Asadullah Mamaghani

Sheikh Asadullah Mamaghani (Persian: اسدالله ممقانی or اسدالله مامقانی; sometimes transliterated Mamqani) was an anti-royalist Persian jurist and clergyman, who helped theorize the relationship between the Pahlavi state and religious leaders.^[1][2]

Life

Asadullah Mamaghani was born in 1881 in Mamqan, and first learned Arab and Persian literature in Tabriz. Following the 1908 bombardment of the Majlis, Mamaghani left for Najaf, where he became one of the foremost disciples of Mohammad-Kazem Khorasani,^[3] eventually representing the Najafi exiles in Anjuman Sa'adat.^[2]

At the close of World War I, Mamaghani returned to Iran and was immediately offered a position in the Supreme Court, but declined to complete his legal education in Istanbul. He later served as Minister of Justice in the Sa'ed cabinet, after which he was appointed to the Supreme Court.^[4]

Philosophy

Mamaghani is known for his clever and innovative theories of Shia jurisprudence. He may be the second generation of Muslim intellectuals to pioneer in the field of religion and state in Iran.^[5] Mamaghani challenged conventional wisdom on theories of establishment,^[6] arguing that disagreement between the secular power and the (Shia) clerics necessarily leads to popular disaffection and rebellion.^[7]

References

1. rasekhoon. Asadullah Mamaghani.
2. Memoirs of Hibatuddin Shahrestani, excerpted by (banned) Iranian reformist magazine Mehrnameh and archived by the Wayback Machine (in Persian).
3. noormags. Part of the statement of Mr. Sheikh Asadullah Mamaghani.
4. tebyan. life of Haj Sheikh Asadullah Mamaghani. Archived from the original on 2017-02-15. Retrieved 2016-02-12.
5. icnc. Bibliographic information.
6. Ashkuri, Youssef Hassan [حسن یوسفی اشکوری] (February 29, 1392). روشنفکران دینی و سکولاریسم در ایران: گزارشی مختصر و اجمالی از افکار و آرای روشنفکران مسلمان و نواندیشان دینی ایران معاصر. [Religious intellectuals and Iranian secularism: Briefly surveying the thoughts and opinions of contemporary Iranian Muslim intellectuals and religious thinkers]. Thought [اندیشه] > Theology [دینیسیاسی]. Rahesabz (in Persian). Archived from the original on 24 Sep 2015.
7. "شیخ اسدالله ممقانی تئوریسین تعامل روحانیت و دولت" [Sheikh Asadullah Momqani, a theorist of clergy-government relations]. Modern Citizen [شهروند امروز].