Rereading and interpreting the ideas of leading Muslim thinkers
Ebrahim Barzegar; Sajad Khodaei
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
Hadi Salehi
Abstract
Although the concept of alienation has been explained within a broadly shared semantic framework across diverse intellectual traditions, it remains ontologically plural and contested with respect to its nature and meaning. Nevertheless, thinkers have repeatedly mobilized alienation to critique existing ...
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Although the concept of alienation has been explained within a broadly shared semantic framework across diverse intellectual traditions, it remains ontologically plural and contested with respect to its nature and meaning. Nevertheless, thinkers have repeatedly mobilized alienation to critique existing realities and to articulate alternative, desirable social conditions. Whether the criticized condition is understood as emerging from a material contradiction between social classes or groups, or as a primarily discursive formation, largely determines whether alienation is theorized on an idealist or materialist basis. In general, Søren Kierkegaard, G. W. F. Hegel, Ludwig Feuerbach, Max Stirner, and several nihilist and existentialist thinkers (e.g., Friedrich Nietzsche and Jean-Paul Sartre) have addressed alienation primarily within an idealist register. By contrast, Karl Marx and Frantz Fanon have employed the concept in materialist analyses. Among Iranian revolutionary thinkers, Ali Shariati makes extensive use of alienation. This study argues that Shariati’s treatment of alienation integrates both idealist and materialist dimensions. At times, however, methodological ambiguities in his work contribute to conceptual confusion or, at minimum, reduce the theoretical coherence of his definitions. Shariati’s materialist dimension is most visible in his analysis of cultural alienation and assimilation into foreign culture—an emphasis that may reflect the perceived clarity of antagonism between “native” and “foreign” cultural formations, reinforced by discourses of dependency, self-sufficiency, and “return to the self.” By contrast, class-based and intra-societal material antagonisms appear more ambiguous in Shariati’s context, given the incomplete formation of class structures and civil society in contemporary Iran. It is in this domain that Shariati’s account tends to assume a more idealist form.
Comparative study of Islamic and non-Islamic thinkers
Alireza Kowsarnia; Hosein Haj Mohamadi
Abstract
The relationship between culture and social structure has long been a central debate in sociology: Do social conditions generate culture, or does culture itself drive structural transformation? Some scholars regard culture as the outcome of structure, while others emphasize its transformative role. Robert ...
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The relationship between culture and social structure has long been a central debate in sociology: Do social conditions generate culture, or does culture itself drive structural transformation? Some scholars regard culture as the outcome of structure, while others emphasize its transformative role. Robert Wuthnow, adopting an objective approach, treats culture not as a subjective phenomenon but as a tangible and observable product. He explains the connection between ideology and structure within a theoretical framework, though structural factors tend to dominate despite his attention to human agency and the concept of “moral order.” In contrast, Ali Shariati conceptualizes the culture–structure relationship as reciprocal and dialectical. While acknowledging the influence of structure on culture, he also emphasizes culture’s capacity to reshape structure. This article analyzes Wuthnow’s cultural theory and critiques it from the perspective of Shariati’s dialectical thought, demonstrating that although Wuthnow attempts to transcend reductionist explanations, his theory ultimately leans toward structural determinism. Shariati, by contrast, offers a more comprehensive interpretation of the mutual interaction between culture and structure.
Rereading and interpreting the ideas of leading Muslim thinkers
mohammad sadegh kolbadi; Seyed Hosein Nabavi; reza azimi
Abstract
After the first encounters of Iranian with the west and their familiarity with the westerns governing and their astonishment at science progress there, Iranian lagging behind from the west was become a certain issue for our country thinkers and intellectuals and also it continues yet. In order to solve ...
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After the first encounters of Iranian with the west and their familiarity with the westerns governing and their astonishment at science progress there, Iranian lagging behind from the west was become a certain issue for our country thinkers and intellectuals and also it continues yet. In order to solve the concept of Iranian historical decline and their backwardness from the west, Ali Shariati and Abdolkarim Soroush views as two most influential Iranian intellectuals was used in this research. Indeed, they were chosen since both of them are two most prominent thinkers who belongs to different social conditions before and after the Iranians Islamic revolution respectively. Therefore, compare of their ideas about the reasons of Iran’s civilization decline and backwardness from the west would lead to better perception of the mentioned issue. For this purpose, the qualitative content analysis was utilized. According to the results, Shariati believed that stupefication or estehmar (it is an innovation concept by Shariati) is the most mainly reason of the Iranian historical decline and backwardness and also the solution is reform of both agency and structure by return to noble Islamic ideology. In addition, Soroush is of the opinion that lack of experimental sciences growth, lack of concept of right, despotism and colonialism as well are mainly reasons of Iranian historical decline and backwardness. Furthermore, his opinion is way of development passes through the scientific development. Moreover, both of them believed that religion is not cause of either the development or backwardness instinctively. Although Shariati believed that there is a potential in religion which could be helpful to reform Iranian society. Conversely Soroush believes that, in general, religion is not able to provide all human beings worldly needs. so he has suggested empirical science against the discourse of returning to Islamic ideology for Iranian society development.
