about heresies, and has designed his directives, as he often does, to ensure that the believers do not fall into heretical belief, or start to develop their own theories of religious law separate from those of the marja’iyya itself. Directive three indicates they should not rely on stories of the Prophet’s family not endorsed and explained by the scholars. Directive eight says that reliance on the people of knowledge is important in difficult times, and it is important to listen to the institutions of knowledge such as the marja’iyya when confusion arises. Clearly, the Grand Ayatollah does not suggest the government plays any role in this regard.

However, when opposition to Shi’ism arises that threatens it through violent means, the Grand Ayatollah expects particular and focused government support. For example, he urges the believers to cooperate with the government on issues relating to terrorism in directive eight, which, when juxtaposed against the other state laws where he expects believer cooperation with the state, traffic and public gardens, is quite striking. He has been outspoken about the necessity of the government using this to defeat terrorism. He clearly considers terrorism, Islamic inspired terrorism, to be a heresy and a threat to the Muslim institutions he leads and wants a concerted, cooperative, legal and religious effort to defeat it.

This kind of effort, however, extends beyond the groups that fall within the standard definitions of terrorism and does expect strong government action on smaller, less threatening groups than, say, Al Qaeda that are heretical to the standard brand of Shi’ism. For example, the Grand Ayatollah indicated two days ago, in a press release issued from Najaf, that “illegitimate” Shi’i Mahdist groups in particular needed to be confronted by the government more forcefully. The standard warnings applied, issued partly by him and partly by the Najaf mayor who met with him. These groups are armed (which means they are dangerous), they are funded from abroad (that helps limit their legitimacy), the Saddamists lead them (that’s even worse), and they are vicious.

In reality, while it is hard to know, these Mahdist groups, who apparently declare the Hidden Imam returned, hardly seem much of a threat in the broader context of Iraq, neither in funding or in numbers. I tend to discount reports of outside, Saddamist funding (it’s the Iraqi version of the more common Arab “it’s run by the Jews”—the convenient way to dismiss anything you don’t like in an anti-Semitic polity), and they certainly don’t seem to pop up often enough really to be on the same level of a physical, violent threat as AlQaeda. So what has the Grand Ayatollah so riled?

Again, consider the material factors. If the Mahdi has truly returned, then the institution of the marja’iyya is rendered pointless. Who needs the deputies when the sheriff is back? That’s not to suggest once again that the Grand Ayatollah would knowingly deny the reappearance of the Mahdi, clearly the man seems to believe in the return and I am sure believes when he does return, he, the Grand Ayatollah, will happily fade into irrelevance. But wouldn’t it also seem likely that someone who would lose any relevance and influence, and whose institution depends on a Hidden Imam, not a Returned One, be a bit quicker to dismiss claims as false, and a bit more aggressive in cracking down on such false claims when they carry with them threats of violence? Isn’t that only natural? And wouldn’t he expect the state to do the same, partly to ensure public safety, but also to ensure the continued predominance of the existing order of things? It is not as if he is objecting, after all, to the far more numerous and better armed militias that support him, or those of the Kurds who provide no threat to him or his followers. Just something to consider.

What interesting, Islamic times we live in.

HAH