KNOWING YOUR ALLIES:

Rise of Iraqi Shiites Threatens Iranian Theocrats: Abdolkarim Soroush, the Iranian scholar of Islam, is widely regarded, by critics and supporters alike, as “the Martin Luther of Islam.” His most important work is The Hermeneutical Expansion and Contraction of the Theory of Shariah. Soroush is director of the Research Institute for Human Science in Tehran and is currently a visiting professor at Princeton University, from where he spoke with NPQ editor Nathan Gardels. (NPQ, Spring 2004)

NPQ | If the Shiite majority under Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani comes to power in Iraq through direct elections, can we expect to see a regime closer to the theocrats in Iran under Ayatollah Ali Khameini, or more like the reformists under President Khatami seeking democratic legitimacy?

SOROUSH | I’m not sure that Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani is familiar with Khatami’s ideas completely, for example regarding constitutionalism. But, yes, he is a moderate in the sense that he has never made the point in any of his writings that clerics should have a divine right to rule, as Khomeini thought. Indeed, I don’t know of any grand ayatollah from Najaf who supports this idea of guardianship. This does not at all mean that they are “liberals” who would embrace the Western conception of secularism. These men want to see Islamic laws and customs observed in daily life.

These grand ayatollahs are not philosophers. They are scholars and jurists concerned with interpreting how religious law should be applied in the modern world. Their concerns are legalistic. That doesn’t make them illiberal either. I know that Ayatollah Ali Sistani did not take a position against my writings when they were presented to him. That, in itself, says a lot. He and the people around him are absolutely open, for example, to the education of women and promotion of women’s rights.

NPQ | If the Shiite majority under Ali al-Sistani comes to power, will that shift the overall balance among Shiites toward democratic legitimacy and away from the idea of clerical rule we see in Iran?

SOROUSH | Yes, I think so. One of the unintended consequences of the United States overthrow of Saddam and the wider influence of the Shiites in Iraq may well be to enhance the democratic prospects in Iran. Let us see.