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Nadir Shah and the Ja'fari Madhhab Reconsidered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Ernest Tucker
Ernest Tucker*
Affiliation:
History Department, U.S. Naval Academy
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Extract

In less than twenty years, Nadir Shah built an empire across Iran, India, and Central Asia. When he took the throne on the Mughan steppe in 1148/1736, Nadir confronted the problem of how to legitimize his reign after two centuries of Shi'i Safavid rule. He attempted to solve this problem, in part, by challenging Iran's Twelver Shi'i identity.

Nadir proposed to the Ottomans that Twelver Shi'ism be considered a fifth school of Sunni Islam, to be called the Ja'fari madhhab after the sixth Imam, Ja'far al-Sadiq. In exchange for Shi'i renunciation of such practices as sabb (the ritual cursing of the first three caliphs), Nadir proposed that the Ottomans give this Ja'fari madhhab all the privileges enjoyed by the four Sunni schools, and that a fifth pillar be erected in the Ka'bah in Mecca to commemorate it. He asked that the Ottomans allow him to appoint the leader of the annual ḥajj caravan from Iran.

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Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 27 , Issue 1-4: Religion and Society in Islamic Iran during the Pre-Modern Era , 1994 , pp. 163 - 179
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1994

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References

1. The terms “Shi'i” and “Shi'ism,” as used in this essay, refer only to Twelver Shi'is and Twelver Shi'ism.

2. The phrase madhhab-i ja'farī has long been used to refer to Twelver Shi'ism. Ja'far al-Sadiq is regarded by Shi'is as one of the foremost scholars of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence). See Encyclopedia of Islam, 2nd ed., s.v. “DJA'FAR AL-SADIK.”

3. The Ja'fari madhhab excluded those aspects of Shi'i law (fiqh) which were abhorrent to Sunnis, such as temporary marriage (mut'ah), but retained the details of the systematic application of Shi'i jurisprudence (furū'āt-i shar'īyah) that were not offensive to them.

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18. Ibid., 154r.

19. Ibid., 156r.

20. See the text of this document in Quddusi, Muhammad Husayn, Nādirnāmah (Mashhad: Chapkhanah-yi Khurasan, 1339 Sh./1960), 540Google Scholar.

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22. “Nigīn-i dawlat u dīn raftah būd chun az jā/bi-nām-i Nādir Īrān qarār dād khudā 1148 [1736]” (ibid., 52).

23. See Malayiri's, Muhammad summary of Hazin's account in Nādir Shāh (Tehran: Intisharat-i Bunyad, 1357 Sh./1978), 153Google Scholar.

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25. Lockhart, Nadir Shah, 197Google Scholar, 233, n. 1. Nadir also visited the tomb of Abu Hanifah during his 1156/1743 Iraqi campaign, perhaps as a gesture to both the Ottomans and his Sunni followers.

26. For a list of the gifts he sent them, see Nava'i, Nādir Shāh, 303–4Google Scholar.

27. Arşivi, Başbakanlik, Istanbul, Mühimme defteri 142: 227Google Scholar, 243.

28. Husayn al-Suwaydi, ‘Abdullah b., al-Ḥujaj al-qaṭ'īyah li-ittifāq al-firaq alIslāmīyah (Cairo: al-Matba'ah al-Halabiyah, 1905)Google Scholar.

29. Ibid., 5.

30. Ibid., 11.

31. Ibid., 17, quoting Qur'an 5:58.

32. Al-Suwaydi, al-Ḥujaj al-qaṭ'iyah, 18–20Google Scholar. Al-Suwaydi included a detailed list of the participants, who represented the major ulama of Iran, Afghanistan, and Transoxiana. Of the Iranian participants, only one, Sayyid Ahmad of Ardalan, was a Sunni. Like al-Suwaydi, he was a Shafi'i.

33. Ibid., 19–20.

34. Ibid., 19.

35. Ibid., 20. This statement contradicted ‘Ali Akbar's earlier assertions about Muhammad's designation of ‘Ali as his successor (see above).

36. Ibid. Moojan Momen observes that the Akhbari school of Shi'i theology adopted an “almost-Ash'ari” approach to theology, so ‘Ali Akbar's statement might be evidence of an Akhbari orientation among some of Nadir's ulama. See Momen, An Introduction to Shi'i Islam (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985), 222Google Scholar.

37. Al-Suwaydi, al-Ḥujaj al-qaṭ'īyah, 21Google Scholar.

38. Ibid., 20–21.

39. Ibid., 23–5. A more complete Persian version of the Najaf document appears in Khan, Mahdi, Tārīkh, 388–94Google Scholar. Another complete version of the text can be found in Iqbal, ‘Abbas, “Vaīqah-yi ittiḥād-i Islām-i Nādirī,” Yādgār 6 (1326 Sh.,/1947): 43–55Google Scholar.

40. Al-Suwaydi, al-Ḥujaj al-qaṭ'īyah, 22Google Scholar; Khan, Mahdi, Tārīkh, 392Google Scholar; Iqbal, “Vaīqah,” 52Google Scholar.

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42. It is said that the same words were used by a woman to insult the Umayyad governor of Iraq, al-Hajjaj b. Yusuf (41–95/661–714), but that she was spared when he interpreted them with their positive meaning. Al-qāsiṭūn was also used to refer to the followers of Mu'awiyah at the battle of Siffin (37/657). See Lane, E. W., Arabic-English Lexicon, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1984)Google Scholar, 1975, 2523.

43. Al-Suwaydi, al-Ḥujaj al-qaṭ'īyah, 24Google Scholar.

44. Ibid., 27.

45. Ibid., 28.

46. Ibid.

47. Khan, Mahdi, Tārīkh, 418Google Scholar.

48. For the text of the Treaty of Erzurum, which in fact explicitly stated that its basis was the 1159/1746 treaty, see Hurewitz, J. C., The Middle East and North Africa in World Politics, 3 vols. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1975), 1:219–21Google Scholar.

49. See, for example, Shahrukh's coins, which resumed the Safavid practice of including the names of the Twelve Imams (Rabino, Coins, 55–6Google Scholar).

50. Efendi, Tanburi Arutin, Tahmas Kulu Han'in Tevarihi, ed. Uras, Esat (Ankara: Turk Tarih Kurumu Basimevi, 1942), 43–6Google Scholar.

51. Ibid., 44.

52. Marvi, Muhammad Kazim, Tārīkh-i ‘ālam-ārā-yi Nādirī, ed. Riyahi, Muhammad Amin, 3 vols. (Tehran: Naqsh-i Jahan, 1364 Sh./1985), 982Google Scholar.

53. For an analysis of Marvi's view of Nadir's relationship to the Safavids, see Ernest Tucker, “Explaining Nadir Shah: Kingship and Royal Legitimacy in Muhammad Kazim Marvi's Tārīkh-i ‘ālam-ārā-yi Nādirī,” Iranian Studies 26, nos. 1–2 (1993): 95–115.

54. Kirimli Rahim Efendi, Sefaretname-i Kesriyeli Ahmet Paşa, MS Topkapi Sarayi Kütüphanesi Hazinesi 1635.

55. For a recent Persian translation and discussion of this work, see Riyahi, Muhammad Amin, Safāratnāmahhā-yi Īrān (Tehran: Tus, 1368 Sh./1989)Google Scholar,

56. Efendi, Rahim, Sefaretname, 44r–44vGoogle Scholar.

57. Mar'ashi Safavi, Mirza Khalil, Majma’ al-tawārīkh, ed. Iqbal, ‘Abbas (Tehran: Tahuri, 1362 Sh./1984), 84Google Scholar.

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