Rereading and interpreting the ideas of leading Muslim thinkers
Sajad Khodaei; Ebrahim Barzegar
Abstract
Ali Shariati is one of the influential thinkers in the contemporary history of Iran and the Islamic world. Considering the social and political circumstances of his time, he sought to redefine Islamic concepts in a way that addressed the needs of society. Serat (the path), a central metaphor in the intellectual ...
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Ali Shariati is one of the influential thinkers in the contemporary history of Iran and the Islamic world. Considering the social and political circumstances of his time, he sought to redefine Islamic concepts in a way that addressed the needs of society. Serat (the path), a central metaphor in the intellectual framework of Muslim thinkers, also holds a pivotal role in Shariati’s thought. This research seeks to answer the core question: "What role does Serat play in the political language and thought of Ali Shariati?" This study endeavors to present a new formulation of his thought by employing the metaphor of Serat as the source domain and political thought as the target domain. Through an analysis of Shariati’s ideas, we conclude that he conceptualized various concepts—such as religion, movement and institution, intellectuals, Alavid Shiism and Safavid Shiism, and others—as manifestations of Serat. By utilizing these concepts, a comprehensive analytical framework and ten foundational pillars rooted in the Serat metaphor have been extracted from Shariati’s political thought. This research adopts a qualitative content analysis methodology, enabling a deep examination of texts, identification of thematic parallels, and systematic evaluation of key terms to arrive at a structured analysis of his ideas within the domain of Serat.
Rereading and interpreting the ideas of leading Muslim thinkers
Tahereh Sharif; Ebrahim Barzegar; MohammadBagher Khorramshad,; Nafisesadat Ghaderi
Abstract
Civil friendship among human beings is a noble virtue, a prerequisite for human flourishing, and a defining characteristic present since the dawn of history. As Carl Schmitt asserts, the essence of politics lies in the friend-enemy distinction, inherently inciting conflict. In recent centuries, discourses ...
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Civil friendship among human beings is a noble virtue, a prerequisite for human flourishing, and a defining characteristic present since the dawn of history. As Carl Schmitt asserts, the essence of politics lies in the friend-enemy distinction, inherently inciting conflict. In recent centuries, discourses of hostility have expanded within the Islamic world, with movements such as Wahhabism and jihadist-takfiri factions exemplifying this tendency. Given that conflict appears foundational and that one of the main responsibilities of politics is conflict resolution through friendship, this study aims to conceptualize and advance the idea of a "politics of friendship" in Iran and across Muslim societies. To this end, the thought of Khwaja Nasir al-Din Tusi—an influential thinker from the Islamic Golden Age—is revisited. Tusi emphasized love in political thought, considering it superior to justice, and offering great potential for grounding a politics of friendship. The findings suggest that Tusi's political philosophy can be adapted to contemporary contexts through a theoretical model of political and civil friendship. This model incorporates insights from Western thinkers such as Hannah Arendt and Jacques Derrida, as well as elements from the thought of Imam Khomeini.
